Growing response to quick response

Many councils have yet to do more than glance at the technology, but Kingston CEO John Nevins believes this sort of technology has become an inescapable part of council outreach. “Today’s reality is that the world has moved from connected to hyper-connected, and much more interconnected,” he explains. “Our communities at state, national and local levels are a part of this world – so if local government is not, it will be left behind.” 

The Wikipedia town, and its dangers. The world’s most ambitious exercise in local- government QR coding happened recently in the Welsh town of Monmouthshire, where a local resident proposed and – with the support of the local shire council – executed a mass tagging exercise across the length and breadth of the town. John Cummings’ idea was to attach QR codes of many different sorts to local maps, information brochures and landmarks; with the tap of a smartphone screen, passersby could instantly learn more about the thing they were looking at. The project garnered the sleepy town worldwide success and saw local artesans producing QR codes on everything from porcelain to paper stickers. Bridges, signs, vistas and more were labelled as over 1000 different tags were installed across the town – earning it the nickname ‘the Wikipedia town’ and setting the high-water mark for local- government signage. While QR codes proved an interesting diversion in Monmouthshire, they are raising concerns in other places: security researchers have recently warned about malicious vandals covering legitimate QR codes with stickers containing their own codes, which may point to Web sites that do nasty things like loading Android malware onto victims’ phones.

It’s a not dissimilar problem to ATM skimming, in which fraudsters install magnetic card readers over the card slots of bank ATMs and use them to steal patrons’ details. Just as spotting a card skimmer takes caution and vigilance that many people lack, spotting a fake QR code may be difficult for many people who are still getting used to the idea of the codes and what they represent.

Prudent caution. Kingston is one of only a few Australian councils that have begun experimenting with QR codes. Another is the Sydney-area Mosman City Council, which has been testing the codes as a way of guiding people to complementary materials that add greater value to cultural touchstones or events. It’s early days for the technology, but one experiment saw Mosman posting QR codes on one of its heritage walks, sharing information about the sights along its length. “QR codes give us the opportunity to link signs with information that we provide on the Web,” says Bernard de Broglio, Internet coordinator with the eastern-Sydney council. “Messages on signs can be fairly restricted, so it can be fairly useful making that connection between physical signage and assets or information. There is better technology in the wings, but for now QR codes seem to be the most practical way to achieve that.”

The ‘better technology’ de Broglio refers to includes new options built around technology that integrates location information to automatically trigger a QR code-like information link. Think of a guided museum tour that uses GPS or RFID tags to sense what exhibit you’re next to, then plays the correct media, and you’ve got the right general idea. Mosman’s libraries have used QR codes extensively to guide visitors to its Facebook and Twitter sites, while other codes have directed visitors to sign up for the library’s email newsletter. Another project, run while the council was executing a rabbit-baiting program, saw QR codes posted in areas where residents tend to walk dogs a lot. “People have loads of information coming at them from multiple angles all day,” de Broglio explains. “It’s unlikely that they’re going to go home and look it up, but if they can get the information while they’re in that space and walking the dog, there’s a better chance they will read the information.” QR codes also proved surprisingly popular in the leadup to a local festival in which QR codes played a significant role. “We did quite a bit of print advertising for the festival and put a QR code in there,” de Broglio recalls. “We expected maybe 5 to 10 people a week to scan it, but were getting 50 to 100 responses in a week. It was modest returns but it’s very simple – and many different business units within the council have been interested in QR codes for one thing or another.”