A Little History of the #QRcode for Beginners
QR Codes (= Quick Response Codes) are 2D Barcodes (two dimensional Barcodes) developed by Denso and released in 1994 with the primary aim of being easily interpreted by scanner equipment in manufacturing, logistics and sales applications. In comparison with other Barcodes, QR Codes combine several advantages:
they can hold a very large capacity of numbers or letters in any language
their printout size can be very small
they offer high speed reading
they can be read from any side (omnidirectional or 360° scan)
Japan, the first country with a highly developed 3G network and high usage of the mobile internet, was also the country where telecoms achieved a breakthrough by bringing QR code readers to mobile phones. Today QR Codes are so pervasive in Japan that it's almost impossible without seeing one. You can find them in advertisements, in mobile campaigns, on maps, in magazines, on billboards etc. In that sense the QR Code revolution is comparable to SMS. It's an easy and simple tool, the cost of the connection to a mobile site is below the price of an SMS and it's up to you to decide whether or not you want to scan it.