Begging for the future, or how I slept with a QR code in my hands under the Google office in New York

I think you already understand what the essence of the idea is, but just in case I'll sign for it. In the photo, I sleep right next to the Google office in New York. Next to me is a sign on which the QR code is displayed with acrylic. As you can guess, in the QR code there is an encrypted link to the page I created on the Internet, which describes why and why I need to give a lot of money right now.

Prehistory

I have been hitchhiking around the world for the past year and a half, and at the end of November, I ended up in New York. It so happened that my computer ordered to live long, but there was no money for a new one. It was the middle of December outside, and the whole world was preparing for early holidays. There was absolutely no money, and Habr read the hunt. One fine Brooklyn morning I had an idea to get a new computer from New York for Christmas.
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Why a QR code?

New York is a begging mecca. The classic ways of street earnings here have become a legitimate business. For example, all the musicians of the New York subway have a certificate, work schedule, and, of course, taxes. The same with dancers, living statues, portrait painters, street comedians, etc. There are also simple tramps who have no permits, but their income level is much lower.

I decided to use the QR code because:

• This is an original idea. At least, I do not know a single case of using the code for such purposes.
• It is difficult for the police to convict me of begging, because the process is implicit. (As practice has shown, this is indeed the case. Not a single policeman passing by during the rally paid me any attention)
• Very reluctant to go to the normal emigre work.

Implementation

In a hurry, I sketched the site with its history. On the page where users go to the scanned code, I’ll tell you about the adventures that have happened to me in different countries of the world with photo illustrations.



For those who have no cash, or those who go to the page through the web, I screwed the buttons of payment systems.



Qr-code painted for three hours. For those who decide to repeat my feat, I advise you to immediately use black paint, because the red code in poor lighting completely refuses to read.

Why not just print a QR code on the printer? Because the street is a stage, and your view plays a big role. A hand-drawn QR code on a piece of paper will complement your image of street freak, but the same code printed on the paper paper will be issued by an office clerk.

In fact, I did not expect to raise money on the street. To a large extent, I was hoping to get on Facebook and Instagram pages of curious passersby. In total, I spent three days in different parts of New York, waving a QR code.

Chronology

On the first day, I walked around the Apple Store on 5th Avenue in Manhattan. I spent about five hours on the street. How many times do you think inquisitive Americans, intoxicated with pre-holiday sales, scanned my code? Right! Never! No one even took a photo for memory. Overwhelmed, I returned home to review my strategy. Obviously, the passers-by were just too shy to point the camera at a living person, albeit with a QR code going. At first, I thought of making a helmet out of a cardboard box, and putting a QR code on both sides. But then he thought that it would be enough just to cover his face with a sign and take a fixed position.



The next day I decided to go to the Williamsburg area, where advanced youth live. I lounged on a Highline park bench and covered my upper body with a QR code. It worked - the camera clicks and the sound of QR scanners began to be heard. A few hours later, photographed from all sides, with a sense of accomplishment, I returned home to check the bills. 117 dollars from five users were waiting for me on Paypal wallet! Of course, this is good news, but the laptop is still not enough.

While I was lying on the bench, fragments of conversations of passers-by who scanned the code reached me. Many of them took my action as a performance, and indignantly argued that again some rogue simply decided to knock out their money.

I did not want to deceive people, so I decided to refine my image to the end. The next morning, I went straight to the New York office of Google, lay at the corner of the building on the sidewalk, put my backpack next to me, washed down a selfie on my memory and covered myself with a QR code ( see the first photo ). On this day I managed to raise a little more than two hundred dollars. On the normal technique is still not enough, but do tramps choose?

Conclusion

Relying on my knowledge and experience in begging on the streets of different countries, I can say that the method with the QR code is far from the most effective, and can be used in literally several megacities of the planet. I did not manage to gain a critical mass of links to a page on the web in order to provide any intelligible statistics. However, it was a good experiment.

I hope you were interested!