It was all downhill after the Cuecat

On the origins of “user manipulation and surveillance.”

13 min readOct 20, 2022

A Cuecat scanner with a bundled cable and PS/2 adapter; it resembles a plastic cat and also, slightly, a sex toy. It is posed on a Matrix movie ‘code waterfall’ background and limned by a green ‘supernova’ light effect. Image: Jerry Whiting (modified) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CueCat_barcode_scanner.jpg CC BY-SA 3.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en

Sometime in 2001, I walked into a Radio Shack on San Francisco’s Market Street and asked for a Cuecat: a handheld barcode scanner that looked a bit like a cat and a bit like a sex toy. The clerk handed one over to me and I left, feeling a little giddy. I didn’t have to pay a cent.

It was all downhill after the Cuecat

On the origins of “user manipulation and surveillance.”

Written by Cory Doctorow