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Is there any data encoded in the picture (like name, account, website, score) that can be decoded by scanning the Stack Overflow flair with a scanner app (Android or iPhone)?

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migrated from stackoverflow.com Jan 18 '11 at 16:13

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You tagged this as meta and didn't think that you should ask it on meta.stackoverflow.com ??? –  Oded Jan 18 '11 at 16:12
@Oded: You're right, it's incredible that this 56-point user didn't know that meta-questions go to an entirely separate site. –  j_random_hacker Jan 18 '11 at 16:23
@j_random_hacker - seeing as the meta link is at the top of every SO page... –  Oded Jan 18 '11 at 16:26
And there's another link to meta in the Ask Question page itself... –  mmyers Jan 18 '11 at 20:08
If you play it backwards, it tries to parse HTML using regular expressions... –  Shogging through the snow Jan 18 '11 at 21:22

2 Answers 2

They are just generated based on the hash of your email (or IP address if you didn't set any). There are an extremely large number of possibilities.


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Brilliant, the question is about the avatars, not about the flair per se! Nice catch! –  Arjan Jan 18 '11 at 21:48

No, there is nothing like that, just what you see on it.

Are you thinking of steganography? There is none in these images.

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Given the reference to scanning with smartphones, I guess it's more about some sort of QR codes? –  Arjan Jan 18 '11 at 20:26
No, not about steganography (horrible word) - more about 3d barcodes. –  albex Jan 18 '11 at 22:15

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