Barcodepedia - a Social Network Barcode DB

Thor Larholm writes "Barcodepedia is a community-based online barcode database, where everybody can contribute whichever barcodes they have lying around on their crowded desks simply by holding it in front of your webcam. The database is completely free to use, and everyone is invited to participate. The site should be available in French, Russian, German and Swedish within a week, so get all your friends and go to your local store with a laptop for massive fun. Donations of cuecats and other specialized scanners are welcomed." Anyone who's read Bruce Sterling's book Shaping Things may immediately think of Sterling's concept of "spimes" — for those who haven't, Sterling's 2006 SXSW address explains a bit, too. (It's easy to create your own barcodes, too — and then, not quite as easily, you can use them to control your house.)

to your local store with a laptop for massive fun

Excuse me while I go back to sleep.

Why would I want barcodes to control my house?

There seems to be so many better and easier ways to control my house.
Now, if I wanted to keep a running total of groceries, or keep a list of items for insurance purposes, then I might consider doing it, but it still seems like an awful lot of work, for little benefit.

Re:Why would I want barcodes to control my house?

OMG, you like totally are not getting the hugeness of the enormity of such an innovative Web 2.0 use this will have on the impact of the world of stuff. Now, instead of going through a bunch of MySpace pages looking for friends, I can just go to MyBarCodes.com and automatically search for other people who have the exact same groceries as me! Then I can get good suggestions from what other people have bought from Amazon's groceries. OMG that will be so such a killa app for the Web 2.0. So you in the future friendz!$!

AAAhhhh CueCats

The Barcode DB is nice, but CueCats were even nicer. I made a lot by selling the modified versions on eBay in High School.... nothing like pure profit :).

Retarded

News for nerds, yes. Stuff that matters... to retards.

This might just be bigger...

...than Paintdrypedia, the community-based online database of images of paint drying. Everybody can contribute by pointing your webcams at freshly painted surfaces.

Re:This might just be bigger...

"Massive Fun?"

If you like that, you'll love my action packed front lawn web cam at watchinggrassgrow.org.

Re:This might just be bigger...

um, your website appears to be slashdotted.

this [watching-grass-grow.com] one is up and running!

More International Feel?

After a long decision process we have decided to change our name from barcoder to barcodepedia. This should hopefully give us a more international feel

Since when does changing an 'r' to a 'pedia' give you more international feel?

Re:More International Feel?

Since when does changing an 'r' to a 'pedia' give you more international feel?

I think it was recently mandated by the UNipedia

hhmmmmm

This seems so dumb that it must be some kind of evil plot to take over the world using barcodes.

What do barcodes have to do with "spimes"?

What do barcodes have to do with "spimes"?

edit history for bar code 780802 118257

# (cur) (last) 15:13, 20 March 2006 BarCodeManiac (Talk | contribs) (rv to BarCodeManiac - germ-fighting capabilities of product stated in NPOV manner)
# (cur) (last) 13:50, 20 March 2006 KueKatKlepto (Talk | contribs) (rv to superior format as per talk)
# (cur) (last) 13:24, 20 March 2006 BarCodeManiac (Talk | contribs) (rv POV vandalism from moronic editor.)
# (cur) (last) 02:56, 20 March 2006 KueKatKlepto (Talk | contribs) (rv)
# (cur) (last) 20:08, 19 March 2006 BarCodeManiac (Talk | contribs) (rv Klepto's POV edit - see talk)
# (cur) (last) 18:08, 19 March 2006 KueKatKlepto (Talk | contribs) (rv; please participate in talk. This version has been extensively justified and you have made no argument in favor of your counterintuitive version.)
# (cur) (last) 12:47, 17 March 2006 BarCodeManiac (Talk | contribs) (rv; KueKatKlepto is censoring valid information that has nothing to do with "clarifying whether or not this product will fight germs that may cause bad breath." Stop the nonsense KueKatKlepto.)
# (cur) (last) 10:10, 17 March 2006 KueKatKlepto (Talk | contribs) (lets clarify whether or not this product will fight germs that may cause bad breath)
# (cur) (last) 11:41, 14 March 2006 BarCodeManiac (Talk | contribs) (rv massive POV shift. KueKatKlepto you are erasing valid information in one massive edit -- edit a little at a time so we can discuss please, or produce a list of all changes in talk so they can be addressed.)
# (cur) (last) 10:24, 14 March 2006 KueKatKlepto (Talk | contribs) (lets be clear about who said what about what and when they said it, not all information about this product comes from the BBB; the BBB is biased and one-sided; restore deleted FOX News link)

Is there anything webcams can't do?

It's times like this I start to miss the 1990s, and looking at grainy pics of JenniCam's cat sleeping on a bookshelf for three hours.

Images?

How about some links to images from Flickr or something?

A simple question

Why? Why do we want or need an online barcode database? What good does this do? I can't seem to find this information anywhere on their site.

Re:A simple question

It has a million household uses! Well, uh... You can take inventory of your food and spices, scan them in and out of the refrigerator and cupboards, and let the computer tell you when it is time to make more. Well, you'll have to program that yourself actually. But let's say you have something that is missing _most_ of the label but still has the barcode intact. You can use this database to find out what it is! See how handy this is?

I have to wonder if these fine folks have heard of an already existing free UPC database? :)
http://www.upcdatabase.com/ [upcdatabase.com]

CueCat?

Is there software for me to use my CueCat with this database? I think I have 3 or 4 left.

YYYYYEEEEEEAHHHH!!!!

Holy Guacamole, Batman! This is the sort of thing I've dreamed of since the first moment I finally came to understand the enormity of the internet. Years of text chat and popup ad bullshit later, I've been a bit disillusioned about the whole deal lately...

BUT NO MORE!!!

Finally, someone has come along and actually put the internet to the sort of use that we've been dreaming of for so long. I mean, Xbox Live was one thing, but man, it just doesn't compare with holding random shit up in front of a webcam and help create a database of barcodes.

The creation of this site may even come to be known as The Singularity (I know, the word is overused, but it's really warranted in this case). Think of it. How could you even dare to imagine what the world will be like after a social network revolving around barcodes? There's only two things we can truly be sure to find on the other side of The Singularity: sentient robots and faster-than-light space travel. All thanks to the power of a database of barcodes.

You heard it here first, people. BARCODEPEDIA IS OUR NEW GOD!

This is kinda neat!

This is actually kinda neat, but I'm a developer who gets involved with things like this. Where else can you get an index of products, and their barcodes? I had thought of building one, but it looks like there's no longer a need to. I'll certainly be contributing.

Should be part of "reorder.com".

As a hobby, it's silly. As a part of something like "reorder.com" [reorder.com], it would be useful. Show your webcam the barcode on any product you've got, and it finds someone who will sell you more of it, then adds it to a portable shopping cart. Grocery and drugstore sites should have had this by now.

Weird Format

Too much flash (8!) for my taste, no images... if there was an obvious way to export the data it'd be more useful to me dumped into a MySQL db.

Flash 8

But the webcam-based scanner tool won't work on anything besides Mac OS X and Windows because it requires Flash 8. :/

Barkopedia

At first I thought it was a collaborative project to decode dog language. Alas, I was mistaken.

Let's Beat up Wm. Gibson, Just on Principle

Anybody else remember the days when Science Fiction writers actually sat down and wrote some friggin' Science Fiction, instead of travelling around to pretentiously acronymed multi-disciplinary conferences foisting their ridiculously named neologism-wannabe terms around like they thought they were the 21st Century's version of Arthur C. Clarke, sans boys?

Anybody...?

Christ, I want four-armed Martians and time anomalies and big honkin' mechs and sexy androids and crew-cut space marines, and your giving me SPIMES? Hey, if I see Sterling "in concert," will I have to sit through some smug intro where the moderator (from the cable TV industry or NASDAQ, I'll bet) tells us how, despite how "hi-tek" the author is, he still writes all his manuscripts on parchment using the juice of mashed berries and JuJubes? Cuz that's the part I always look forward to...

WRITE!! Jeezus, God, Mary, and all the goddamn archangels in Heaven, WRITE! A Story! With characters!! and an ending that makes me happy, or leaves me wondering and wanting more, but please, just lock your fuckin' luggage in the attic, lose the key, and WRITE A STORY!

kk. thanx. better now...

For all the critics

Hi all

For all critics of the page, I just want to clarify that the page is not done yet. As some of you might have noticed its not navigable in the user section when not having JavaScript tuned on and the language translations are not done yet.

We do however count on having all this fixed in the middle of next month.

Guess slashdot comes when you least expect it

Regards
        -Chris Benjaminsen

CueCat

Wow. Somebody is finally trying to fulfill the Digital Convergence "vision."

Flash 8 needed

I love the way the site proclaims to me "you must have flash player 8", well actually, no I don't.

Barcode Porn

Those guys clearly get out even less than slashdotters, so I think they need some help. The question is how best to encode Jenna Jameson in barcode? I think a barcode version of ASCII art would probably work best, I doubt they'll be able to appreciate base64-encoded boobies.

Re: Barcodepedia - a Social Network Barcode DB

Aside from the obvious yawn factor I have to wonder, at least a little, the worth of such a venture when bc's will be replaced completely by smart chips in probably as little as 10 years.

To evolve on this idea

What if google were to implement a sort of barcode scheme where you could use your camera phone to take a picture and get results of nearby locations or competing prices

Barcodes Are Interesting

Now hear me out. I have read on various top 100 lists over there years, that barcodes are one of the most important inventions in human history. Reason being because of logisitics. We could simply not have the engineering projects, economic growth, etc with them (or in an alternate universe, some other method). As for my own experience, I used to work at a company that built variable data printers, meaning unlike regular printers, the content could change with each print. So in this case, barcodes was our core market. I probably know more about barcodes then anyone really should have to know, but once you get the hang of a couple, like anything else, there is no great mystery to them. Code 3 of 9, Code 128, UPC, Matrix, etc are your friends! And for the hardcore /. crowd, barcodes are not RFID!

This is a spime? This is 22.9% of a spime.

I'm darned if I see how it provides "tools to virtually construct nearly any kind of object," "Ways to rapidly prototype virtual objects into real ones," or implements "'Cradle-to-cradle' life-spans for objects: cheap effective recycling."

It appears to me to have, by my account, approximate 1-3/8 of the six facets of spimes [wikipedia.org].

This seems more like Where's George. [wheresgeorge.com] But less interesting.

Finally!!

Now I'll have the ultimate warrior!! [skannerz.com]

I can think of thousands of uses...

But they're all ideas for sites I could make money from, so I won't. This just reaffirms that Slashdot is primarily made up of people without a creative thought in their heads.

this allows for interesting possibilities

sounds dull on the surface, but imagine another wiki database interfacing with the barcode database where you can look up company information/product information to determine things like: * what country your product was made in * whether or not they use child labor/sweatshops * what company/parent company the producer is owned by * what political parties those companies give to * what the environmental track record of the company is it could allow people to become smarter consumers.

UPC Database

This site [upcdatabase.com] seems to do the same thing without the nifty webcam-scanner and has been around a lot longer and is cue-cat compatible. It probably has much more in its database.

Used for Stealing.

This will make it much easier for theives to "legally" steal from stores.

Let me explain. . . .

An theif duplicates the barcode of a cheap item, say a pair of jeans that was on clearance at a particular sotre, say Walmart. Then that theif takes his/her duplicated barcodes (on labels) and applies them to a more expensive pair of jeans. Then they proceed to the "newest" clerk at the checkout lines, and proceeds to purchase a number of the jeans at the clearance price instead of at their retail prices.

Now there will be a database so the theif can do more of their work in the safety of their home. How nice!

crazy

I used to work with a guy who for fun would memorize barcodes. He even informed Crest or Colgate of an error in one of their barcodes and got a big stack of coupons.

of course, we just called him crazy. I guess we should have called him visionary.

Giant Crab

Strike its weak spot for massive damage

Obligatory slashdot-ism:

I, for one, welcome our new barcode overlords.

Had to be said.

nothing to do with social networks

At least as it now is, this site doesn't appear to have anything to do with social networks--nor does it claim to. Apparently the submitter either (a) knows something about the site that the admins haven't chosen to release or (b) assumes that any community site must automatically be a "social network" thing.

an excuse for my pocket barcode scanner

Now with my portable pocket barcode scanner, a laptop, and wifi, I can know what is inside any can, the size of any pair of jeans, or the name of any product ever!

Or I could just look at the label.

great snapshot of Slashdot readers' lifestyles

The data may be duplicated elsewhere, but some of the statistics are fun. Considering that they're probably Slashdotted right now, the list of latest entries in the database rocks. [barcodepedia.com]

Latest 25 products

        * SPAM - Hickory Smoke flavor
        * Dr. Pepper
        * Python Pocket Reference, 3rd Edition
        * Kleenex Brand Facial Tissue
        * Windows XP Home Edition Upgrade
        * The Duke Spirit - Cuts across the land
        * Kingston SD Memory Card - 1Gig
        * Mates of State - Bring it Back
        * Starship Troopers (DVD)
        * Ibuprofen Caplets 200mg
        * Seattle Metropolitan Magazine
        * Diablo: #1 Legacy of Blood
        * 108Mb Wireless CardBus Adapter TL-WN610G
        * Chock full o' Nuts Coffee
        * Wente Vineyards Merlot Arroyo Seco Monterey 2003
        * Wings of Fury
        * Dr. Pepper
        * Lay's Kettle Cooked Original Extra Crunchy Potato Chips
        * Crazy Jack Organic Sun-Dried Raisins
        * Elektra DVD
        * Epoxy/Aluminum Putty Stick
        * Canon Zoon Lens EF-S 17-85 mm f/4-5.6 IS USM
        * Expo Fine Point Dry Erase Markers - 4 Color Set
        * MySQL Pocket Reference
        * Dig into Rocks: Minerals and Crystals

Remembering all barcodes ;-)

I don't need Barcodepedia, I can already memorise all barcodes. They start with black, then white black white black white black white black white black white black white black white black white black white black Try, it I'm right!!!! A.M

webcam barcode scanner

he barcode-scanner-flas-thingy didn't work for me.
anybody know of any good and free programs that can scan barcodes from a webcam? in the worst case from a snapshot taken from a webcam? the real scanners are just too expensive, if webcams could do the same.

CueCats

I still have about 2,000 of these in my storage unit. I should sell them. Or donate them.

unprecented user-centric web graphics

It's a ground breaking theory object. It's an unprecedented astonishing piece of my job description, which is to drop lit matches into the wet bog of unrecognizable distributed intelligence of cyberspace. The creator is Frankenstein, running wild with radical atheist poets. The legacy people must become the change I want to see in the european dissident crowd. I am fearless and brilliant. The center does not hold, for its the end of history... Milosevic was a bad leader.

Now if I could just web-enable my BarcodeBattler

Finally, the ultimate weapon!

http://www.consoledatabase.com/consoleinfo/barcode battler/ [consoledatabase.com]

I knew I held on to it for a reason.

Re:In Related News...

I'll gladly wear a prosthetic forehead on my real had, as long as I get a rock to wind a string around.