Last weekend was essentially geek heaven down in San Diego. More than 125,000 fanboys, geek girls, and overall pop culture enthusiasts descended upon the town to indulge in everything genre and sci-fi related. With such an enthusiastic crowd, it should come as no surprise that attendees are at the forefront of consumer technology who consider themselves early adopters. Every year, new gadgets, and therefore practices on how to incorporate them on the exhibit floor and in panels, pop up to get everyone buzzing about the latest in television, movies, video games, and yes, even comics. Two years ago it was Twitter, last year it was FourSquare, and this year it seems that a new trend had come to roost.
This year, the new belle of the ball was QR Codes. Every booth seemed to have a QR code to scan. Instead of entering giveaways with an old fashioned pen and paper, people would scan the QR code with their smartphones to enter to win. Want to watch the trailer for the WB movie you just passed a poster for? Scan it to pull it up on your phone. One booth was even having a scavenger hunt throughout the convention center via QR codes, where one scan would direct you to the next, and the first to the end won a box set of comics and prizes.
On top of the tangible prizes, entertainment check-in service Get Glue got involved in the fun too. For a few of the TV and movie panels, those inside got a postcard with a QR code to scan to receive a Comic-Con exclusive Get Glue sticker. As a social media enthusiast, I live-tweeted the panels I attended and these Get Glue stickers are so desirable that random people on Twitter were asking me to post the picture so they could check in too. They searched out people tweeting about certain panels in hopes they’d respond with the pic to get that coveted check-in, regardless if they were actually watching it or not.
As Comic-Con is essentially a gathering of 125,000 of those at the forefront of technology, it’ll be interesting to see how QR Codes continue to be adopted and utilized in less tech-savvy gatherings. Given their success at this event, I expect to see them shape even more event experiences in the future.