why was the wand made?

[rprosperi]

At the time, printed media was the primary distribution media, for example all the User Library Programs, HP magazines, PPC Journal and more. Other 'competitive' systems used printed assembler and / or BASIC listings, but these had weaknesses such as zeros look like letter o's, 1's look like I's, etc. while the barcode system was relatively error-free and much faster, in addition to being far cheaper than cards.

Today, it seems kinda quaint, but back in the day, these were extensively used by experts and noobs alike, and it was the quickest way to distribute and enter lengthy programs.