Article

2010-06-22 Economy

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Posted by twobyfour 2010-06-22 07:53|| || Front Page|| [11124 views ] Top

#1 Ummmm...

GS1 is the standards body that administers barcode prefixes. The link is dramatically out of date.

Here it states:

"GS1 Prefixes do not provide identification of country of origin for a given product. They simply provide number capacity to different countries for assignment from that location to companies who apply. Those companies in turn may manufacture products anywhere in the world."

A certain logic exists that buying 'US' sends the profit back to the US, but in this so-called 'global economy' and, as the liberals would have it, 'free-trade system', that supports the shipping of jobs overseas, there is little comfort in buying decisions based on 'barcodes' that still may send $$ overseas, for manufacturing (not to mention shareholders).

Consumers need to be more savvy than simply relying on 'barcodes'...

Posted by logi_cal 2010-06-22 09:58|| 2010-06-22 09:58|| Front Page Top

#2 Read the label. All products, except unpackaged food, show the country of origin. It just may be nobody has seen a "Made in USA" label in many years, but it does exist.

Posted by ed 2010-06-22 10:18|| 2010-06-22 10:18|| Front Page Top

#3 A good point. I mentioned the bar codes for orientation purposes where the country of manufacture is not stated on the product label or the product is distributed by a trading company within US & CA. For instance, pet food. You simply want to avoid Chinese made pet food. The bar code is a good indicator.

Posted by twobyfour 2010-06-22 10:26|| 2010-06-22 10:26|| Front Page Top

#4 You simply want to avoid Chinese made pet food.

Do you know which foods the Chinese are putting pets into?

Posted by phil_b 2010-06-22 11:03|| 2010-06-22 11:03|| Front Page Top

#5 So, Rantburg is going away from War on Terrorism news and into the latest urban legend in the inbox?

It's not verified? Then why the hell post it? Do five minutes of google research before posting it here! Jeez, some people!

PS if you have a link dealing with the story, put it in the "Source" field and not in the body of the article as non-clickable plain text. THANK you.

Posted by gromky 2010-06-22 11:27|| 2010-06-22 11:27|| Front Page Top

#6 Gromky, though stated as not verified at the beginning, verified later (the "seems to be confirmed" should give a clue).
Second, the link is not the source of the story, just the list of bar codes and countries.
Third. My pet cat decided to press enter, before I could URLize the link. She simply does not have a concept of something behind something yet, despite me trying hard to explain, so she thought I am finished with the post, I think. ;-)

phil_b, switch pets and food around. E.g. food for pets, not food of pets. Though, I can't exclude the second.

Posted by twobyfour 2010-06-22 11:50|| 2010-06-22 11:50|| Front Page Top

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Posted by 2010-06-22 12:55|| 2010-06-22 12:55|| Front Page Top

#8 I'm a big fan of data matrix bar codes. It is public domain, scalable, and can hold over 3,300 extended alphanumeric characters. It can be encrypted just by using encrypted text, and includes error checking.

I can see a big use for it as the reverse side of scrip currency, if the dollar goes nuts with deflation or inflation. As such it would be a totally price and value controlled currency, literally registered to an individual until transferred. So no black market, and the currency can be printed on plain paper.

You could carry the equivalent of tens of thousands of dollars on a thumb drive, and nobody could use them but you, with an authorized retailer. If your money is lost or destroyed, just print some more.

Posted by Anonymoose 2010-06-22 13:26|| 2010-06-22 13:26|| Front Page Top

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