The Fair Tracing Project

“Join the dots: camera phones to decode new ad widget”

“Next week’s DVD release of the zombie-flick 28 Weeks Later will bring a revolutionary marketing widget, widely used in Japan, to the UK for the first time.

The film poster contains a square box full of black and white dots known as a QR – quick response – code. It contains information that can be decoded by the camera on a mobile phone with the right software installed. A huge poster showing nothing but a QR code has already gone up in London’s Shoreditch to advertise the DVD.

These “bar codes” are widely used in Japan to store everything from web addresses and phone numbers to product details. Rather than laboriously typing in a person’s phone number or an internet address into a phone, these codes give one-touch access to a wealth of information that can then be stored on a phone. Rather than laboriously typing in a person’s phone number or an internet address into a phone, these codes give one-touch access to a wealth of information that can then be stored on a phone.”

To read the full story that appeared in The Guardian on 5 September 2007, click on the link above.