Comments on: Forget QR codes: Your touchscreen can “read” this ink

By: Colin

Colin — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 07:03:49 +0000

“Imagine tapping a printed card in Starbucks to your handset for a direct download of the tune currently playing.”

LOL — are they only playing 1 song, or is there a printed flip-book that you have to flick through to find the title of the song, then tap your device :P

A better solution would be a QR code linked to the HiFi system in Starbucks — if Apple was a partner maybe they would use iTunes as a player show a QR code of the iTunes store link on an LCD display and you can point your phone camera at it… that’s elegant!

Also “I think Touchcode is ingenious because it directly bridges the physical and digital worlds with a medium that’s been used for thousands of years: Ink. The products looks no different than any printed medium today. And they gain the extra characteristic of working with a capacitive touch screen.”

What! Bridge something that’s thousands of years old but rely upon contact and the new technology of a Touch Screen.

More ingenious is using ordinary ink and an ordinary camera!

Pft… you must be an investor to think this idea warrants a comment like “forget QR codes!” — I thought you were going to talk about OCR of the human readable URL, like Google Goggles :P

Nice try at making this sound like a good idea…

By: Craig

Craig — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 18:54:12 +0000

This doesn’t require any of those things. It only uses your capacitive screen (touchscreen), which interacts with the ink on the paper/packaging. The ink is like your finger interacting with your touchscreen. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitive_sensing

By: Dean Collins

Dean Collins — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 14:58:22 +0000

Gina, Blaming clunky landing pages on QR codes would be like blaming the internet for Geocities….

Its not a fault of the technology….

By: Gina Danner

Gina Danner — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 12:47:30 +0000

Intresting… I wonder if the surface comes too close to an electrical or magnetic source does it scramble, much like a putting your hotel key card in the same pocket as your cell phone. Plus, how does a user know that the image has this embedded technology.

QR Codes are getting closer to universal adoption — still somewhat clunky, but they are coming along. I regularly see people of all ages scanning and discussing. The biggest problem for QR Codes is the crummy landing pages / user experience they too often lead to. Come on marketers, get your act together here!

By: Dean Collins

Dean Collins — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 12:14:20 +0000

dumb dumb dumb.

i cant stress how poor image recognition works with real world use.

the reason this is a fail comes down to door knobs. yep thats right door knobs.

when was the last time someone showed you “how to use” a door you hadn’t seen used before? that’s right you don’t, you see a door knob and you know what the UX will be.

The issue with image recognition is unless you can guarantee every print/object/surface in the world is linked to your database when people pull out their scanner and it doesn’t work a few times they are going to feel like idiots.

People understand the “practice” of using QR codes, pull out phone/scan/get result – same as door knobs.

Cheers,
Dean

By: napkkin

napkkin — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:55:52 +0000

What’s the cost difference of this technology VS regular printing? At least you can print QR codes cheaply…

By: napkkin

napkkin — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:54:39 +0000

Also, what’s the cost of printing these special codes on paper VS using regular, non-interactive ink? QR codes have the advantage of being cheaply printable

By: FarmerBob

FarmerBob — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 17:14:43 +0000

But QR Codes are very diverse, easy to use and free.

By: Tom Desmet

Tom Desmet — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 08:40:00 +0000

“These all require cameras”…. I guess any smartphone with touchscreen has a camaray right?

By: Stuart

Stuart — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 01:20:41 +0000

I don’t want anything rubbing against my phone screen if I can help it. It can smudge, scrape or scratch and i don’t see people putting their expensive phones screens on some public surface that could damage it.