Tag Archives: Embedded systems

Pay Money, Scan Barcodes With Your Cellphone

ScanZoom, which allows camera phone users to scan barcodes to compare prices in stores and obtain other information and services, is now available. It will work with most camera phones, but there’s a catch: You have to pay $10 for the software, $10 for a special macro zoom lens, and another $5 or so to… Read More »

More On Camera Phones As Bar Scanners

Here’s more on a subject I looked at in December (and then promptly forgot about): Using your camera phone as a bar code scanner. Wired says there are at least four software companies that have released applications that let you take a photo of a bar code, which will then trigger the download of coupons,… Read More »

News: The Ugly Truth About The Self-Checkout Lane

 I live in Indonesia, which teaches you tons about credit cards and how easy they are to get fraudulent with. But at least here they don’t allow you to swan past security with riding lawn-mowers you haven’t paid for. From the Sacramento Bee, a cautionary tale about the self-checkout lane in supermarkets where you swipe… Read More »

News: When An ATM Isn’t An ATM

 From the These Thieves Are So Smart, Why Can’t They Get A Real Job Dept comes a story about ATMs. The Canadian Press reports of a scam in Ontario where the bad guys have rigged a number of existing bank machines allowing them to make working copies of customers’ debit cards by putting on a… Read More »

Column: Christmas stuff

Loose Wire — Have a Bidet Christmas   By Jeremy Wagstaff, from the 27 December 2001 edition of the Far Eastern Economic Review, (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc. For most of us, this Christmas is going to be what I would call (remember where you heard it first) a “bidet Christmas.” In a… Read More »