Hey Weird, an Augmented Reality Tool that's Useful

To strengthen the US Postal Service's online chops -- and give augmented reality technology some bonafide useful marketing implementation -- AKQA/DC developed the virtual box simulator.

Here's how it works: you print a little eagle off the website. (This is so the system knows how big your item is, relative to something else.) Switch on your web cam and launch the Virtual Box Simulator. Hold the eagle up to the camera until a virtual box appears, then toggle the size to best suit whatever item you plan to ship.

If that was too many words to stomach in a sitting, it's cool, here's a handy-dandy video demo (upper right-hand side).

AKQA says this marks USPS' first-ever use of interactive video and augmented reality tools. Part and parcel of its current campaign, "A Simpler Way to Ship."

We enjoy. And props to AKQA for thinking outside of the... never mind.