They are Everywhere

QR Bar Codes Are Showing Up Everywhere

They are showing up all over town. You find them in newspapers and magazines, on bus cards and in museums. You will see them on real estate signs and fast food menus. At first they may look like one of those Maze Games that you played with as a kid. In reality they are an extension of the bar code you may find on the box of cereal or loaf of bread as you run through the check out at the store. Called “QR” or “two dimensional codes,” these black and white printed labels made up of lines and boxes can hold much more information that the old bar codes consisting of only vertical lines of different thickness and placement.

The reason that they are becoming so prevalent is that they can be read by most smart phones and the information can be instantly translated into an Internet address leading to additional information and detail.

For example, using a QR code on a real estate sign provides a way for the potential buyer to see much more detail about a property of interest even when the agent is not there. Scanning the code on the sign can bring the prospective buyer to a video tour of the home, information about the neighborhood and any other detail that might promote further interest. All of this played back on the mobile phone while standing in front of the house.

Your walk through a museum or gallery can be enhanced if the displays and
artwork have corresponding QR codes. Scanning the codes as you walk through can provide added information. Even an audio or video presentation about the display can be presented to you on the phone’s screen. The same technology could be employed in cities and towns providing a running narrative of your walk through historic neighborhoods or buildings.

The CR code above can be scanned by a smart phone with an appropriate scanning app will take you to a page on Wikipedia. You don’t need to enter an address or any special codes. All you need do is scan and let the phone make the connection.

Your Age and Your Technology Linked

A recent conversation with a young lady tending bar at a local eatery prompts this week’s missive. As I was waiting for a lunch companion, I was speaking with a friend about how Apple had just announced that more than 15 billion Apps had been downloaded from the iTunes Store since it began a few years ago. That is “Billion” with a “B” and works out to more than 2 Apps for every person now living on the earth. The conversation was overheard by the bar tender who chimed in that she used several apps to just watch TV.

As the conversation progressed she related that she does not own a radio or a TV set but is an avid watcher of TV and listens to radio stations a lot. She does it all on her computer or digital mobile device. The young lady looked to be in her late 20s and is representative of a sea change in how we will all someday consume media. More and more of us are forsaking the cable, satellite or broadcast platforms and relying on the Internet for not only YouTube short videos but full length TV shows and movies. Pandora.com allows us to have customized “radio stations” that fit our changing moods and tastes. Many Public and Commercial TV programs can be watched on line.

For certain, the older you are the more likely you may be wedded to the more traditional forms of Radio and TV but, as sure as the VHS Tape and Cassette Audio disappeared from our media landscape, more of us will be using on line platforms and less and less using the traditional modes of delivery. Just ask a thirty year old.

This change in consumer behaviour poses lots of questions and issues. How will we pay for the programming if commercials can be deleted and skipped? When will we fill up the available band width that wireless internet requires? Will these new platforms prove reliable in emergencies and bad weather?

Perhaps the same questions were asked about the telegraph when it replaced the pony express or the steam engine when it replaced the horse.

TV Commercials for Hearing Impaired Legit.

I wrote about this a few years ago but the commercials on local TV are back offering telephones that display in text form the other end of a phone conversation so that those with profound hearing loss can make and receive phone calls. The ads indicate that the phones can be free. This is only one of several similar offers aimed at older adults and just like the free cell phones and free scooters, the offer is true but the description may be a bit incomplete.

In this case, a company called CapTel (www.capTel.com) markets a hard wired telephone that has a small LCD display. The phone uses the same wires and systems as any wired telephone and requires no additional fees to the telephone company. The phone is purchased from CapTel for about $100. The phone is only half of the required system. In order to display the captions, the incoming caller’s voice needs to be digitized for display on the phone. The CapTel phone does not do this.

What the advertisements don’t tell you is that when someone wants to call you and have their voice displayed on your phone in text, they need to go though a third party. Many states, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky included, have “relay” systems that provide this service. A person calling you dials a 800 number first and then, when prompted, enters your telephone number. The systems connects with your phone and displays the callers voice as text.

In most states, the service is free. It is in the case of our three neighboring states. Some individuals, depending on their income may be eligible for assistance in purchasing the phones as well. Information can be obtained in Ohio at (800) 973-4560 and in Indiana at (317) 334-1413.

This system should not be confused with the TTY services that have been around for years where special equipment on BOTH sides of the line allow two hearing impaired people to “talk” using text only. With the proliferation of mobile phones and text messaging, TTY is quickly becoming obsolete.

The CapTel systems work well but they are not as hassle free as the smiling elderly man on the TV commercial might indicate. You do need to let your friends and relatives know that they need to go though the 800 number if their conversation is to be translated into text. For those with significant hearing loss it is worth looking into.

If It Is Not Broke....

Since the very first days of the World Wide Web, most of us have grown accustomed to the various web address conventions. The dot com, dot org and dot edu suffixes are as familiar to us using Internet as Area Codes are when making a phone call. Over and above the suffixes listed above there are some that are used to designate various countries of the world like dot us for the United States and dot uk for the United Kingdom. Other than the country suffixes there are currently only about twenty other suffixes used throughout the world. The three listed above are the most used but there are others other less known like dot mil for the military, dot gov for government and dot info for reference sites. That list may get much larger very soon.
Just a couple of weeks ago, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) voted overwhelmingly in favor of the proposal that will change web address conventions forever. ICANN is the Internet’s international body that is responsible for maintaining structure and order to Internet domain names for the millions of Internet address holders and billions of Internet users.
According to some experts, this is the biggest change to domain names since the creation of dot com 26 years ago. If these changes get implemented businesses will no longer be restricted to the list of generic top level domains which now include dot com and dot org when they apply to register a website address.
So a large company like Macy’s or Procter & Gamble might be able to change their web address from the current www.macys.com or www.pg.com to www.shop.macys or www.washwith.tide.
Companies wanting to take advantage of this new domain structure will find that it does not come inexpensively. ICANN will charge $185,000 per name and levy an annual fee to maintain the names.
I think this change is really an example to fixing something that is not broken and in many cases will be introducing a system that will be harder to use. Some websites already have very long names, but they most often make sense. For example, if you want information on the CSO concert at Music Hall you can go to www.cincinnatisymphony.org. With this new method of naming web sites it is anyone’s guess how long and how complicated they might get. If I had the bucks perhaps I could get a new web site. I would call it www.jackdominic.besuretoreadmygreatcolumnsintheharrisonpress. That should be easy to remember.