On 18 Sep 2012, at 11:19, Gordon Joly <gordon.j...@pobox.com> wrote:
> On 17/09/12 20:34, Chris Keating wrote: >> >>>>and will provide a firm basis for the growing use of Wikipedia-linked QR >> >>>>codes in future. > > > This issue has always been on my mind. The use of a code requires a method to > decode and produce a result. In general terms, QR Codes resolve to *text* > *strings* and those strings tend to begin "http://"; and then QRPedia codes > have a second level on indirection (the language switching). > > Can we feel sure that for the next 5, 10 or 25 years QR codes will be in > common use (the legacy), and that Wikipedia linked QR Codes will resolve and > send the user to the relevant article? We assume that Wikipedia will last for > another 25 years! If QRPedia codes don't work in the future, then they will > be a very widespread piece of negative advertising. That's sort of like saying that CDs won't work in 25 years time, so it's not worth making Wikipedia available on CD. At the present time, QR codes are a very effective approach to take to make Wikipedia widely available on a local basis. I'd expect that technology to change over time - e.g. at some point in the future you might be able to point your camera at a building, and image recognition programs will figure out which building it is and redirect you to the article - but that sort of technology is quite a way off, and QR codes are available now, are effective, and will work for the reasonably foreseeable future. Thanks, Mike (personal viewpoint, of course.) _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediau...@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org
