Anyone not living in a cave in the late ’00s will likely remember the rash of QR codes that suddenly broke out and, just as suddenly, disappeared. Spotify, however, is hoping they can make a comeback as a convenient way to share music.
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Guest post Bobby Owsinski on Music 3.0
The QR code feels so yesterday. For a year or so you found them everywhere, then they all seemed to disappear at once, at least on a retail level. Spotify thinks that they can be a quick way for sharing music though, and it’s trying to bring them back only in a different form.
There’s actually some confusion over what Spotify is calling them. On it’s Twitter account last month it announced a new feature called “Spotify Scannables,” but its help page refers to them as “Spotify Codes.” Either way, you’ll notice that under individual songs, playlists, and albums, there’s now an addition of a soundwave-like barcode.
To use the code, go to your Spotify app, click the search button, and you’ll see a camera icon in the search bar. Hover the camera over the code and it should take you straight to the music. It’s fast and easy, but still involves switching to your camera app, which is what people didn’t like about QR codes in the first place.
This isn’t exactly a big feature, and since it just quietly appeared with no announcement, you get the feeling that Spotify isn’t exactly sure about it. Regardless, the audio waveform looks a lot cooler than the old standard QR code, which had nothing ascetically pleasing about it. Now the question is, will anyone actually use them?