Why we love to hate them
Welcome to our Technology Explained series, where we breakdown the wireless technologies powering today’s modern world and shaping the future of human- machine interactions.
We’ll be talking fun facts, debunking myths and lifting the hood on how these technologies actually work (all while showing you that Everlink’s ultrasonic tech may just be the solution you’ve been looking for).
At Everlink, we’ve built our ultrasonic technology to be a smoother, ‘ultra-contactless’ verification solution compared to standard wireless technologies. We’ve worked hard to ensure verification can occur at customisable ranges — starting at 1cm but going up to 12.5 metres. With verification happening within a split second and at the simple swish of a phone — the process is seamless, safe and satisfying.
First on the Technology Explained roster: The QR Code.
The QR code was first released in 1994 by Masahiro Hara, while he worked for Denso Wave in Japan. But the development of the ‘Quick Response’ code (who knew?) traces its roots back to the 1950s, when a solution was needed to help the aching wrists of supermarket cashiers manually inputting prices at checkouts.
The QR code and the barcode — sisters not twins
To help the tired cashiers, the barcode (invented in 1951 by Norman Joseph Woodland and Bernard Silver in the US) was introduced to replace manual data entry. Next came the Point-of-Sale (POS) system, which helped speed up things like totalling and stock taking. But soon the limitations of the barcode became evident, not least because it could only hold 20 alphanumeric characters. The barcode was fine for shopping, but something better was needed for more complex production — step in Hara and the QR code.
The QR code’s real breakthrough was the transmission of more complex information at speed. Hara was able to create this by adding positional information, the square marks and patterns we all recognise today, to help machines quickly identify the presence of a code to be read.
In a recent interview with the New York Times, Hara said that he did not anticipate the market use of QR codes to become quite so global, and that he had originally created the codes to streamline car part production.
QR codes have never ‘gone away’ — but they probably should
Since the 1990s, the QR code has seen varying levels of adoption all around the world, with slightly newer versions of the original designs emerging to service specific needs (like micro QR codes for tiny circuit boards).
In Europe and the US, we probably all remember, to some degree, seeing badly placed QR codes on billboards or lazily included in magazines — while not all examples were awful (just check out this campaign from Guinness), for a time in the 2010s they typically serviced grasping marketers and advertisers, desperate to innovate offerings. Of course, QR codes have been used for payments in Asia for years and remain highly popular. In China for example, Alipay’s QR code payment method launched in 2011 led to the rapid adoption of mobile payments, and as of 2018, around 83% of all payments were made via mobile. Using your phone to capture a QR code is a very normal way to pay for products in Beijing or Jakarta.
However, after conducting research on the matter, Comscore found that the use of QR codes by US customers had declined between 2018 and 2020. At the close of 2019, the QR code was seen as a marketing novelty of the past or an everyday part of operational, production or payment processes.
Then came 2020. The QR code has reached a new global heyday — a renaissance 26 years on from its initial release. Spurred on by necessity during the Covid-19 pandemic, Hara’s QR code has become the default solution to provide contactless or touchless verification experiences. It’s popped up everywhere from pubs to health centres, but as we shall outline, this default approach has crucial drawbacks.
How do they actually work — in laypeople’s terms
But how do QR codes actually work? Well firstly, it’s easier to think of it more like a language, indecipherable to humans, but completely understandable for machines like scanners and mobile devices.
When the barcode was first designed, it represented data in a visual way for scanners to read, and it differentiated products by varying the widths and spacings of its parallel lines.
For the QR code, the data is represented in modules, they are the black-and-white blocks that make up the square itself. These modules hold the data and they run along rows and columns (think of these like an excel spreadsheet). The complexity of the code is based on something called the ‘version number’ (that’s the total number of modules in the code) and this can range from 1 to 40. The more complex the QR Code, the larger the display must be in order for scanners and phones to read it.
We started this by mentioning the leap Hara made in the speed and quantity of information transmitted in a relatively similar codified space (from the rectangle barcode to the square QR code). He achieved this by adding more positional elements for scanners — and now phones — to read.
For example, unlike a barcode, a QR code has ‘Finder Patterns,’ these help scanners find the edge, ‘Alignment Markers’, so the code can be scanned from any angle and ‘Quiet Zones’ — where no code exists — these elements help machines understand how to read the code as well as the data encoded within it. QR codes also often contain data for a locator, identifier, or tracker that points to a website or application (which made them a useful consumer advertising tool).
Back in the day only scanners could read QR codes, but now they can be used on various mobile operating systems. Importantly however, only iPhones running iOS version 11 or higher, and only some Android devices can natively scan QR codes without downloading an external app.
Now we’re all experts, right?
Why we argue sound is better — for most situations
The QR code was an important innovation in 1994, and it still has relevant applications today (we wouldn’t deny it!). It works well for large scale manufacturing and in areas where low-tech, low security solutions are needed.
But it’s not the ideal solution for a number of cases, whether it’s checking in at a location or as a contract tracing solution. As users we’ve all experienced QR codes during Covid-19. The experience is slow, clunky and often a little panicky as you check to see if your phone can even scan it in the first place. Yes it is ‘touchless,’ but in a world where users demand the safest possible experiences, they need a solution which goes beyond just ‘touchless’.
At Everlink, we’ve built our ultrasonic technology to be a smoother, ‘ultra-contactless’ verification solution compared to QR codes. We’ve worked hard to ensure verification can occur at customisable ranges — starting at 1cm but going up to 12.5 metres. With verification happening within a split second and at the simple swish of a phone — the process is seamless, safe and satisfying.
To make our point, let’s quickly look at the 3 major downsides to QR codes, and take the specific example of checking in at a newly reopened office building as our case study.
1. Poor User Experience
QR codes create poor user experiences. There we said it. QR codes function through light, which is unidirectional and struggles over longer distances, so you need to get pretty close to the code itself in order to capture it. In reality, this means only one user can scan a code at any one point in time, and they all need to be in relatively close proximity.
What is the biggest downside of this you ask? Queuing. QR codes encourage queuing which in turn causes inefficiencies for the service provider (and even bad reviews) and unneeded stress for the user. It’s an all round bad deal.
While most standard phones do now come with a built-in QR code scanner, not all do, and there is still an element of friction working out if your phone can natively scan the code or not. Who needs that hassle? (*cough, cough every smartphone, regardless of make and model, has microphones and speakers capable of receiving sound, just FYI).
2. Functionality Drawbacks
QR codes, by nature, are static (unless changed frequently). They are most often printed and stuck on doors or displayed on tablet screens and changed every day or so. Hardly secure. That aside, this static nature means the actual onus of verification is on the smart devices in the users’ hands.
This places a huge amount of pressure on camera and screen quality — which does vary across devices, and the wear and tear accumulated over a device’s lifetime can drastically increase failure rates.
QR codes also offer limited variety when it comes to functionality. Yes, you can scan the code to confirm your presence on arrival, but in order for the QR code to continue being useful, say for a contact tracing exercise, you’d need to scan more around the venue or location. For most users who have manually inputted their data and completed the steps between them and a pint of beer, the QR code recedes in the rear-view mirror. It does very little to keep you protected on-site.
3. Outdated for Today’s Hyper-Hygienic World
This may feel like a combination of the previous points, but it is specifically related to the new world we find ourselves in courtesy of Covid-19.
Social distancing measures, contact-free interactions and stringent safety protocol are now major factors in any business which has reopened or is looking to do so once their national or regional lockdown is over.
The QR code is an outdated method to keep customers safe — for the short and longer-term. For example, if you have a room of 100 users and 1 QR code to verify their presence, all 100 users would have to queue and scan in the same area. Meaning all users share the same airspace, and all their smart-devices scan in the same common location.
When there are such solutions as Everlink, where verification can happen at whatever distance the user feels safest — why bother putting customers at risk?
Case study: We can go back to the office (yay?) — but what’s the safest way to check-in?
Lockdown has ended. We are free again. But with that freedom comes an obligation to return to the office or (we can always dream) visit other offices for meetings.
How do we do this safely? Most workplaces around the world have already prepared for this scenario or are preparing for it, and we say look to ultrasonic verification as the answer.
Imagine if it was this simple:
Say goodbye to pointless, contact-fuelled queuing, and say hello to frictionless ultra-contactless verification.
Check-ins may be the first scenario on our list to revolutionise, but trust us — there are plenty more use cases we’ll be disrupting in the days and months to come.
Next in the series, the old King of Denmark— Bluetooth — so stay tuned and look out for that next week.
