Friday, July 2, 2010

RFID--Look it up.

Technology is not something that many of understand, but it is a part of nearly every aspect of our lives. How many times a day do we see something happen, yet have no idea of how it works? Nonstop--computers, cell phones, cars, etc. Think of the barcodes that are so common in every store. These RFID labels are necessary staples in any store, yet they remain a total mystery to most consumers.

When the Insane Clown Posse sang about miracles they forgot to mention these labels--actually they forgot almost everything technology related, but maybe that's the idea. Technological advances are too confusing to be miracles. A miracle we can write off as something amazing and unexplainable--if someone invents something and no one can figure out how it works, it just makes the rest of us feel stupid. Barcodes are just an everyday example of the geniuses of the world making our lives easier without telling us how.

Who makes these custom RFID tags? For those of us who have had retail jobs, we know that the labels are often printed at our place of business, but who creates them? There must be some company out there who has contracts for making these labels–they must also have somewhat of a monopoly on the system since it seems to be above so many other people’s heads. We should just accept this new world and go with the flow, oh wait–we already do that.

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