Back in the late 1990s, the world was first introduced to the CueCat, a consumer-aimed handheld scanner which allowed users to simply scan barcodes in printed publications rather than type in arcane web addresses. I can’t help but see a correlation between yesterday’s CueCat and today’s QR Codes. Both were aimed at consumers and driven by marketing. What I really wanted to know was if the world was finally ready for the second coming of the CueCat, or if history was about to repeat itself.

Apparently I am not the only one wondering the QR Codes’ fate. Archrival—a youth marketing agency—wanted to know if it made sense to force feed these barcodes on the populace and looked to the one demographic that could make or break a trend—college students. From Archrival:

Here are just a few of our findings:

• 81% of students owned a smartphone
• 80% of students had previously seen a QR code
• 21% of students successfully scanned our QR code example.
• 75% of students said they are “Not Likely” to scan a QR code in the future.

QR codes do enjoy a high-level of awareness among college students yet only a fraction (21%) could properly scan and activate the code. Why the discrepancy? According to our findings, students simply struggled with the process. Some didn’t know a 3rd party app was needed, many mistakenly assumed it could be activated with their camera, and others just lost interest, saying the activity took too long. This could be why 75% of students said they were “Not Likely” to scan QR codes in the future.

This mirrors my experience when I tested QR Codes for the first time. Even with the convenience of the App Store, I still had to spend time determining which QR Code scanner to install. Then came the painful scanning process. It took me multiple attempts before the app recognized the barcode, only to find out that I was being sent to an advertisement. With all the ads we have thrown at us on a daily basis, why would I want to knowingly subject myself to more?