Oh, Qrap

qrapping_paper.jpg

I've been obsessed with QR Codes, those 2D tags that encode URLs and other information, for the last 18 months, having penned a couple of Economist pieces, and this item about bookmarkleting QR Codes here at BoingBoing. The inflection point in Seattle, at least, appears to have hit: I spotted six at a burger joint this lunchtime.

My friend Ren Caldwell knows my horrible interest in this matter, and she IM'd me a link (via several intermediate sources) to QRapping Paper. $19.95 buys you two 20-by-30-inch sheets of paper with codes that link to 50 different online videos. This includes videos like Harry Truman in Heaven, and one in which a gingerbread man torches his foreclosed gingerbread house. It's a pricey novelty gift, but clever.

I'm going to co-opt this idea. This sanctioned holiday period, every one of my gift recipients is going to get an empty but suspiciously heavy box wrapped in plain white paper with a QR Code pasted on top. The code will link to Never Gunna Give You Up. That's right: I'm gunna rickroll Christmas, all y'all!

(Ren's officemate Dan asked, "All I want to know is: is it pronounced 'crapping paper'?")

And with that, I…am…outta here on my guestblog gig! Thanks for the love, BoingBoing readers.