barcode scanners, anyone?

From: J.C. Wren <jcwren_at_jcwren.com>
Date: Sun Aug 31 22:24:00 2003

        Yea, that's the basic summary. The bitch was each CueCat had a unique ID, so
when you scanned a product, they'd note that. If the UPC of the product
wasn't one they knew about, you could enter the information. The whole
"payback" of the CueCat was that they'd build this database of customers and
products they were interested in, and do targetted marketing. And the whole
point of their baseless lawsuit was that people who were using the CueCat for
other than they intended were "depriving them of revenue". Of course, since
they *gave* the thing away, that case was uninforceable. Particularly since
they were sent unsolicted through the mail.

        They were kind of slick engineering in some respects. Wel built, very low
cost, and as I recall, they had a pretty good scan rate of success. The mods
in the 'net show how to read the scanned codes out (I think you had to XOR
everything with the unit ID, and delete some headers and trailers), and how
to defeat the ID part in the unit. But they're still pretty goofy looking.

        I had about 50 that I had acquired by asking for several ("me and my friends
need one") everytime I went to Tech America or Radio Shack. I eventually did
nothing with them, and gave them all to a friend of mine.

        --John

On Sunday 31 August 2003 22:34 pm, Mail List wrote:
> > You can probably find someone who will give you a CueCat. They look
>
> stupid,
>
> > but they work well enought, and there's lots of software on the web for
>
> them.
>
>
> Is that the ones they gave away free at Radio Shack? There was something
> they were giving out at one time to make it easier to shop online out of
> their catalog, but
> I never had the time to plug it in and check it out, so I don't remember
> the details all
> that well.
>
> At 10:26 PM 8/31/03 -0400, you wrote:
> >You can probably find someone who will give you a CueCat. They look
> > stupid, but they work well enought, and there's lots of software on the
> > web for them.
> >
> > --John
Received on Sun Aug 31 2003 - 22:24:00 BST