I’ve been doing a little bit of reserach about QR codes. For those of you who remember the post from last year, QR codes is short for quick-read. They were developed by Denso-Wave in Japan and really took off there in the last few years. But if you pick up a package or look on your FedEx packages, you’ll notice they’re there.

After the jump, I will share with you some resources and a great YouTube tutorial to get you started.

History. QR codes haven’t been around for a long time so it’s no wonder why most don’t know about it. Get a taste of the history from the Denso-Wave website or on the QR codes Wikipedia page.

Application. How does this apply and how can you use it? Well, there’s mobile tagging. Imagine you are at the electronics store and you want to buy a stereo. You’ve spent six months researching and obsessing over it. It’s THE model. And they’re out of it. But you know you can get it online. Grab your cell phone, launch an application and snap the QR code on the shelf. After confirming the model, color and delivery options, it’ll be delivered to you in a matter of days. It’s a great way to enhance the buyers experience.

A good start. Marcello Di Pietro created a YouTube movie to explain how QR codes work with your phone.

How do I get started? We’ve been playing with this technology in house for a little bit and found several programs that will work. Most of them work pretty easily with a Windows Mobile device and iPhone, though we’ve had limited success with Blackberry phones. However, most of the world runs Nokia, which is a huge promoter of the technology and promises to incorproate a QR reader in future phones. Among them is NeoReader, BeeTagg and 2D Sense. Of course there are others.

Practically speaking… Until QR codes take off in the US, we imagine a lot of people won’t know what they are. So you’ll have to do some explaining. As you saw from the main page, the BBC embdedded their logo in the QR code itself, but maybe you’ll need to do some mousetype near the QR Code. You could also create a mobile-friendly renegade HTML page that links to apps that will get them started and get them what they need.

Other Applications. So you’re not ready to convert your New York Times full page to a giant QR code. But maybe there are some other applications. Our Jeff Woelker created a QR code t-shirt that can be read and directs you to a webpage. Or, if you really wanna be über-geeky, you can have the QR coded to automatically add you as a friend on someone’s Facebook page.