PORT TOWNSEND – The use of QR codes, matrix bar codes that hold information about a product or a store, is emerging in Port Townsend in two different venues this week.
The QR — or “quick response” — codes are rectangular images that can be mistaken for small pieces of abstract art which are accessed through smart phones or phones with cameras.
The QR codes are configured to link to online material that gives the customer an explanation of a product, event or location, provides other information — or even offers coupons.
The Port Townsend Film Festival, which begins on Friday, is using the codes on its posters and programs to provide instant information about specific films.
The Port Townsend Co-op today will add a QR code to its display of Dave’s Killer Bread, allowing the user to read the QR code and access a store coupon.
Applications developed locally
Port Townsend video consultant Jack Olmsted, who developed both applications, said that the instant-coupon through a QR code has not been used anywhere in the nation prior to its debut today in Port Townsend.
Although most tend not to trust any characterization of new technology as “simple,” Olmsted’s explanation of QR codes doesn’t intimidate.
Users need to install a QR application on their smart phones or camera phones and take a picture of the code wherever it appears.
That will then lead the user to whatever the sponsor wants, which can be as simple as calling up a coupon or as ornate as linking to a video that explains the product and its role in the marketplace.
Olmsted said that merchants who want to use QR codes have only a slightly more complicated process.
They can create the codes for free, and easily link the desired information to the code.
This linked material can be changed while the code remains the same, which Olmsted calls the most exciting part.
“A customer can click on the same code at a different time and get new information,” he said.
“They never know what they are going to get, which keeps them coming back.”
The codes are monochromatic, seemingly random patterns. The information they contain is not visible to the naked eye.
They are not obtrusive and resemble abstract art. The QR codes on the Port Townsend Film Festival poster look a bit like flowers.
Not a new idea
The idea of QR codes aren’t new to Port Townsend.
The city last year primed the pump for the process by signing up and training merchants, as well as incorporating them into the “way finding project” that lists businesses and tourist attractions through codes that are posted throughout the city.
It has yet to find its local potential, since most of the businesses listed as part of the program link to a website or a Facebook page rather than using interactive material such as coupons or video.
Olmsted said that it takes awhile for some merchants to “get it,” that “sometimes the people who have been in business for a while need a teenager to show them how it works.”
He said there is also an “anti-technology” contingent in Port Townsend, from people who are opposed to the digital world on principle.
“A lot of people are against this, because they don’t like it that some people spend all their time in front of a computer screen,” he said.
“The irony is, QR codes are a good way for people to find out what’s in their community so they can go out and interact with new things.”
Olmsted’s mission is to get both users and merchants involved, and the use of coupons and how the codes enhance the film festival experience will convince a lot of people.
“There is no secret and there is no magic,” Olmsted said.
“Anyone can do this.”
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Jefferson County Reporter Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or charlie.bermant@peninsuladailynews.com.