Originally Posted by Peckish
There are a couple of problems with microchipping. The cost is one - those RFID chips and readers are not cheap. The second (and biggest, IMO) is how does someone who is not a quilter know there is a microchip in the quilt?
The microchips range in price from $5 to $25, depending on how many you buy at a time. The scanners are anywhere from $100 to $500 when new (and are often available used for much less).
A group of quilters such as a guild, could buy the chips in bulk and one scanner to share. If you don't want to buy the scanner, most animal shelters, vets and municipal shelters have a scanner and are more than happy to scan anything you bring in.
I still like the QR code best. You can quilt the QR code right into the quilt, so that to remove it would mean destroying the quilt. Generating a code is free and very easy. Reading one does not take special equipment, only a smart phone.
To me (and a few other crabby old people), a smartphone IS special equipment! A scanner is cheaper than smartphones seem to be (when you include the price of the accompanying cell phone contract).
And smartphones have that pesky telephone feature. I have one telephone and that's bad enough. Imagining carrying one with me everywhere makes me shudder. LOL.