From NY Fashion Week to Sharpie’s own print campaigns, these little data hubs are the gateway into a new world full of opportunities to unlock exclusive content from your favorite brands, including Sharpie! Now, the question is what do you do with them? Well, fear not because we are here to give you a step by step tutorial on how to unlock all the secrets of the QR code!

Lets start with a quick glance at our own beautiful renditions featuring this year’s advocates; Erica Domesek for Stained by Sharpie, Mark Rivard for Sharpie Mini, Cheeming Boey for Sharpie Pen and Marirose Weldon for Sharpie Liquid Pencil. 

To check out the secrets that lay just behind this tiny digital door:

1. Whip out that smarty, smarty, smartphone (iPhone, Windows Mobile, Nokia, BlackBerry, and other app-based phones with a camera built in)

2. Boot up your favorite QR reader, or, in the event your phone didnt come pre-loaded with this handy little app, you can download one, like RedLaser, ScanLife, Barcode Scanner, Shop Savvy or i-Nigma. (Caution: some code readers work better with certain devices. For instance, BlackBerry users may have greater success with i-Nigma and ScanLife.)

3. Point your camera at the code…

Scan ME!!

4. Congratulations! You are one step closer to revealing a whole new world of exclusive content AND look like a digital baller doing it. While you’re at it, scan the Sharpie ads above for a behind the scenes look at all of our advocates (yeah, I had to)!

On Saturday, August 27th Sharpie will stage a one-day takeover of YouTube’s home page and showcase the countless unique items that fans, just like you,  have started with Sharpie. 

Just imagine- for one day only, thousands of Sharpie images will come together to create,  not only one epic, and interactive, mosaic featuring all consumer submitted work, but a statement where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.  And don’t worry about being lost in the crowd– you will be able to find your individual submission through a simple search field, or scroll the full image landscape for a truly unique Sharpie experience.

Grab a Sharpie marker, pen,  liquid pencil or highlighter and be a part of the takeover, visit www.sharpie.com for more details and to submit what you started.

Coolhunter was first to post about them and inadvertently credit Sharpie for creating them.   IT WASN’T US, I’m sorry to say – although several posts have called us “genius.”  If anyone knows who is behind these, please let me know.  It’s like a Where’s Waldo adventure trying to get to the bottom of this.   Here’s a start:  What country is the license plate from in the photo?   

I haven’t heard about any sightings in the U.S. but would love to play with one myself.

What would you write on it?  What would be your message? 

Reminds me of another cool Sharpie use that went viral wild.  

 From Coolhunter:

Many of us have a fascination with graffiti art, and we sometimes even look over our shoulders to make sure no one’s watching when we scratch out our initials in a freshly laid slab of cement – or carve them into a wooden desk – or even scribble profanities across the stall door in a public restroom.

The creative minds working for Sharpie, the ultimate in permanent markers, have discovered a way to satiate our desires to deface public domain. Interactive e-cast billboards have been scattered around cities, which allow people to experience the rush of creating their own graffiti. Choose some colors, write a message and Sharpie makes it possible for anyone to leave his permanent mark on the side of the bus stop or the public phone or anywhere else billboard adverting may be experienced. 

* One thing we want to be sure to note is that the marks on the billboards are not permanent and that Sharpie does not condone the use of graffiti to deface property.