Jukka Eklund - jukka [at] s60.com
2007-02-08 20:03:16

Good points. But don't you should also ask this question: which 2D barcode is "IPR safe"?

DM is safe, but QR could be potentially at risk if DensoWave decides not to give their IPR for free someday.

Roger
2007-02-11 23:48:30

Good point Jukka.
First if that would be the case it would certainly be very badly perceived in Japan first and I guess the time to do it has passed. Denso aka Toyota has never ever mentioned to change their current approach, rather on the contrary - as they want to make MicroQR now as open as the current QR Code.

Second, I don't think Denso would do that as a quick shift to Datamatrix would then ensue (something similar to the GIF case). But it's certainly good to continue by supporting both - DM and QR Code.

Or do you have any other inside knowledge that would contradict this?

Todd - tmalan [at] ofii.org
2007-02-14 13:39:35

Roger: Really very interesting and ratinonal list. Two thoughts: QR is still limited in terms of working reliably with the optics of camera phones. Also, I dont think that the "presumption of QR" is finalized yet. Check out what SMART is doing in the Philippines with Nextcode's mCode and ConnexTo. This local blog does a nice job of discussing the utiltity: http://www.chette.com/main/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=99&Itemid=1&pop=1&page=0#thecomments

Roger
2007-02-15 00:18:54

Hi Todd,
I think ConnexTo's Reader is really great, I guess it's the best proprietory code I've seen so far. I tested it on my Nokia 6670 some time ago and tested the examples via your link again.

The code itself with it's changing shapes is a bit more a problem. And I am not sure if the code works well in a newspaper.I could imagine that the tiny dots are encountering some problems then. And what about code stamps? But as I haven't tried it out, I really don't know. ConnexTo has to show that this is not a problem.

Have you on the other hand tried out the Kaywa Reader, especially on a Symbian phone? I think it works very nicely too, you don't even have to push a button to scan.

Why I still believe the QR Code is better off? First because our phones will soon be as good as the japanese ones - Nokia's N80 is showing the way and in Japan nobody ever complained about QR Code. And they are so small now (check the latest Softbank catalogue as an example).

Second and most importantly only an interoperable open code has in a situation of countless companies with proprietory codes the potential to become global.

Tim Berners-Lee said some very important things at 3GSM. I think they fully apply to 2D Barcodes:

How does a company think about standards then if following them may involve losing that short-term ceiling technology return?

It is a game. In the mathematical sense. Here is the payoff matrix: You commit to working on a standard, or not. The standard may take off or it may not.

If you don't commit to the standard, and it doesn't work, (which of course it won't if no one else does) then life, and your proprietary ceiling technology, continues. No innovation.

If you do commit to it and it it does work, then a whole new market is enabled: This is the disruptive case. There is some effort involved moving the company to the standard, and often to help build the standard. You might join W3C to help make it happen. A certain amount of effort. There is a major long term return.

One of the most difficult things for some companies to learn is that this is not a zero-sum game. We are so used to battling over a fixed market, or battling over fixed resources, that we tend to assume everything is such that we can only win what our competitors lose. But when we make a whole new market space, like the Web, or like GSM actually, then we are in fact together battling the human condition such as inefficiency, poverty and ignorance.

Now, what about the corner cases? The fear seems to be of going for the standard and it not taking off. Well, the loss in this case is the engineering time to tool up for the standard, which could have been saved. But is a very finite loss.

On the other hand, what if you decide not to go for the standard and it does take off? Everything happens, the new market appears, and you are not there. The pace of everything ramps up dramatically, and you are left standing still. The costs of retooling to a standard get much bigger as time passes. In this conference we all can see the stresses on phone companies, and we know the dis-empowerment of all travelers from the fact that the GSM standards and frequencies are not quite global — and we know the benefits from the fact that are becoming so. Other cases spring to mind. On the Internet, for example, streaming media are available in many incompatible formats.

Often this is due to companies wanting to profit from ceiling technologies. This involves making a high income from the technology itself rather than letting its take off. This in turn requires patents, and of course that the owned technology dominates. Hence the battles over VHS and Betamax, HD DVD and Blu-Ray, and so on.

So as the Web platform and the mobile phone converge — what do we want the result to be a foundation or a ceiling technology? Clearly, a foundation. A mobile phone — or whatever device we carry around which uses GSM technology and its successors — is going to be everywhere, and everyone will have one. It has do be designed to be universal. So that everyone can use it. So that you can do anything with it.

The choice is the new platform being a privately owned walled garden, or a competitive open platform. Both models can work in the medium term. But the open model opens up new things which we can only try to imagine.

I have nothing to add to that.


PS: One question: Do you know why the SMS doesn't integrate the number to send it to. Is this just for demo that it is left out?