thinking: relating- celebrating :-)

Here is a glimpse into the future of online shopping from Korea. What is exciting and significant here is that customers using mobile phones are able to use QR codes to short cut straight to a shopping cart by scanning those codes directly off a poster.

We have seen some use of QR codes and mostly it has been trivial to date.

“A QR code (abbreviated from Quick Response code) is a type of matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code) designed to be read by smartphones. The code consists of black modules arranged in a square pattern on a white background. The information encoded may be text, a URL, or other data.”

For QR codes to be useful shoppers need to have access to a QR reader cable ecommerce shopping system, a smart phone and fast, inexpensive mobile data.

The display posters are close to lifesize photos of each of the products. I can see this is an exceptional idea for extending online shopping functionality to busy locations where a billboard space might be available.

In effect shoppers are able to browse the equivalent of a several metres wide screen image of key products without going near a computer. Although to be fair their smart phones do need to be able to read the qr codes off the posters.

We need to do some more research on exactly how to do this for online shopping sites but I suspect billboard owners will be extremely excited about this

My QR code is displayed at left and if you have a reader you can scan my contact details but just imagine I could also sell you an ecommerce report at the same time.

Now we’re talking business !

P.S We’ve been watching all of the coupon sites and while that seems like a good way to drive offline media traffic on to online channels not all deals work that well for vendors or the media channels.

Also the price of accessing the old media (TV for the most part) is still expensive and the unintended consequences of a huge rush of traffic to a website or physical store is not easy to manage or profit from. Getting repeat business is not easy to do if most of the shoppers are deal takers who just chase discounts.

“We’ve also heard consistently from certain categories of businesses (very popular ones I’m afraid) that daily deals are uneconomic for them, which does raise questions around the sustainability of “50% off” daily deals for these types of businesses.”

Yelp CEO says they are working on new developments to the daily deal type of business.

My money is on QR codes and this store concept from Korea is the future of online stores and no unsustainable 50% off foolish deals are needed to get more online business by heading down the QR path.

One of the nicer things about getting older is being able to take a longer term perspective on the future.

More specifically; how our lives and those of our friends turn out based on decisions and actions in time past. It is a truism that we often don’t know or fully understand the significance of key events until much later.

The trigger for some of these thoughts was a long term wedding anniversary which is great achievement in itself but the what I really enjoyed was the opportunity to compare notes across a very wide sample of people ranging from 3 to 70+ .

In some case I talked with people I hadn’t seen in 30 years. With so many people it was a series of quick snapshots on what they or I had been up to and the results were often fascinating.

Marshall McLuhan famously said that “Predicting the present” was more difficult that trying to guess the future.

In answer to the question What Are You Optimistic About? Howard Rhinegold started his answer in this way (in a 2007 series.)

“The tools for cultural production and distribution are in the pockets of 14 year olds.

This does not guarantee that they will do the hard work of democratic self-governance: the tools that enable the free circulation of information and communication of opinion are necessary but not sufficient for the formation of public opinion.

Ask yourself this question: Which kind of population seems more likely to become actively engaged in civic affairs

— a population of passive consumers, sitting slackjawed in their darkened rooms, soaking in mass-manufactured culture that is broadcast by a few to an audience of many,

or a world of creators who might be misinformed or ill-intentioned, but in any case are actively engaged in producing as well as consuming cultural products?

Recent polls indicate that a majority of today’s youth — the “digital natives” for whom laptops and wireless Internet connections are part of the environment, like electricity and running water — have created as well as consumed online content.

I think this bodes well for the possibility that they will take the repair of the world into their own hands, instead of turning away from civic issues, or turning to nihilistic destruction.

In my life I’ve been far more motivated by causes and big ideas than anything else.

My Dad always used to say he wouldn’t know how he’d done till he sees how our children turn out. How is that for a longer term view? My daughter keeps me on my toes  and we are enjoying the journey of being engaged with the world around us and beyond.

I agree with Rhinegold and the idea that we can choose to repair the present and engage with optimism.

With recent events in Egypt still unfolding we can take heart that it is largely the youth of that nation who have called time on the tired old ideas of the past. (Linda Herrera)

“Some characteristics of this global generation are excessive communication, involving many people in decision making, multitasking, group work, blurring of public and private, sharing, individual expression, and collective identification.

Another important distinction between the generations is that the digital generation take what media theorist Clay Shirky calls “symmetrical participation” for granted.

In other words, they are not passive recipients of media and messages, as in the days when television and print media ruled, but take for granted that they can play a role in the simultaneous production, consumption, interaction with, and dissemination of on-line content.”

There is no doubt that the social connections and amplification of these ideas online has made a huge contribution to a far more optimistic future.

As a parent – I’m always interested in ways that children can get more engaged with learning about everything. Touch screens like those used by the iPad are clearly of interest and as a music fan I liked this one.  The featured app here is a curated history of jazz that costs $US9.95.

It offers more content that most books on Jazz and a much richer experience with different video and other content all collated together. That also means that content can be updated online within the limits of technology and pricing models.

One aspect of the application that I like is the keyboard style navigation at the bottom of the screen. The keyboard “look” is an interactive timeline.

It is great to see application designers rethinking the intersection of reading, listening, touching, looking.

The UX designer calls this a collision of media.

Scobelizer says.

“I look at a lot of iPad apps and there are very few that get to a really great interface. http://www.955dreams.com/ History of Jazz’ app is one of those examples. Really nice all the way around. What did it take? I sit down with the team to learn more. Their app is currently rated five stars and is high on the best selling list.” (35 mins)

What is also very interesting about this video is the discussion around the design process and especially about how to bring a concept to life for the iPad.

Here is what the application looks like on an iPad.