I have to get back to the guy who wrote me first about using QR Codes in philippine comics.

As now even Tyler Brûlés new Monocle starts a comic with QR Codes. And apparently Monocle will make a QR research. Sugoi!

In other news, I managed to slip a QR code into our manga for issue 03 - fun! Sneak preview:


image: Dan Hill's City of Sound

Hopefully a lot more of that kind of action to follow. Next week, off to Osaka and Tokyo with Tyler to explore this and more.

We are happy to partner with IMD and Agence Trio for this QR Code operation:

Today, 35,000 top managers around the world will be receiving a personalised postcard inviting them to join an IMD programme. The “QR code” has arrived for an avant-gardist expression in phase with the mission of one of the best business schools in the world!

The “Quick Response code”, a new technology from Japan, makes it possible to stock information in the form of a bar code. Click, photograph it with your mobile telephone and you have the path to success in the palm of your hand. And when one is fond of Swiss imagery, it is true that a pixel says more that a thousand words.

Keep a step ahead of the trend by downloading the Kaywa reader then photographing the “QR code” on screen.

See also:
Go to www.imd.ch/qr_code for the lastest in management ... and technology.
Agence Trio: un QR code pour promouvoir l’IMD

High-Tech Ads Go Big (Ask Boston)

"Mobile will play an increasingly important role," says Wayne Ruttle, vice president of sales for Adflow Networks, a company that develops digital signage and interactive kiosks. "While consumers can already send a text message to a number listed on a billboard and have information or coupons sent to them, mobile offers lots of other possibilities."

One of these is QR codes, multidimensional bar codes that are already being used in Japanese advertising, thanks to code-reading software embedded in camera phones there. "Consumers in Japan read ads, then snap a photo of a code at the bottom of the page to get all kinds of additional information," says Vedrashko. "It's very cool."

We all know that the mobile internet will thrive if prices come down. Flatrates (as we know them from the PC/Mac internet) are obviously how this is gonna end up.
And most probably we'll see bundled flatrates which not only include mobile, but rather the other way around they will include things we do not longer use that much (TV, PC-Internet, Fixnet Telephony) and by packing them in a bundled flatrate, subsidize them.

Update from March 18: I didn't see it coming so quickly. Cablecom (Part of Liberty Global Inc) announced today, that they start with flatrate fixnet telephony. The monthly price here in Switzerland is CHF 20.- respectively 23.-.

The misconception that operators want to increase data traffic because SMS is coming down and MMS didn't get off yet, is a common one. Yes, they want to increase data traffic with today's high prices, but they are not so happy to come down with the price just because more people are using the mobile internet - there is not much profit in this scenario. That the japanese operators came down with the data traffic price had a lot to do with substantial earnings through other (walled garden) services they provided.

That's what was coming to my mind, when reading Any other flatrate data plans besides X-series and Web'n'walk?, and especially this part from Eduardo:

The reason why operators are so not into data is not only due one point but a combination of the ones you listed:

1. Per MB model gives revenue, which shareholders love.
2. Data requires high capacity at nodes, which increases costs by a lot.
3. (my favorite) The internet needs the hyperconnectivity heaven mobile operators can provide but at the same time the internet is the armageddon of the mobile voice operators for the obvious reasons we all know.

Just for fun:
In China we care for your mobile;)

Moritz Leuenberger, Federal Councillor and Head of the Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications opened a blog at blueblog today (not to be confonded with bleublog).

He is most probably the first statesman to be reachable via a QR Code.



PS: In Switzerland you can send also an SMS to 202 with QR 2021300493 to get the link for Moritz Leuenberger's blog. (CHF 0.20)


The rules of Moritz Leuenberger's blog can be found here.

After our first successful Mobile Marketing Seminar about SMS and MMS, there is now the second part on March 29th about Mobile Tags.
As in the first part André März (Ringier AG), Howie Sennhauser (MNC Alcatel-Lucent) and myself will guide you through this topic from 10:00 to 16:30.
Regular readers of the QR, Datamatrix category of this blog will already have some insights.

Seminar description
In Japan already established since 2003, Mobile Tags now also arrive in the West. Mobile Tagging uses the camera phone as a barcode scanner and connects in a simple way print and the web.
The potential of Mobile Tagging for the mobile internet could even be more important then the now ubiquitous SMS.



After a theoretical part with examples, there is also a workshop part in the afternoon.
At the end of the seminar you should have all the knowledge to start a Mobile Tag campaign.

Themes
- Mobile Tag Readers (Differences between Handsets)
- All the different sorts of Barcodes (EAN, QR Code, Datamatrix, proprietory formats)
- Differences: Japan - Europe, USA
- Mobile Tags in comparison to RFID and NFC as well as picture-based scanning
- Where to put mobile Tags (Newspaper, Posters, Billboards, Places, Food and Goods, Television, the Web etc)
- Mobile Marketing Possibilities with Mobile Tags
- Costs

If you want to book, go directly to SMI (Ringier).

PS: The seminar language is german.

Swetake writes: How to create a QR Code

The below figure is a structure of QRcode model2 version 1.
In the below figure,white or black parts are fixed in specification.
They are "finder pattern" and "timing pattern".
"Finder pattern" is used to help detection a position of QRcode in decoder application.
"Timing pattern" is used to help determine a symbol's coordinate in decoder application.

In yellow color parts,encoded data (including error correct code) are stored.
And in cyan color parts,information of error correcting level and mask pattern(described later) are stored.This is called format information




■encoded data (including error correct code)
■format information

In addition, version2 or higher has "alignment pattern" which is used to correct skewness in decoder application.
And version 7 or higher has "version information" which has information of version itself.

Recently I got an email from CNN in London to blogvertise their new wap site. If I surf the blogosphere it looks that I am not the only one as I saw several more or less identical posts about the CNNMobile launch. Interesting move from CNN and it looks like a successful one too.
(As a side note: The IntheField part of the wap site, it is mentioned, is written by CNN Bloggers covering the globe.)

Now all words and pictures aren't comparable to the real experience - so here is the QR Code to access the mobile site directly:



In Switzerland, you can also send an SMS to 202 with QR 202071002 to get the link back. (CHF 0.20)

***

I for myself didn't have yet the time to browse it thouroughfully - on first sight it looked pretty ok -, I just went on the main page and then directly to that Lexus (image) ad. There were two big pictures first and then quite some text about the Lexus Hybrid Drive. At the end there was a link to www.lexus.eu. As soon as I clicked the link I was however no longer on a mobile site and I found myself scrolling through a lot of white screen. Not yet convincing, the mobile ad.

News from February 08, 2007 (JAPAN: [Science-Asia] #40, February 2007*) :
100 Million Phone Users:

The number of subscriptions for mobile phone services in Japan exceeded the 100 million mark for the first time, meaning the vast majority of Japanese now carry cellular phones.
Japan's population is around 128 million. The proliferation of mobile phones has been boosted by the popularity of a wide range of handset services, including Internet connection and music downloading, according to industry observers.

Speed:

5 Gbps Mobile Phone Data Transmission Rate
(February 10, 2007)
NTT DoCoMo Inc. successfully transmitted data at rates as high as five gigabits per second in tests of its technology for fourth-generation mobile phones. To achieve the fast speed, DoCoMo utilized 12 antennas and modified the signal-processing technology used for data reception. With a 4G handset, a two-hour movie that now takes more than two hours to download with the latest 3.5G service could be gotten in just around six seconds.
Downloads are so fast that all of the handset's data could be stored in a data center and downloaded as needed.

and Innovation:

Business Opportunities In Mobile Phone Tech
(February 26, 2007)
The dramatic advancement in the technical capabilities of cellular phones has opened the door to a wide range of new business opportunities for venture companies. According to the Nomura Research Institute, the market for development services for cell phone-based systems will expand to more than 1.7 trillion yen by 2010. Online shopping and content distribution are hardly the only services that can be provided for cell phone users. A vast frontier beckons for companies with original ideas and the ability to quickly turn their concepts into innovative products and services.

*If you wish to receive more detailed information, feel free to contact Felix Moesner,
Science & Technology Attaché, at the Swiss Science & Technology Office in Tokyo.

The Moji-Q-Meekaa (文字Qメーカー) is a very nice service as it lets you integrate easily some writing in the QR Code.

See also our Marco's Color Matters! which lets you create colored QR Codes as well as PDF's.


See also (not my cup of tea though):
Colorful QR Codes