[kalleboo]

They've been doing the image scanning thing a bit in Sweden, where you can take pictures of bus stop ads and be taken to a site. The problem as I see it is that it needs a database connection, which means

* You need a network connection for it to work, so it won't work everywhere (subway ads)

* Since there's a network service involved, it can't be an open standard, and users will need 20 different apps installed for all the different service providers, and figure out just what app to use for this damn ad.

* Due to the network roundtrip, you don't have instant feedback that the scan worked, which is a problem since

* Performance is poor in the dark.

QR codes also solve the problem of telling people that there's something actually there to scan.

[grimen]

1) Network works well in metro for me mostly, though it's a valid point that it might suffer here and there. But metros is just a smal fraction of the possabiities we - and retailers we talked with - see.

2) It won't be 20 apps, becuase there are only a few companies in the world that has sophisticated algorithms enough - many algorithms you can read about on the web are not realiable enough. So far no one has done a consumer product but hundreds of QR-based apps, I would say that this say a bit how hard it is. Anyone can craete a QR app based on some open-source libs.

3) Well, our demos show something else - ~1-2 seconds.

4) Flash. And scenario for scanning stuff in night dark is...not really a descent secenario anyway if it's that dark people have hard to see.

5) That's an assumption based on today's reality, because no viable succeedors are available yet that do more valuable things. Yet I haven't heard of anyone using QR codes more than once or twice for fun even though it been "hot" since for half a decade or more.