Origiallly I was thinking about Semacodes, which are a 2d barcode for storing URLs.
This lead me on to thinking about the possibility of using a simple webcam as a barcode reader.
I then searched and found the website of Softek Software, who write software that can find barcodes from digital images.
Got out me digital camera and took a test image of the Walker's Crisps voucher, at a horrible angle to see if it could cope.
I suprised myself when I put it though the program and got the following output...
It found and decoded barcodes I'd not consciously realised were in the photo! They will take over the world these black and white lines you know...
Yeah... so you weren't as amazed as I was... oh well. I think barcodes are one of the best inventions of the 20th century, they don't get the recognition they deserve.