What is that funny little box?

We've probably all seen them, but maybe we weren't sure what they were. They look a bit like a bar code that you scan to get the price of a product, and to some extent, they are codes to be scanned. But these little box-like codes provide the average person with a lot more than just the price of a product, or maybe I should say they CAN provide a lot more than that.

Last week was the first time our student newspaper at Texas Wesleyan University, The Rambler, displayed a QR Code on the front page. The code or rather codes were displayed on the faceplate of an iPhone illustration, and when the codes were scanned with said iPhone, mine in this case, they took my browser directly to http://www.therambler.org/. Neat trick.

Unfortunately, QR codes aren't as well received in the United States as they are in Europe or other parts of the world. Too bad, because they can definintely help in marketing and providing folks with extra information.

To provide you with extra information, here's the QR code to one of my class blogs, which will directly send you to some great GoogleMaps created by my students. If you poke around on the blog, you'll find other interesting things.

If you don't currently have a QR code reader, you can download the Mobiletag app on your smartphone. Then just scan. For those of you who don't have a smartphone, click here.