Microsoft Tag

Microsoft Tag is a new way you can put out links to web sites or whatever. The links are printed as patterns a bit like bar codes which you can read with your mobile phone camera. They use a cunning colour technology which means that even when they are snapped out of focus they can still be resolved into a readable address.

The tag for this blog.

The tags are linked through the Microsoft Tag site, which means that you can put expiry dates in them and the use of your tags is automatically logged so you can get reports on how much they are being used.

There are reader programs for most Smartphones including Windows Mobile, J2ME, iPhone, Blackberry and Symbian S60 devices. To work the phone needs a camera and of course internet access.

I'm thinking that when paired with a Polaroid PoGo printer, which prints sticky coloured prints just the right size for some text and a tag, this would be a very neat solution. I'm thinking about having a Tag treasure hunt at the next departmental bash. You can find out more about Microsoft Tag here.

Comments

[Wesley Mason]

I'm not quite convinced MS have brought much to the table with this, considering the proliferation of the well establish QRCode format, apart from the tracking, which frankly you could do yourself by linking to any stats/URL redirection service of your choice (or your own).

QRCode are decidedly more print-friendly too as well as still being suitable for display on a screen, I've used them in my comics recently to provide extra info on the front cover, next to the regular old UPC barcode.

[Andrew B]

It's PNG - great! :)

[Apart from for all IE6 users, welcome to the grey-effect]