19 Feb 09 Wikiproducts

The correct place for manufacturer information is on the GS1 database, right next to the barcode. GS1 does a great job of providing a global standard to uniquely identify products, but the reality is that the richness of this information, and ease of access to it is extremely limited.

The incentives of product manufacturers is to sell as much product as possible, and there is overwhelming amounts of evidence to suggest that more information help conversion. Yet, when a manufacturer goes to do this there are a multitude  of channels that they need to do it – many of which are competing with each other and benefit from making it harder for the other guy to have access to this information. All the while, the manufacturer and the consumer lose because of middle men.

The obvious solution to this is to have an API to access the GS1 database – I envisaged a product wiki in the absence of any progress from GS1. It seems we have a better database of uniquely identified people accessible to all developers through Facebook Connect, than we do of products.

A massive amount of services would benefit from this, including Lasoo and all its competitors, but the real winners would be manufacturers and consumers.

Kudos to Shopsavvy for their pressure, pointing in the right direction.