Are traditional QR codes threatened by dots in three colors?

Picapicamera app

Picapicamera app

These basic mobile barcodes may prove more popular among consumers.

Casio has launched their latest iPhone app, called the PicapiCamera, which could put the future of QR codes at risk, if its “visible light communication technology” catches on among consumers more effectively than its predecessor.

Though this new form of barcode is much more simplistic, if it is actually used, it may prove more attractive.

Marketers love QR codes for their ease of use, vast potential, and inexpensive nature. However, consumers haven’t been catching on with their use half as quickly as brands and companies. This has left the door open for other technologies to come along and challenge the dominance of these barcodes in the mobile marketing sphere.

The PicapiCamera app functions on screen by flashing a circle that alternates among blue, green, and red. The camera feature on an iPhone device uses this flashing to capture the changes in color patterns which can be translated in the form of encoded data. This data essentially breaks down to an ID number with an 8 bit word.

The iPhone that has received the number and word sends it to the cloud as a key that unlocks more data. That information is then downloaded into the phone.

This makes the entire process more straightforward and simple than using QR codes.

It eliminates the need to be near to the barcode in order to snap a picture of it so that it can be scanned by the app. The Casio app allows the mobile device to capture the dot from a much more significant distance. This provides marketers with a much wider opportunity for using the dots, as an entire airport concourse, train platform, or even sidewalk could be blanketed in these dots and an unlimited number of smartphone users would be able to use them.

The true key to whether or not these will truly become more popular than QR codes will be whether or not the obstacle they overcome is truly meaningful to the consumers and is one of the primary issues that is holding those smartphone users back from scanning the quick response barcodes in the first place.

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