Waking up in Geelong

Fresh out of the box, a Myki reader is a yellow plastic thingy with a blue ‘touch here’ message on the front.

But after only a few days in service the blue paint starts to wear off.

If you keep on rubbing, the Myki logo disappears.

Leaving you with a plain yellow bit of plastic.

Leaving station staff to scrawl a ‘Touch here’ message on the front, so first time passengers don’t try to touch on via the screen, Paywave / Paypass style.

Or at the next station down the line, a simple ‘x’ in the middle.

So why are the Myki readers so vulnerable to everyday wear and tear? Part of the problem is the slow read speeds – if their card isn’t recognised instantly, less clued up passengers usually start rubbing their cards against the reader as hard as possible until it makes the beep (or catches fire).

The other cause is piss poor design – who thought it would be a good idea to cover a device that is frequently touched with just a thin layer of screenprinted paint! Event the designers of Melbourne’s Metcard readers had more of a clue fifteen years ago – they used a separate ‘hockey puck’ of yellow plastic insert into the main green body to indicate the smartcard target.

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