Yesterday, the Taiwanese Student Association (TSA) held a traditional Taiwanese night market at UW’s Red Square. The place was packed with enormous amount of people, and there were long lines to buy the food. Sadly, I didn’t eat any food because it was too pricy for me, but some things other than food caught my attention.
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| A somehow rare scene, someone scan QR code |
Look at this! I quickly took a snap at this man, who was scanning a QR code on the flyer. This flyer’s content was nothing more than a hyperlink and QR code, and the man choose to scan it! The QR code will bring you to the night market’s mobile website, which includes various information like food stands, menu, parking places, maps, and etc. There was no printed catalog for the event. I thought this was a great idea for tourism. At Taiwan’s tourist attractions, you would see different types of language’s brochure and catalog. In a place like National Palace Museum, there are at least 10 different language of pamphlet. What if the catalog of certain languages is all out? Sometime even I have to use the English map because they were out of Chinese. In this case they could print a notice at bottom of shelf and say “please link to xxx to get info” with a QR code for quick access. This way people could get a quick update, and these site could update instantly without forgo their whole batch of pamphlets just because misspelling (which happened a lot).
QR code might be dead in few years, but until there are better ways to replace how people access information, QR code can still stand for the competition.
Another thing interested me was the exchange money stand.
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| Square device used as ATM machine |
Didn’t bring your cash? No problem! Swipe your credit card by using the Square device and get your cash instantly! This was quite new to me because I always thought the Square device was for ordinary b2b or b2c, like buy lemonade on food stand or pay your tuition to your spiritual mentor on the Alps. However, this redefined Square as walking ATM machine.
What if… this is applied in an underground gambling site? Didn’t bring your cash? No problem! Just swipe your card and you can get your chips. Instead getting your merchant, you receive a monetized currency as a product you bought.
Finally, I was probably one of very few people who took pictures with a digital camera (and it’s not even mine…). Most people took pictures and videos of the performance on stage by their cell phone. This reminded me the photo comparison between 2005 and 2013 papal conclave photo. How shocking it is technologies have changed within few years. It is not even a decade and new technologies have shifted our behaviors and interactions on different events.
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| People use their mobile devices to record events on stage |
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| Papal conclave |
http://gothamist.com/2013/05/03/instagram_your_meals_study_says_you.php
Few days ago there were articles about people who obsessed with taking pictures on food may have mental issues. With the new Google Glass, would this device turn into as new equipment for food fetish voyeurism?
OS: Hey! Stop staring at my cheese! That's creepy!
I was there last Saturday. Though I didn't notice the flyer, I agree the QR code menu is such a considere move. Every line of the booths was really long so I had to check the menu in front of the vendor and joined the long line behind. The process was not very efficient so I ended up only buying one food in the event. I personally prefer the traditional environment of the night market instead of too modern and system with technology. For me, it lose some kind of atmosphere...
ReplyDeleteSquare as ATM? Really? I wonder if it's doing a true 'cash advance' on your credit card? Also, where is all the cash being kept? In the booth? Security Alert!!
ReplyDelete