May 21, 2011
A small update and then a post about QR codes! Fun!
Update, Sunday, May 22 at 2:15 a.m.: I added an image to the bottom of this post after reading this week’s PostSecret.
Quick update on my life: I’ve finally found out what day I’m starting my internship–June 13! It’s the perfect timing because it will give me a full week to get ready for London when I get back in August. The only rub is that I will only have two days to move in between starting my internship and leaving the IHS seminar. But I’ll make it work.
Right now I’m just searching for housing, and let me just say, it’s really hard. You would think the capital of the state would have more short-term leasing options available for summer interns, but they don’t. This one apartment complex I’m looking at is really giving me the run around. It would have been perfect, too–a 10 minute walk to my job and a great Catholic Church and it’s in the middle of downtown! I’m hoping they decide to give me a call back soon, otherwise I’m probably going to be moving out to the suburbs and that’s just not as fun.
But in other news, and to actually say something of relevance, I wanted to touch on how cool QR codes are. By now most everyone knows what they are, the funky little boxy things that you scan with your smartphone and takes you to a webpage.
I happen to love QR codes, they are incredibly useful and just plain cool. I was introduced to them by my boss at Connect2Mason last summer. The first time we utilized them (or at least that I saw) was in August during freshmen orientation; we printed a bunch of sheets and passed them out to the freshies and once they scanned them it took them to a video explaining a contest we were holding. The contest wasn’t very successful, but I believe that was because, at the time, people didn’t really understand QR codes. I think people do now, more so at least. I’ve seen them used in Lupe Fiasco’s campaign for his album Lasers, like in the video for “Words I Never Said” (jump to :48 seconds or so), in cupcake competitions (really, how awesome is that?), and now even in PostSecret.
So QR codes are pretty mainstream. Connect2Mason and Broadside, GMU’s student-run newspaper, used them last semester during the Student Government elections; students could read bios on the candidates in the paper and then be directed to video interviews that C2M conducted. It was pretty fantastic and was precisely what Connect2Mason is about–convergence!
So this brings me to my point, why aren’t more publications utilizing the QR code? Not sure.
Yesterday evening I was flipping through my Newsweek and in this one article about cooking I was directed to visit The Daily Beast website for a recipe, no link was provided, it just said visit The Daily Beast. Could Newsweek actually expect me and their other readers to put down their magazine, turn on our computers and actually search for this recipe? I was immediately surprised that Newsweek, which last year merged with The Daily Beast, wasn’t utilizing the QR code. It was like the QR code was made for Newsweek/Daily Beast convergence! I suppose you could argue that they simply don’t have the space for it, but I counted and there are about 38 pages of ads including the back cover of Newsweek. There are only 86 pages.
I was pretty frustrated that I’m essentially paying for a magazine of ads, and they can’t even spare a few inches of the page for a stinking QR code, so what did I do? I tweeted it. And to my surprise, they responded.
Here is the transcript:
YasminTadjdeh: @Newsweek, instead of telling me to visit @thedailybeast for a story, just use a QR code. You have 38 pages of ads, you’ve got the space.
Newsweek: @YasminTadjdeh we’ve played with that idea. 1 issue is to work w/ majority of phones, QR has to be certain size, 2 big for most pages ^br
YasminTadjdeh: @Newsweek well, even if QR codes won’t work there needs to be a more direct way for readers to get to the content, a bit.ly link perhaps
YasminTadjdeh: @Newsweek I’m sure you guys have the numbers, but I’m pretty confident not a ton of people are going to use the search tool to find a story
Newsweek: @YasminTadjdeh we’re with ya. ideally nwk.com/story, simple URL. getting there. ^br
YasminTadjdeh: @Newsweek excellent 🙂 looking forward to seeing it! I love print/digital media convergence!
It was pretty fantastic having an actual, albeit very short, conversation with Newsweek. I’m glad to hear that they are looking at other options for linking besides the primitive search feature, but come on, QR codes don’t take up that much space. They really don’t. Plus design-wise, Newsweek can spare the space. And if they can’t, perhaps consider getting rid of one of your 38 pages of ads, I mean, didn’t I pay for your magazine?
Well, that’s it for tonight. Glad I was able to survive the Rapture and actually get to post this. So to celebrate why don’t you listen to this awesome Hanson song? Yeah, Hanson!
This was in this week's (May 22) PostSecret. What great timing! I just had to update this post with it. Scan it and see what it says!
Filed by yasmintadjdeh at May 21st, 2011 under Uncategorized
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