UPC Art : Form or Function?

An interesting piece in the Wall Street Journal has some really nice examples of gussied-up UPC barcodes. Which is more important- for a barcode to look pretty, or for it to function as it should, scanning accurately time after time? Clearly, done correctly, it can do both.

The Gray Lady Hips to QR Codes

You're the Boss, the small business tips column in the New York Times online today has a fun read about Ayara, a Thai restaurant in LA incorporating QRs into their menu.

And they remembered to optimize their QR landing pages for mobile phones- hurray!

QRdvark In the News

QRdvark, super-coolest free generator of perfect QR codes* and the awesomest QR-reading Android app in the universe** get an appreciative shoutout from Curtis Finch at Inc. Magazine this month.


QRs are finally hitting our shores, folks. QRdvark makes it easy to get your business into the palm of your customers' hands. Literally! If you've never heard of QR or think that apps belong on menus, grab your teenaged neighbor and ask them to bring you up to speed.



*this is 100% true. Also, the makers of QRdvark are very good-looking.

**scientifically proven in 1881 by Lloyd T. Rickenstacks, Certified QR-ologist and Town Barber/Veterinarian.

Free 2011 Calendar Download

SEATTLE-Once again, Azalea Software has release a series of four free calendars. The 2011 calendars are in PDF format and feature photographs with food visual puns. These free calendars can be downloaded from Azalea Software's website [ http://www.azalea.com/calendarhttp://www.azalea.com/calendar/ ] and printed on any inkjet or laser printer.

For almost 10 years, Azalea Software's founder and owner, Jerry Whiting, has designed calendars from family, friends, and business partners. All except the first year's have featured Whiting's photography. Every year's calendar has a distinct theme. Past calendars have highlighted graffiti, neon, orchids, and humorous signs.

"I've tried to quit making calendars a couple of times and my Mother and her friends insist otherwise. I'm not about to piss of my Mom and her friends." says Whiting. "Last year we stopped printing physical calendars due to rising costs. Instead we gave the calendars away online. Not only did we save money, we were able to share them with countless people around the world. The response was overwhelming!"

The 2011 calendars are one page, feature all the major holidays as well as the Azalea staff's birthdays, and offer humorous images throughout the year.

The calendars' names hint at their punchlines: key lime pi, nuts & bolts, diversity fish, and hot duck.

Download one or download them all. Link to them on your Facebook page. Give them away to strangers. Make your own if you think ours stink.

Azalea Software [Seattle WA], founded in 1992, sells barcode fonts and barcode software. They maintain The Barcode FAQ and have been known to mouth off in their blog, BarcodeNerds.blogspot.com

Lasers, Waffles and QR Codes

These are a few of my favorite things.

New York superdorks NYC Resistor organized an edible QR code competition and waffle batter got the laser treatment. Other foodstuffs included crackers, Chiclets and jello.

Amazing video here.

story via

Business FINALLY Discovering the Beauty of QR

Art galleries in Augusta, Georgia get into the QR act with window decals.

Italian cheeses- always delicious, and now smart phone-traceable!

Wine snobbery goes to a whole 'nother level with QRs on labels.


Seattle's Herbfarm restaurant QRs their menus.

Middle Tennessee Medical Center's new print ad is QR-tastic.

A New Jersey sign maker brilliantly hops on the QR wagon.

Beckley, West Virginia tourism gets a QR boost.

Nintendo's Japanese 3DS Will Include QR Codes

Mii Studio characters can be converted into a QR code that users can print or post on a website to share their Mii's. Friends then scan the QR with their 3DS camera to retrieve the Mii.



via IGN
image via Duck Fluff

Online Retailer Gets QR Codes Really Right

Fashion retailer Bluefly and Bravo have teamed up to create a commercial QR experience that's both useful and savvy.



45-second commercials running on the cable network feature QR codes along the bottom of the screen that when scanned with a cellphone bring up online extras, full-length video and special Bluefly discounts.



This is how QR should be done!

via the New York Times

Excel Spreadsheets & Barcodes

There's a way to put barcodes in Excel spreadsheets. Use Azalea's fonts and free Excel spreadsheets with macros.

Japanese Town Utilizes 2D Barcodes in Worst Way Ever

Sad, awful fourth-sign-of-the-apocalyse dating simulation game LovePlus+ and the resort town of Atami, Japan have joined forces to create the ne plus ultra creeptastic "romantic holiday" for terrible male humans.

2D barcodes are scattered at locations throughout the town where the men can have CGI-type pictures taken with their "virtual girlfriend".

At a dozen romantic locations in and around the town are three-dimensional barcodes which can be read by an iPhone. The barcode allows the love-struck visitors to have a computer generated photograph taken with their beloved through augmented reality technology. In the hotel, some beds have barcodes, so that photographing it reveals the virtual girlfriend lying there seductively.

The end is nigh, friends.

Print UPC & ISBN-13 Barcodes in Excel Spreadsheets (video)

A short video about printing UPC & ISBN-13 barcodes in your Excel spreadsheets using UPCTools. Use our free sample spreadsheets with macros that convert your data into a scannable UPC or ISBN-13 barcode.

www.azalea.com/UPC/Excel/

Creating Code 128 Barcodes in Excel Video

A short video about printing Code 128 barcodes in your Excel spreadsheets using C128Tools. Use our free sample spreadsheets with macros that convert your data into a scannable Code 128 barcode.



www.azalea.com/Code-128/Excel/

Hurricane Exhibit Utilizes QR Codes

The Louisiana State Museum's new exhibit Living With Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond incorporates QR barcodes to link visitors to in-depth information via their smartphones.

Audrey, Betsy, Camille, Rita, KATRINA - names that evoke memories of fear, loss, destruction. Unheeded warnings that Louisiana is washing away. A city under water. The desperation of people on rooftops unable to escape rapidly rising flood waters. Ordinary heroes. Failed levees. Failed leadership. A city struggling to survive. The kindness of strangers. Resilience. Recovery. Hope.

These are the stories of Living with Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond, a 6,700 square-foot interactive multimedia exhibition scheduled to open on the ground floor of the Presbytere in the fall of 2010. Living with Hurricanes will be the world's definitive hurricane exhibition. Combining authentic contemporary accounts, historical contexts, immersive environments, and in-depth scientific exploration, Living with Hurricanes will enable visitors to understand Katrina's impact on Louisiana, the Gulf Coast, and the nation.

via National Geographic Blog

App That Combats Texting While Driving

We all know how dangerous it is, and we all know someone who does it (occasionally that someone is us). Texting while you drive leaves you twenty-three times more likely to be involved in an accident. TWENTY-THREE TIMES.

Seattle developer Erik Wood has introduced OTTER (One Touch Text Response), a brilliant little phone app that offers auto-reply, car mode, and parental password controls. May it save a life. Or ten.

MSR Water Filter Field Cleaning

QR Codes On Tombstones

It takes some real creativity to surprise us with a new use for QR but this is simply brilliant.

QR Code Protects the Eyes of Innocents

Calvin Klein Jeans has found an ingenious way to deliver sexxay™ video in the very public square, without offending anyone's sensibilities.



(Right then and there, I mean. The video encoded in the QR is of negative artistic value and makes me barfy, feminism-wise, but what advertising doesn't do that?)

Barcode Beasties on Your Cellphone

The cutest new mobile phone battle game is proudly sponsored by the super awesome and very good looking folks at Azalea Software (okay, that's us).

Why? Because it's barcodes. Duh.



Visit barcodebeasties.com from your phone, or download directly here.

Microsoft Really Really Really Wants You to Use Their Tags. Really.

And they're partnering up all over the place to help you do just that.

What you really need is a (proprietary Microsoft) tag that's reliant on (proprietary Microsoft) servers to deliver you content (that's been logged by Microsoft but they probably most likely won't use for anything like intrusive marketing right because why?). And hey, pretty colors!

Never mind QR codes- you know, the free open-source barcode that's already in global use. Who needs open source? Piffle.

QRdvark 1.0 now available in Android Market

Download and install QRdvark from the Android Market.

QRdvark is a free QR scanning app. It scans QR symbols and reacts appropriately. QRdvark recognizes all common QR formats including URLs, contacts, SMS, email, and location, as well as standard barcode formats and GS1 identification keys.

"See it. Scan it. See what happens."

Google and the QR Barcode

Because we are Google's BFF (and huge G1 phone nerds) we love to see the big G dabble in the barcode arts.

Offering a new sort of checkout to Google merchants/Android users, a QR barcode is generated live at online ordering, the buyer scans with their Android phone and completes the payment that way.

A little convoluted for my taste (okay, a lot convoluted for my taste), and really nowhere near utilyzing the practically-magick potential of the QR, but everyone's got to start somewhere.

The iPad meets the CueCat

It had to happen sooner or later. Yes, someone somewhere plugged a CueCat into an iPad.

And it worked!

Cardboard G1 Cell Phone Stand

Hacking via Barcodes

Just when you thought it was safe to scan any and all barcodes, someone comes up with an attack using barcodes.

If you do use this technique, please buy your barcodes from Azalea Software. It's the least you can do.

Trader Joe's Double Barcodes

EAN-8's to begin with. Not one but TWO on the package (hire better staff and/or train them more). And that second one. Dude, what's going on here???

QR Barcode From Your Android Phone

Barcode Tattoo Photos Gallery

Azalea.com now sports a barcode tattoo photo gallery.

And while both of us are inked, none are of bar codes.

Think RFID is the answer? Read this!

Call me paranoid and yes I *do* own a tinfoil hat thankyouverymuch. I've always envisioned some badguy/badgal sitting outside a DC subway stop scanning all the federal ID badges that popped up above ground. CLONE!

Now comes word of this RFID emulator thingie.

Hand me my hat...

Google Ventures Into the Physical World

By using, of course, barcodes. The big G has "..launched a new effort to send window decals to over 100,000 local businesses in the U.S. that have been the most sought out and researched on Google.com and Google Maps".

Locate the 2D barcode decal at a participating store, snap it with your phone's barcode reader, follow the URL link to the web and behold: store hours, user reviews, special offers, whatever the retailer's loaded up on the intertubes for you.

We love this idea (and began implementing it locally a year ago but hey, when Google bites your idea it's a compliment) because our love of cellphone app gadgetry is second only to our love of real world barcode implementation.

Wonder how the folks at Yelp are taking it.

Free 2010 Calendars!

Azalea Software, Inc. and Peg Ogle Design have just released a series of free 2010 calendars for immediate download from www.azalea.com/calendar

The press release is available from www.azalea.com/news/2010-calendar-press-release.pdf

Get Azalea Software's 2010 Calendar (PDF)

Azalea Software's 2010 calendar can be downloaded from www.azalea.com/calendar/ for free.

Jerry's photos of industrial textures found in Seattle's SoDo neighborhood. You know, metal and stone.

Our holiday gift to you and yours!

I may be a barcode nerd but I have my limits.

I've been doing barcode software for almost 21 years now. At no time did I think it was necessary to learn how to read Code 39 barcodes in my head. Never.

Barcoded Lexus? Really?!?

Seen coming out of the parking lot of the Azalea Software offices here in West Seattle.

Goodbye Barcodes, Hello Lasers!

Ariel Schwartz of Inhabitat's got a quick piece up about "annoying" fruit labels and the new process of etching them with low energy lasers.

Not sure I've ever devoted much time to being annoyed by the tiny labels on fruits and veggies, but LASERS. We love lasers.

New Barcode FAQs

We just uploaded a series of new bar code FAQs: Code 128 FAQ, UPC FAQ, Code 39 FAQ, and Interleaved 2 of 5 FAQ.

Phew!

Our namesake

Azalea OR 97410
Why we're called "Azalea Software, Inc."

Google Recognizes Barcodes 07oct09

Make note: Today, Oct 9 2009, Google celebrated barcodes by making a bar code the icon of the day.

Thank you!


- the gang at Azalea Software, Seattle

How evil is your food? Scan the barcode to find out.

FoodScanner is an iPhone app that makes me wish I still had an iPhone.

Oh yeah, that's right. AT&T's reception SUCKS at my house. Happiness is a G1. Yes it is.

But still, the app is cool in that it adds a social, political, & nutritional bent to your shopping.

DIY Barcode Software

That's right. For those of you who want to roll your own barcode decoding software, here's a project you can sink your teeth into.

Consolidating the Barcodes in Your Wallet

You don't have to know much about barcodes to appreciate this suggestion. Of course it leaves the poor cashier to scan every shortcut on your dance card until the register beeps. Still, it leaves your wallet thinner. File this one under "ultralight shopping".

UPCTools Mac on sale now!

UPCTools for the Mac is now on sale for only $149, a savings of 25%, now through Aug 10th.

ordering details...

NeoMedia Business Model in 3 Easy Steps

1. Patent an existing technology

2. Shake down existing players for license fees (or, you know, sue the pants off them)

3. Compete directly with your licensees.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

AzaleaRSS Website Hosted On Cutest Server Ever, the Pogoplug

AzaleaRSS is both rockin and rollin, and now officially hosted in-house on the most adorable server you've ever seen.







CloudEngine's Pogoplug is a tiny Linux box, smaller than most laptop power supplies. It's made of a power cord, an ethernet jack, a USB port and rainbows.

Behold the Azalea server room:



We've got a whiteboard full of ideas for the next eighteen 'Plugs we buy. Love these little critters!

DataMatrix Barcodes On Irish Chickens

How did I miss this one? It's barcodes! On chickens!

Scientist at the Bioresources Research Centre at University College Dublin have created a way to place 2D DataMatrix barcodes on the beaks, legs and combs of the wee birdies in order to more efficiently track them.

They were careful to use non-alive birds for the testing however, bless their cruelty-free hearts.

“Although these experiments were carried out in the laboratory, real chicken body parts, sourced at poultry processing plants were used. No animals were purposely culled for this research programme as per UCD ethical committee directives.

“In real life situations, ways will have to be found to imprint the barcodes on to live poultry whilst ensuring the safety and wellbeing of the bird.”

Story via The Irish Times

New York Times Notes UPC Barcode's 35th Birthday

The Times takes an interesting look at the UPC code, grandaddy of all modern barcodes. Thanks again, George Laurer!

Bar Codes & beer. Together at last...

What can I say...

Barcode Game That Will Drive You Mad

For a few minutes at least. Gregory Weir's Bars of Black and White is a barcode-based 'escape from a locked room' game that challenges you to scan your way to freedom.

Scritchy-scratchy hand drawn illustrations and figuring out how to kill a big spider make it a whimsical way to waste some time on the company dime. Tell your boss that you're researching auto-ID and real world barcode implementation. That's what I did.

Free desktop wallpaper images

As part of the relaunch of our humble website, we've added a growing collection of free wallpaper images you can download.

So all of you bored with your current desktop background can grab one of our stone & metal, azalea & rhodi photos. They're great as cell phone wallpaper too.

Set a bookmark because there will be a lot more free photos and artwork to come.

Happy Birthday, UPC!

At 8:01 am on June 26th, 1974, the very first ever UPC (Universal Product Code) was scanned at Marsh's Supermarket in Troy, Ohio. The item? A 10 pack of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit gum.

Visitors Can Now Use QR Barcodes to Navigate Port Townsend, Washington

"PORT TOWNSEND -- Visitors to Port Townsend can now scan the city with more than just the naked eye.

Last week, a handful of barcodes -- which literally can be scanned -- were placed in locations throughout town in what's called the Way Finder Project.

Using a cell phone with Internet access and a camera, you can walk up to a code, scan it and pull up a Web site about the location."

That good ol' "Global Supply Chain"

It's not called a global supply chain for nothing. Shipping and distribution are assumed to be international these days. All over the map. Worldwide.

To that end we're now whispering about barcodes in Albanian, Arabic, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Filipino, Finnish, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Vietnamese.

Now that's global. And you just know there are barcodes lurking around in there.

azalea.com *finally* gets a makeover

We call it The Mother Ship, sometimes The Vending Machine. Venerable she is but neglected too long.

Over the looong weekend Azalea Software's website has been updated. Including new photos of us.

There's more yet-to-come. Much more...

AzaleaRSS: Free RSS Creation Tool Hits The Interwebs

Version 1.1 of Azalea's free RSS feed maker, Azalea RSS, is now available.

Azalea RSS is a quick and dirty RSS maker that walks you through creating your own RSS feeds. Based in MS Excel, it's user-friendly and as easy as falling off a log. And falling off a log is SO EASY. Trust me, I fall off logs all the time.

Give it a try, RSS wizards!

NeoMedia Wins One For the Dark Side

UPDATED 30 Apr 09: Interestingly, this post sat dormant for weeks and just today three new replies came in a flurry. What a coincidence! One talks of how TinyURL infringes on NeoMedia's patent. One is a reply to another commentor. And one, why, one suggests that I have no testicles! At all! Which is true! But rather a mundane fact to point out, and so angrily (also, Jim, water is wet!). And also, things may be "getting legal", yowza! Not sure what that means but it sounds scary, doesn't it? Eek!

Clearly this economy (and swine flu!) is affecting everyone, creepy mouthpieces for random strangers coincidentally interested in NeoMedia's "interests" and barcode bloggers alike.

Like I said, all y'all folks with dogs in this fight: I'd be taking notes and backin 'em up to hard disk if I were you.




ORIGINAL POST:
After protracted review, the US Patent & Trademark Office recently ruled in favor of evil attorney cabal tech company NeoMedia. For years NeoMedia has argued that they own absolutely everything having to do with barcodes + cellphones, and they own all barcodes + looking them up on the intertubes. They also own a patent on you. And your dog. And your mom.

While the Electronic Frontier Foundation valiantly begged to differ, devoting years and miles of effort, funds and reason to disputing this sort of mercenary dipshittery, it's all over now but the crying.

"Overbroad and invalid patents threaten to chill important innovations, especially for startups and other nascent entrepreneurs. It's important that technology in the public domain stays there." EFF Senior Staff Attorney Jason Schultz said in 2007.

The US PTO has changed all that in one fell swoop of patent validation. NeoMedia can now threaten and actively initiate lawsuits against anyone who creates, uses, promotes or dreams up anything having to do with their special corner of the auto-ID universe. Pay the NeoMedia licensing fee/s now, or pay them after a financially crippling lawsuit- it's entirely up to you!

This would be marginally acceptable if NeoMedia had created a unique technology of their own. But they didn't; these patents are based entirely on murky, factually-suspect claims of prior art. They now have a patent on using barcodes that they didn't create (which are based on font and image technology that they didn't create), with camera phones (which they didn't create) that take photos of said barcodes, the phone applications (that they didn't create) which translate those pictures into data (which they didn't create) which can be used to direct the user to a database (that they didn't create, and don't own) on the internet.

This means that if you scan a barcode that has a URL in it with an app on your cellphone, NeoMedia may attempt to squeeze cash from every developer in the chain: the maker of the barcode, the cellphone app developer, the cellphone maker, the cellphone carrier, and the owner of the destination internet database. Also, of course, your mom.

This means you, Google. NeoMedia's sure to go after the big guys first, right? Some dude who's running from blog to blog threatening lawsuits sure thinks so. Wonder if NeoMedia knows he's picking fights with some very big dogs on their behalf? Of course he could be NeoMedia's president and CEO for all we know (either way, I'd be making a hard copy or ten of all such blog and forum comments if I were, say, Scanbuy or ShopSavvy or ZXing..).

Whatever happens, it will certainly be interesting to watch. Pop some corn and pull up a chair.




US patent #6,993,573

US patent#7,383,209

Barcodes That May Just Prevent Vomiting (and Death)

Two University of Rhode Island researchers and a company called SIRA Technologies have teamed up to create temperature-sensitive barcode ink.

The fancy "proprietary thermochromic printing ink, printed in a non-scannable color..emerges to a scannable, deep magenta when activated. It is therefore capable of adding a temperature and shelf-life monitor to any other barcode thus preventing the sale of contaminated food and archiving the incident."

In English, this means that your grocer can't try to kill you/make a buck with expired products because the barcodes will change color and become unscannable. Man, barcodes really might save the world.

This Friday the 13th is also 1234567890 UNIX time!

In a couple of days it'll be Friday the 13th. Not just any Friday the 13th. It's also 1234567890 in UNIX time at 11:31:30pm UTC (11:31:30 here in Seattle). Read all about it on Slashdot (where else).

This should give all the 666 Mark of the Beast nutjobs something else to ponder.

"Two Steps Forward, 1,400 Steps Back"

An interesting article in Business Daily Africa takes a hard look at how increased business efficiency can lead to a slump in customer service.

"..modern technology came to their rescue by introducing the barcode. Today, every supermarket worth its salt has a scanner system for reading these codes.

In addition, virtually all manufacturers now print the barcodes on products to make it easier for supermarket staff: the bulk packages are now simply unwrapped and the items taken to the shelves directly. This saves a lot of time.

Unfortunately, a new problem has emerged: in the hurry to display products, workers do not take care to ensure that a price tag has been posted on the shelf next to the items.

[]The workload increases as demand for their products rises. Consequently, management begins looking for ways of making work easier for the company. Many times the improvements are made at the expense of customer services."

It's an excellent reminder that progress in business should always be tempered with an eye to that most valuable of creatures, the customer.

Azalea Software as part of Seattle software community

The Washington Technology Industry Assoc. did a wild map of the Seattle software family tree. I'm proud to say that Azalea Software is in the solar system, proud of our lineage as an Aldus spin-off. The only Aldus spin-off still around 16 yrs later.

The only surviving Baby Paul!

666 Mark of the Beast is about to come true!

So some goofball has just patented barcode tattoos for commerce.

Dude, you realize all those fundamental nutjobs are going to go nuts re: 666, Mark of the Beast, Book of Revelation, etc., etc.

Here we go...

Azalea Software Sponsors Winning Lava Lamp Webcam

Azalea Software, publishers of barcode software, are the proud sponsors of JetCityOrange's live Lava Lamp webcam, winner of EarthCam's "25 Most Interesting Webcams 2008".

Azalea Software hosts the webcam on one of its web servers. JetCityOrange benefits from Azalea's generous offer to house the two lava lites on timers and the webcam that broadcasts them across the internet.

This year's winning webcams was selected by a panel of celebrity judges including NY Nicks asst. coach Phil Weber, actor/comedian Pauly Shore, and Beauty and the Geek winner Amanda Corey.

Azalea Software RSS feed Now On Feedster

Azalea Software started the New Year by launching an RSS feed with news and updates about barcodes, barcode software, and related issues. The raw feed is: www.azalea.com/feed.xml.

The Azalea Software feed is also available on Feedster: feeds.feedburner.com/AzaleaSoftware

Coupon Barcodes

In these perilous financial times coupon-clipping is a really good idea.

Barcodes In Space

When you live and work in a tiny, airtight capsule for weeks or months on ends, things get a little messy. When over the years 150-plus roommates move in and out, leaving their various space tools and dirty socks all over, it gets to be a right pig sty. You can never find anything.

The solution, of course (as with all of life's challenges), is barcodes.

Yet Another Cautionary Tale of Inventory (Mis)Management

Volume forty-seven in this series is titled Maybe We Shoulda Kept Tracka' Our Guns, from the Fletcher, NC police department via BlueRidgeNow.

While running a recent inventory check officers discovered that four weapons were missing- including an M-14, a shotgun and two handguns.

“It could be the weapons were taken to a gun shop for repair and it was not documented,” [official George Erwin] said. “The guns could have been traded for others and no paper work was filled out. The guns could have been stolen.”

Oh my! But fear not, citizens of Fletcher, it might only be an inside job:

Erwin also pointed to the fact the department has had a high turnover rate recently and the guns may have been taken by former officers.

Phew! Sleep better now, won't you?



As always happens, the FPD is considering a comprehensive management system after the fact:

“We are making some changes due to this,” he said. “Previously, too many people had access to the supply room. Now we have one officer who has access to evidence and to the supply room. We are also looking to track the weapons by a barcode system.”

Sigh. Manage your inventory before it goes missing, folks.

Intro to azalea.com on YouTube

www.azalea.com introduction by Jerry Whiting, owner

The CueCat: it's *alive*!!!!

Damn CueCat just won't die. Now after all these years, it's been granted a patent! You gotta be kidding me. Someone's been paying a patent attorney all this time!!

Sh*t. Now I have to update my CueCat post mortem.

QR Barcodes for Barack Obama

With the election quickly approaching, QR barcodes decided they couldn't sit on the sidelines quietly any more. It's time 2D barcodes took a stand and had their collective voices heard.

It's unanimous: Barcodes for Obama

Lego QR Code

We all love QR barcodes though maybe not as much as Pedro Morales does. A QR bar code done in Legos. Whodda thunk?

Barcode Dogtags!

Nothing says loving like barcode dogtags! Take my word for it. Or, watch the video on YouTube.

Barcode Tattoo Photo Gallery

No sooner than I put up a new barcode tattoo photography gallery I run into someone working at my local plant nursery sporting yet-another bar code tattoo. Whadda the odds?

Rummaging around Flickr I'm no longer surprise how frequently photos of barcode tattoos turn up. I have literally dozens of barcode tat pictures on JetCityOrange too.

No, I'm not inked.

Steve Jobs has a barcode license plate???

I just got my first ever personalized license plate for my new Smart Car*. Now I hear Steve Jobs has a barcode license plate? How'd he do that?

Well, it isn't a bar code license plate but his car's VIN in a barcode under the plate. Glad we cleared that up.

* mine reads: 3JEWELS

Now it's Amazon and the CueCat

Hey, it's raining CueCats. Here's someone else talking about our favorite extinct auto ID kitty.

The CueCat Rides Again

Admittedly I'm a Luddite when it comes to tiny, expensive electronic toys; I never see the point and I hate carrying yet more crap around (plus they always make them so droppable. WHY WOULD YOU MAKE A THREE-HUNDRED DOLLAR CELLPHONE SLIPPERY?).

But it's with an extra jaundiced eye that I read a breathless review of the Groqit. It's tiny! It scans yer stuff! It keeps you from buying yet another copy of Steel Magnolias!














It's also already been done.

Barcodes in Schools. how long before the kids cheat?

From the Land Down Under comes a story of barcodes for kids' attendance. OK, so a parent wrote a barcode-based check-in system. Children as inventory. As a father of 3, I can relate.

My question is: how long before the little tykes realize they can photocopy their barcodes and have their siblings and friends check them in?

Obama barcode tattoos!

Barcode tattoos, how can you not like 'em? Barack? We love us some Barack.

Put 'em together and whadda ya git? Barack barcode tattoos, that's what! All of this of course begs the question, "Why didn't I think of this???"

Musical Barcodes from Malmö University in Sweden

If you love music and you love barcodes, how can you go wrong with this project? It's from Malmö Univ in Sweden and no I don't speak Swedish but I like what I see in this YouTube video.

The idea behind barcode beats is explained here. Sounds like fun! Do they do the Dead??

One More Reason To Never Leave the House

The NYT has a happy review of the new Ikan grocery scanner, a home countertop item that scans your empties and maintains an online grocery list for you. When the cupboards are bare simply log in, place your order and wait for your replacement sustenance to knock on your door.

Okay, so I love the technology. A consumer-level gizmo that reads barcodes? Yay! A gizmo that reads barcodes and communicates with the interwebs? Super awesome! An "online database of one million products"? Neato!

But we don't get outside enough as it is. Not one of us. We're isolated from other humans in ways unfathomable even 20 years ago. We work online, go to school online, shop online, chat online and meet potential dates and spouses online. Look, it's creepy. Internet-dependent living is just creepy.

I'm as web-addicted as the next nerd but I refuse to give up my scratch-paper-and-pen grocery list. I won't abandon my twice- or thrice-weekly trip to the neighborhood grocery store. At the store I can smell the birthday cakes being made in the bakery. I can ogle the olive bar, admire the asparagus mountains, fondle the navel oranges until I find just the right succulent few. I can chitchat with the checker, smile at the bagger, experience the actual sights, sounds, smells and sensations of an actual public place. And that's super duper awesome if you ask me.

Why we use barcodes for inventory management

This is a textbook example of why one wants to use barcodes for inventory & tracking purposes. Scan, hit the database, take the appropriate action.

Perhaps if CVS & RiteAid had relied on barcodes for tracking merchandise, said merchandise wouldn't be old and out of date.

Hey, wait a minute. Maybe investigators used barcode technology to inspect said stores! Barcodes to the rescue again.

Read the AG's statement here.

Hacking Barcodes!