Stephen Years Dot Com

Via the Los Angeles Times:

Last fall, social media entrepreneur Seth Goldstein was hanging out with ace programmer Billy Chasen in Manhattan. They had a pastrami sandwich at 2nd Avenue Deli then walked the streets, chatting about different ways to leave digital traces in the physical world.

A few weeks later, Chasen seized on the idea of creating stickers with bar codes that could be scanned by Android phones or iPhones.

You could put the stickers on any object. Then you could attach a message to the bar code: say text, a photo, music or a video that anyone could then scan with their smart phone.

More messages could be embedded and anyone who scanned the bar code could see the stream. People would be notified when someone picks up their message. Each scan and related message would carry a location tag so you could track the object’s movements.

Like other location-based services, this is technology that no one could have imagined or afforded before the advent of the smart phone, Goldstein said. The more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that tagging the physical world with digital data via a smart phone could have endless possibilities for consumers and businesses.

Stickybits was born. Goldstein and Chasen got the backing of software mogul and philanthropist Mitch Kapor and venture capital firm Polaris Ventures. In 100 days and with $100,000, they went from concept to launch. Their tag line: “Tag your world.”

The mobile app is free. Stickybits is selling packs of 20 vinyl bar code stickers for $10 apiece.

Link to article. Link to Stickybits.