User:Victuallers/QR Codes

QR Codes are one method of joining smart phones/people to the internet based on micro-position. There are 3 or 4 others I could name. It doesnt really matter which one you use - but the one thats in the lead is QR codes

If you have a brand new museum with identikit customers who are not disabled and all speak fluent English and do not want more or less information. Or more or less pictures.... and you have infinite resources to keep it up to date (or don't care)

Then you don't need them at all.

If you have limited resources, want to comply with the law and broaden your appeal to customers .... then QR code is the best deal Ive found so far

An example QR code by a Derby Museum exhibit

Derby Museum's experiment with QR codes allows museum users to use smart phones to access additional information. It has quickly been seen that this approach allows additional information available on an existing exhibit without rewriting existing labels and without any substantial expense. Opportunities to easily supply support for museum visitors who speak an unusual language or who are not fluent English speakers, blind or deaf are available. This essay discusses the options that are available and which can most easily be achieved. THe possibilities of this technology are so easy to install that it will be interesting to see which organisations use this ability first. The easy installation also throws up legal questions as the law in the US and the UK oblige organisations to do anything that can reasonably be achieved to prevent needless discrimination against the disabled.

Is it illegal to not use Wikipedia?

Derby Museums and Wikimedia UK have recently demonstrated the idea of having QR codes by their existing exhibits to allow Smart phone users to easily access additional information on the artefact. It appears that this is an easy way to give additional features to an existing GLAM display.

Language

Currently the phone user is directed to an article in English. This is as good as the existing signage in the museum but it is missing an obvious opportunity. One QR code implementation that we have seen described trys to solve this problem by directing QR code users initially to an intermediate page where the phone user can choose the language they require. This is not ideal as the point of the QR code is that it is Quick Response. Users should not need to do anything (like typing in a url) but they should be seamlessly taken to the correct article. How do we achieve this?

It would be possible to have a QR code for each language by each exhibit but this will add confusion and could only reasonably support a small number of choices. A Welsh museum that needed to support just English and Welsh could use this technique, but it is not going to look very slick but it would be easy to understand.

It might be possible to create a super wikipedia that contained a record to every article on any of the wikipedias in any of the dozens of languages. When the user accessed Wikipedia it would ask the users phone to specify the language and deliver the article in that language. This would require a lot of new work. What would be the name of this article before the language was specified? It may also be very difficult as there is no language in which every article is available. Therefore the super version may require polyglot complexity. Creation, organisation and maintenance are estimated to be high.

A solution considered is to ask wikipedia to improve its existing language switching lists so that a user who uses English, but who would prefer Catalan when available, could have a user defined button that would take them to their choice when an articlw was available at the touch of a button. This appears to be easily achievable and it would mean that Wikipedia would know each registered users second choice of language on any of the existing wikipedias. So for instance a Welsh and English speaker could browsw the English Wikipedia and would get a more obvious clue that a Welsh version was available. Admittedly this is almost available to users who are willing to look down the list of languages to see if Welsh is present. What is being suggested in this option is to make it more slick.

Another solution is to ask an App designer to sense that the phone user is accessing wikipedia and to use the infomation available on the page concerning the availabily of other languages to automatically switch languages depending on the phone owners preference. Why would the designer of a phone app or a phone operating system worry about this minor application?

Specialist Languages

The idea of choice of language has veen extended, at least within Wikipedia, to include similar concepts

• Simple Wikipedia is designed to allow people who are not fluent English users to access a version of an article in simplified English
• Spoken articles - Wikipedia allows articles to be accessed as a sound file
• Pictures - many articles have dedicated links to related pictures

Each of these three concepts can be mapped onto the existing construct of language in Wikipedia. Wikipedia supports different natural languages by creating a completly new wikipedia. Users of wikipedia can switch from an article in one language to another article written in another language. These articles are not usually translations and and infomation that they bothy present is a result of coincidence rather than design. The advantage is that articles i different languages are not machine translations that have never been read (or understood?) by another human being.

Wikipedia and the law

• In some countries (e.g. Wales) there is a legal obligation to try to supply information in more than one language. This can create a significant overhead for organisations like museums or art gallerys.
• In the USA and in the UK it is a legal requirement to make reasonable provision for people with disabilities. This is demonstrated by the use of ramps in new buidlings for wheelchair access. The "reasonable" bit is also demonstrated in that there is not always a ramp where the stairs are part of a medieval castle. This requirement is not limited to hardware. AOL had to withdraw a version of their software because of action brought und er the "Am ericans With Disabilities Act" This made it illegal not to make reasonable steps to avoid discriminating against users with disabilities. A court in Boston ruled that the law was "not limited to physical structures". The designers of the web standards are keen to point out that the software that is designed for the blind is useful for able bodied users too. Fighter pilots or satellite navigation users appreciate that information can be presented to them using just sound alone if necessary.

The ability of technology, like QR codes, to deliver not only sound files for the blind but also supporting images, more technical or simpler versions of the standard description and to supply versions written (not translated) in different languages may not only be useful, but in some cases necessary to comply with the law.

Assuming that the arguments above are correct then it is reasonable for application designers to allow phone users to switch languages. It is reasonable to make changes to Wikipedia to allow phone users to easily switch languages. It is reasonable for Gallrty, Library, Archive and Library keepers to add QR codes to their exhibits.

If these things can be done to improve accessibilty for the disabled and the cost is reasonable then noy only should it be done but it is legally enforceable that these must be done. If Wikipedia has the majority of your artefacts described in a more accessible way than your current information then it may be illegal to not supply a link to that information. Wikipedia probably also supplies access in more lanhuages that most institutions can afford to create and maintain. Accessing Wikipedia from your GLAM may not only make a substantial improvement but may also make sound financial sense.... and it may be illegal to do anything else.