Dear LPG, 

If you look at one of these black-and-white square things too closely, you can end up losing perspective and going a bit giddy, but there are more and more of them cropping up in the most unlikely places lately, and they are getting harder to ignore. It got me asking the question, why? 

A quick look at the internet taught me a thing or two which I feel the need to pass on so that those younger members of our families won’t have another excuse to call us old fashioned and behind the times. 

They are called QR codes (quick response codes), and although I have seen the odd one in recent years, they have become a sight we have all got a bit more used to recently. It is a code. Still, you can learn nothing by just looking at it apart from that dizzy feeling that I mentioned earlier, and this is because they are not designed to be looked at by human eyes. However, if you have a mobile smartphone, you will likely be able to work out what it is all about.  

From what the internet tells me, it is all about the position of the little black squares in relation to the three distinctive black squares found in the top two and bottom left-hand corners. While I did find an explanation, I am none the wiser for having taken a look at that.

Shops seem to stick to barcodes, but these QR codes are everywhere. I have seen them in street adverts, leaflets, newspapers, and letters, and if you are interested in discovering more about something during some television adverts, you now have to watch with your phone at the ready… 

Something else I have learnt about them is that scammers are also learning how to generate them; it is becoming easy to develop them yourself, or at least that is what the internet tells me. 

They usually lead you to a link much like the ones that LPG leaves at the bottom of many of their posts, but the beauty is that you don’t need to copy anything to get them right the first time, and the only thing you need to touch is your phone. You can understand why people preferred them during the pandemic when touching anything was risky.

I advise you not to study them with your eyes too closely because if you are anything like me, you will go seriously boss-eyed quickly. Just use your phone…

TI, Catford 

TI shares a little more about QR codes but warns that you might need someone who knows a bit more to really explain it to you… 

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.. and here is  one of those television adverts she was talking about…

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