Acoustic Barcodes Are Probably Super Popular In Some Alternate Universe

With technology like NFC on the rise , you might think the lowly barcode might not be long for this globe . As it turns out , that old sensitive has at least one more fast one up its sleeve . Going tactile and operating with soundjust might be what it take to make barcodes cool ( again ? ) .

The premise is simple , just like race a stick across a spotter fence , running a finger , a pen , or a speech sound across a serial publication of grooves creates a unique , identifiable snippet of auditory sensation , like Morse code for machines . An app can well convince the dissimilar dots and dashes to a information value , similar to the bar and spaces of a barcode , or the squares of a QR codification .

It ’s definitely more low - tech than the most outwardly comparable technical school , NFC , but the acoustic barcodes do n’t require any sort of limited tech on the phone side — not even a camera — which could be a big feature . They could also be practically invisible . With mobile technical school being as advanced as it is now , it ’s hard to evision this really taking off as anything but a novelty , but it ’s still a jolly neat technology , and better than some of the popular alternatives like QR code . you’re able to imagine how it might have been a real plot - changer in some substitute creation , one where it ’s really crucial your iPhone does n’t drag well . [ Chris HarrisonviaEngadget ]