Google Ditches Barcodes for NFC. Google is moving away from barcodes and towards NFC (near field communication) if a pair of stories about the search company are tied together.
Yesterday, news broke out about Google's decision to officially end support for the use of QR codes, the 2D barcodes readable by camera-equipped mobile phones, in its business listings service Google Places. Today, non-profit industry association NFC Forum announced that Google has joined its ranks as a new member with voting privileges. If you've been waiting to see momentum surrounding NFC, here it is. Killing the QR Code Earlier this month, Mike Blumenthals of the "Understanding Google Maps & Local Search" blog noticed that business owners could no longer create a printable QR Code for their listing in Google Places.
Why, then, would Google kill it? As it turns out, the missing feature wasn't due to a bug, but an executive decision at Google to move beyond the barcode. A company spokesperson provided Blumenthals with the following statement: The Introductory Guide to Location-Based Marketing. Jason Dempsey | April 8, 2011 | 3 Comments inShare23 Location-based services can focus on a variety of engagement and marketing aspects.
It's important to define your objectives as you migrate into these services. So you've read about location. You've sat through many presentations with the cliché "Location, Location, Location" somewhere in the title, and you're still clueless about how to get started in tying location-based services (LBS) back to your marketing efforts. Register Your Stores The obvious but important first step to location-based services is the simplest: make sure your retail locations are accurately listed with the services you want to work with. Know the Landscape When it comes to awareness and reach, name recognition counts: Google Places and Facebook Places will be the first place for most brands to look.
Know What You're Trying to Accomplish. NFC Digital Payments - what's in it for consumers? Changing consumer behavior is very difficult.
Making things more efficient, easier, faster, or more convenient isn't enough if it requires a change in normal consumer behavior. Many tech startups fail because they don't consider the user experience and behavior changes required to use their amazing tech solutions. NFC (Near Field Communications) enables your smartphone to make digital payments. But will consumers care? Jean-Louis Gassee has an interesting take on NFC on Techmeme today. There have been many transitions in payment "technology" over the last 75 years. Why did these payment transitions take so long? Every new technology goes through an adoption cycle. Will it save me money? How will consumers save money using NFC? How does NFC work? Disrupting the payment processing business will take time. The real battle will be among the technology providers. "Magic" Angry Birds Could Give NFC-Powered Nokia Phones A Bump. Rovio's incredibly popular Angry Birds game is about to take the next technological step with the Magic edition for Nokia phones.
The secret here? You have to bang two NFC-enabled phones together to unlock game levels. Angry Birds is so popular, there's even been some scientific prying into exactly why flinging digital birds at pigs is so addictive. Rovio's also smart about exploiting the games' success, and has been expanding it across platforms and trying clever tricks to promote the game and keep the cash rolling in. But its latest move is perhaps the most technological it's made yet, and ties right into the future of mobile tech.
The upcoming Magic edition of Angry Birds, you see, is specially for Nokia phones running the recent Symbian Anna code. But the principle is sound: Rovio is trying to create a small-scale, very personal "social network" of sorts, which encourages Angry Birds fans to meet up and tap their phones together. Yet it's also a bit more than this.