Phil Donahue's Concerns About Technology: Thoughts on RFID Oversight

In 1974, the TV talk show host denounced the Universal Product Code, better known as the bar code, as a dastardly plot that would let grocery stores trick consumers. Grocers would replace price tags with bar codes and confuse shoppers, Donahue informed his viewers repeatedly. . . . Not many people may remember this, but Phil Donahue was one of the digital age's first technophobes.

In 1974, the TV talk show host denounced the Universal Product Code, better known as the bar code, as a dastardly plot that would let grocery stores trick consumers. Grocers would replace price tags with bar codes and confuse shoppers, Donahue informed his viewers repeatedly.

Donahue's predictions turned out to be nonsense, of course, and today, the humble bar code saves Americans more than $17 billion a year in grocery stores alone.