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Fact #17

QR Codes Were Born on a Go Board

The black and white dots in a QR code were inspired by the stones in the board game Go

Justin Lee, Dumb Game Lab ·

QR Codes Were Born on a Go Board
Photo: Dietmar Rabich, CC BY-SA 4.0
Short answer QR codes were made in Japan in 1994, inspired by the black and white pattern of Go stones.
The QR codes you scan every day.
Photo: User1042, CC BY 4.0

The QR codes you scan every day. Where did this square pattern come from?

QR codes were made in 1994 by Denso Wave, a Japanese car parts company. At first, they were used to track parts in car factories.

Masahiro Hara, who led the development team, was inspired by the black and white stones on a Go board.

YauSo he came up with QR codes while playing Go?

The three big squares in the corners show where the QR code is. They use a pattern that almost never shows up in print, so they rarely get confused with other images.

QRshort for Quick Response

YauNow every QR code is gonna remind me of a Go board

Sources

  1. Wikipedia: QR code

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