In the first two articles we looked at the history of scanning barcodes with your mobile phone, newspaper print ads, and a new effort to bring barcodes to web printouts. Now we'll look at other uses of the technology including scanning products in store, scanning broadcast media, and even exchanging contact information with others through the use of barcodes.

Things You Can Do Today

To get you excited about the promise of what barcoding can bring, we'll take a look at what you can do with barcodes today as well as some of the industry trends. Since barcoding is still new to the U.S., this may be old news to some of our international visitors, but bear with us...we're trying to catch up here!

1) Tag The World With Wikis

Instead of waiting for someone else to provide barcodes for you to scan, you can get involved with Semapedia instead. Semapedia.org is a non-profit project whose goal is to connect the physical world with relevant knowledge from Wikipedia. The community is encouraged to create 2D barcodes (QR Codes) and then venture out into the real world and attach them to objects. Any URL from Wikipedia, Wikinews, Wikibooks, and Wikisource can be used. While we love this innovative idea, a quick look at their map showed very few places where these codes have been used.

2) Exchange Contact Data With Your iPhone / Cameraphone

In Japan, you'll find QR codes everywhere including business cards, id cards, magazines, newspapers, flyers, posters, stickers, food products,puzzles, web sites, billboards,and more. (Thanks for the links, David Harper!) But here in the U.S. it seems we're still struggling to get the trend started. So why not let iPhone users lead the way? If you have an iPhone, there is one app that lets you exchange contact data with others through the use of barcodes - just like the Japanese do! The app is called QRContact (iTunes link) and it generates a contact's details as a barcode. To use it, you simply click on the "Address Book" button to select the person in your address book whose details you want to turn into a barcode. Of course, that means you'll have to enter your own information in your contacts in order to exchange the info with others.  The recipient would then only need a barcode reader application installed on their device in order to read the code and add the info to their address book. Do a search in iTunes for "barcode" and you'll find a few free readers to choose from that will do the trick.

3) Get Nerdy With Patches and Pillows

In an email from self-described "barcode nerd" John Young, we learned of all sorts of fun barcoded-related projects. He began by making a barcoded needlepoint pillow featuring a 2D barcode that linked to the Wikipedia page for pillow. After getting a little exposure on both BoingBoing and the NYT, he decided to extend the project and is now selling needlepoint canvases with custom QR Codes on them. You can find them here on Etsy: http://nerdlepoint.etsy.com.

After having so much fun with that, John decided to explore other wearables. Since so many people were already making and selling QR Code t-shirts (see our review of Japanese co. C-Shirt, too, if you're interested in how wearables work), he decided to venture into the world of patches instead. He launched the site http://p8tch.com where he sells velcro-backed "commando nerd patches." The system lets you change the target of your QR Code sort of like how TinyURL operates, so your patch can read something different whenever you want.

4) Scan Products In The Store (Coming Soon, Perhaps)

A company looking to take mobile barcode reading mainstream in the real world is StoreXperience. This m-commerce platform allows consumers to capture 2D barcodes from products. Consumers could then see product information, including local availability and customized offers right on their mobile handsets. StoreXperience isn't just limited to 2D barcodes, though. Their technology also supports RFID tags and soon 1D barcodes, too. Unfortunately, although StoreXperience has built a platform they aren't in any noteworthy stores as of today. We're disappointed that you can't actually use this technology yet, but we're keeping our eye on it.

John Young (see above) is now investigating the use of barcodes for real estate. He thinks it would be great if there was something (besides an infotube) which potential buyers could read while they're standing right there at the house. How about a mobile web-page linked by a barcode? To learn how to make your own barcode to do this too, keep reading...

6) Get Your Own Reader And Make Your Own Codes

Yesterday we mentioned the NeoReader, but as some pointed out, NeoMedia hasn't always played nice in this space. There are other readers you can use if you would rather support efforts of a more open nature. For example, the Kaywa Reader (go to http://reader.kaywa.com to see if your phone is supported); Google's zxing reader which was designed for Android but supposedly works on iPhone, too;  i-nigma; QuickMark; upcode; or, for Nokia phones, there's an entire web site devoted to barcodes at http://mobilecodes.nokia.com. You can also try semacode, connexto, or scanzoom. These last three may be helpful to owners of older Nokia phones that can't use the reader provided on the nokia.com site. In the EU only, you can try the reader from activeprint.org. The Japanese apparently don't need our help, but if you want to see what one of their readers looks like, check out camreader. Then prepare to be very jealous: in Japan, they can scan the barcodes of everyday objects to be taken to the mobile version of the Japanese Amazon.com for that product.

But here in the U.S. and other parts of the pre-barcoded world, you may wonder what good is it to have a reader if you don't have any codes. Maybe it's time for us to generate our own codes and let the business world catch up with our own innovation! Right now there are numerous sites that let you generate your own codes. What you choose to do with those codes is up to you. Make t-shirts, stickers, flyers, posters, or anything else you want. Try the Kaywa QR-code generator, Nokia Mobile Codes, Winksite (which can also generate codes for RSS feeds), Denso-Wave creators, DataMatrix generator by IDAutomation, QR Code Generator by NFC Games, viooli, or even the Firefox plugin Mobile Barcoder.

OK, Barcodes Are Cool, But Here's What You Should Be Worried About

If you're not much of a do-it-yourselfer, there's a good chance the technology will come to you. Earlier this month, CTIA announced a "Camera-Phone Based Barcode Scanning White Paper" (PDF) during a keynote event where they also demoed the technology. In the paper, they endorse two bar code formats: the open standard Data Matrix and the proprietary EZ Code. CTIA Vice-President of Wireless Internet Development Mark Desautels predicted that handsets using the technology will be widely available in 12-18 months.

On the surface, that sounds like good news: if you just wait, barcoding will come to you, right? As it turns out, it's not quite that simple. The proprietary EZ Code isn't read by anything except ScanLife by Scanbuy, so essentially, CTIA just endorsed one company's product. It's worth noting that Scanbuy was on the team defining the standard, Correction: Scanbuy was working with several carriers in a CTIA-initiated trial that contributed to the results of the white paper (as well as explaining to carrier executives how it should work), too. Opinion: Conflict of interest much?

The other standard supported by CTIA, DataMatrix, is an open standard and is free. Well, except for having to go through the Scanbuy gateway for processing. What that means is that in the indirect DataMatrix model, you ca't embed a URL in the barcode that resolves directly by DNS to a web address. Instead, the codes are given an ID number and these IDs are sent to a gateway for processing - a sort of man-in-the-middle (and potential bottleneck) who monitors the "clicks."

That's why the barcoding advocates here in the U.S. want you to support the open QR Code format. This is the more popular format internationally and is used in other countries like Japan, Australia, UK, and elsewhere. Thanks to its open format and freely available readers, innovation has flourished.

There are plenty of companies ready for this technology when it arrives. For example, CEO Ron Feldman of the text messaging reminder service Kwiry tells us that they plan to implement 2D/Mobile Bar Code input support when a critical mass of phones/consumers are actually capable of using this technology. Hopefully, that's only a matter of time.

Photo Credit: QR Scanning: PSD; QRCode Future: avlxyz

See also: The Scannable World, Part 1: Mobile Phones As Barcode Scanners
The Scannable World, Part 2: Scanning Your Web Printouts

In "The Scannable World: Mobile Phones As Barcode Scanners," we introduced the concept of using your phone to scan barcoded objects in the real world. We also touched on some of the history surrounding this technology. One of the issues with barcoded ads today is where you find them: newspapers, arguably a dying medium whose subscriber base isn't necessarily composed of cutting-edge early adopters. So how can barcodes make their way to the people who actually use the web and other modern technologies? One company thinks they have the answer.

Neomedia is ready for the barcode trend to take off. They've been around for a decade and have had the technology for reading barcodes with mobile phones in place for years. Now, thanks to the ubiquity of modern mobile phones, they are poised for success if this trend ever takes off. Their barcode scanning software lets you access mobile web content by scanning ads from print, packaging, billboards, and even broadcast media.

The Printed Out Web

No matter how tech savvy you are, there are still times when you simply must print out something from the web. Driving directions are a great example. Now imagine that your printout looked something like this (see below) - directions at the top with a scannable ad for a hotel at the bottom of the page:

That printout isn't a prototype, but a real ad available today from RandMcNally.com. The ad is made possible through NeoMedia's partnership with Format Dynamics, a company that works with web publishers and advertisers to help transform web pages into readable printouts which can then be monetized with ads. The company's "Clean Print" technology is a real-time dynamic reformatting engine that harvests a page's content and then produces a printed page in a coherent format without odd line breaks, cut off images, etc. Clean Print will also work no matter how the end user decides to print - whether "Ctrl + P" is pressed or a print button is used, the results are the same.

Any site using Clean Print technology can now include barcoded ads alongside their content. This is great for driving directions, but also for articles that tend to be printed out and shared, such as those from online news sites. (Don't believe it? Just look at the uproar over the RWW print button, for example). Below is an example of what that looks like. The article is from The Orange County Register's site and the ad is for Crocs footwear.

Since the partnership between NeoMedia and Format Dynamics is still brand new, there aren't many other examples just yet. But Format Dynamics is already serving ads and reformatting the printed web pages of approximately 80 web publishers, including Rand McNally, CareerBuilder, the San Jose Mercury News, the Denver Post, the Houston Chronicle, and a few others. In time, NeoMedia will extend their barcode offering to more of these clients.

How To Scan: NeoMedia's NeoReader

NeoReader is the barcode scanning software. It's not a separate piece of hardware, but software that runs on your phone. NeoReader currently works on iPhone, Java, Symbian, Blackberry, and Windows Mobile. The only missing platform is Android, but the company plans to include that at a later time. Even without Android, the company has managed to cover most of the smartphone market as well as many of today's standard phones via their Java offering. (You can see a full manufacturer's list here).

To download the application, just go to get.neoreader.com from your handset's web browser and follow the instructions. If your handset is not supported, you can still access the NeoReader program. Just bookmark the URL get.neoreader.com/go. This web page will let you enter keywords and barcodes in order to access the same content available to users of the mobile application. iPhone users can simply download the NeoReader application from the iTunes App Store.

Android has been announced but it isn't actually out yet, so we can't compare NeoReader to Android's barcode scanning apps like CompareEverywhere or GoCart. On the iPhone, though, NeoReader is not the only barcode reading app currently available - there are several to choose from. In function and feature set, the difference between most of those apps and NeoReader is minimal. Like many of those other iPhone apps, NeoReader also lets you build your own barcode if you so desire. You can create a barcode for any URL just by going to http://www.neoreader.com/code.html and entering in the URL you want to convert.

Make a Barcode:

The real difference between NeoReader simply comes down to the fact that NeoMedia is a business that's trying to make barcode scanning a reality...it's not an app put out by an independent developer. NeoReader already has a handful of sites where it can be used and over the coming weeks they will be able to add to their list as their partnership with Format Dynamics deepens.

Is This The Answer?

With the rising popularity of camera phones, smartphones, and better web browsers for surfing the "real" internet at higher 3G speeds, there's an improved chance for a technology like barcoded ads to take off. However, for it to really become truly successful a lot of advertisers and big-name companies will have to get on board and consistently offer barcoded ads for an extended period of time - not just try it once and then give up, claiming them a failure. In today's uncertain economy, the number of advertisers willing to take this chance may be low.

NeoMedia's partnership with Format Dynamics means they are able to offer a good selection of web sites where you can find the technology in use. That's a good start at least, but ultimately the technology will come down to consumers' willingness to interact with the real world in this virtual manner. The expectation behind this whole barcoded ad platform is that people will see the advertisement and then take an extra step to learn more about the product or service. Is that even how today's consumers interact with ads? In our media-saturated culture, most consumers run from ads, not the other way around.

Will adding barcodes make viewing ads a more engaging experience or will consumers continue to ignore ads like they do today? That's a hard question to answer with a technology so new and untested, but it's possible that, if done well, barcode scanning could work. The trick may be to provide an added value to the customer who takes the time to scan. That added value could be a discount, a free gift with purchase, or something else of a compelling nature to the potential customer. That could make barcode scanning the coupon clipping of the 21st century...and that might actually work. Scan to save. We would do it. Would you?

See also: The Scannable World, Part 1: Mobile Phones As Barcode Scanners
The Scannable World, Part 3: Barcode Scanning In The Real World

One of the promises of the mobile web was the possibility of being able to integrate the internet with the real world. One of the ways to accomplish this task is through the use of barcodes. The idea is that you take a picture of the barcode with your camera phone and you're then delivered to a mobile web site. This could effectively make anything - whether a poster, an ad, or an object - a virtual part of the world wide web. Although this technology has been available for years, it's only now with the birth of the smartphone, or more precisely, the next-gen smartphone, that the potential for this type of integration may finally be realized.

Smartphones have been around for years, but even though every business worker had a Blackberry glued to their hip, it wasn't until the iPhone that the true potential of smartphones was realized. These are no longer phones, but tiny, portable computers we fill with our favorite applications. The iPhone paved the way for the next generation of these "computer phones," but it isn't your only choice - Google has now entered the game. Yesterday, we saw the launch of the iPhone's first competitor, the T-Mobile G1. Around the corner both RIM and Windows Mobile are preparing their new phones and OS's, too.

Now that we have new, usable, app-friendly, and yes, downright fun, mini computers in our pockets, will we began to interact with the real world in different ways? There is that possibility. And one of (supposed) future trends for the mobile web is the scanning of barcodes to interact with real-world objects.

Failures and New Attempts

In 2000, an internet technology startup, Digital Convergence, saw their :CueCat barcodes appear in newspapers and magazines all over the U.S. Unfortunately, this company required a separate piece of hardware in order to read the barcodes, so, as you may have gathered, the technology didn't quite take off as no one wanted to carry around yet another device for the sole purpose of scanning ads.

Then, at the beginning of this year, Google attempted to revitalize the barcode again. This time, through their Print Ads service. Advertisers can choose to include barcodes that will appear in newspapers and are readable with any camera phone. The Print Ad publisher network from Google provides access to 800 newspapers, representing nearly 70% of all U.S. paid circulation. Although thousands of advertisers have Google Print Ads, the barcodes themselves haven't hit mainstream usage yet. When asked about conversion rates for barcode "clickthoughs" or the percentage of advertisers using and renewing this service, Google won't disclose any details. If the program were a raging success, there's no doubt that those numbers would be happily shared as proof of the technology's potential.

But we can't blame Google for wanting to keep quiet about the barcodes and their lack of adoption. This is still very much an emerging technology where success is largely unproven. And in our unstable economy, advertisers may be hesitant to use such a risky and unproven option for their ads.

Newspapers May Be The Wrong Medium

It's possible that the failure of the barcode to gain traction could be simply a case of marketing to the wrong demographic. Let's be honest, the people who still take a daily newspaper instead of getting their news via the TV or web aren't, in general, likely to be the most cutting-edge technology enthusiasts. So, the question remains: how can you get the attention of hippest web users when your scannable barcodes are on paper, not screens? And once you have early adopter involvement, how can this technology go mainstream?

In part two of this post, continued tomorrow, we'll look at a company that thinks they may have that answer...stay tuned.

See also: The Scannable World, Part 2: Scanning Your Web Printouts
The Scannable World, Part 3: Barcode Scanning In The Real World

Another change since the late-90s when :CueCat made its debut is that users are less concerned about companies harvesting information about the sites they visit. One of the main concerns many users had with the original :CueCat, was that Digital Convergence could theoretically compile a database of every web site people visited by scanning barcodes in newspapers and link it to personally identifiable information (since each reader had to be registered).

These days, it is generally accepted that Google already knows all about which web sites we visit, and many users voluntarily share their bookmarks, lists of their possessions, and their entire life stories on social media sites like del.icio.us, LibraryThing, or Facebook. So privacy concerns might be less of a hurdle for Google this time around.

Of course, that's not to say that Google will have no issues rolling its printed barcodes out to consumers. In order to make these ads attractive to advertisers, they need to get the software onto the phones of a large audience -- that means making deals with handset manufacturers and mobile carriers, which as Frommer points out, means figuring out how to split up the revenue pie.

Google might have an easier time selling the idea of scannable printed URLs this time around, but I'm not holding my breath. Eventually, as in Japan where they are very popular, these types of scannable barcodes could offer a lot more functionality than just sending you to a web site -- like sending you relevant coupons or allowing you to pay for services.

Note: It looks like I wasn't the only one who was reminded of the :CueCat (actually, I suspect most people around in the late-90s were). A number of commenters to Frommer's post have also discussed it. As Henry Blodget chimes in, "Digital Convergence (owner of Cuecat) was the single worst idea I heard in Bubble 1.0--and that's saying a lot." It sure is...