No shit?

The UPC barcode is 30 years old! Go figure. Didn't seem that long ago. Via South Knox Bubba:

[. . .]

It was met with more criticism than even Michael Moore could have mustered.

Union representatives said it would steal American jobs. Conspiracy theorists believed it was intrusively "Big Brother." Some Christians thought it hid the number 666, representing the Antichrist. Television talk-show host Phil Donahue claimed it was a corporate plot against consumers.

[. . .][My emphasis]

See what I mean about . . . you know . . . them.

Yeah, I know. Read the whole story here. And Happy Birthday to the Universal Product Code!


And it wouldn't be right if I didn't lift this either:

Other technologies, such as radio-frequency identification tags, may one day replace it, but the lowly UPC improved efficiency and supply-chain control almost invisibly. One of the few times it gained media notice at all was in 1992 when President George H.W. Bush marveled at it during a campaign visit to a grocers' convention in Florida. His reaction added to a perception that he was out of touch with the public, because many people were by then well acquainted with the technology.

The UPC code is a Democrat.