[Dryland]

I look forward to using this technology on vacations when I want more info about an item. Imagine a link to Wikipedia just by pointing your iPhone at a structure or monument.

Today's video showing how it could work to get information about a person is even cooler. No matter where you are you will be truly on the web. Some could care less about this, but for a geek like me I think it's revolutionary.

What are your thoughts?

[Jellotime91]

It's definitely revolutionary once more people know it's out there.

Once it gets more widespread appreciation it's going to be a way of life.

[cobra302]

i think its kinda freaky! i would probably use it from time to time, but the freaky factor would still be there!

[Alli]

It will be great for so many things! Especially the first time you go to a tweetup and don't know any of the attendees...just aim your iPhone at random strangers until you find who you're looking for. And meeting a stranger off Craigslist at the local B&N to sell something? Awesome.

[whmurray]

It will be great for so many things! Especially the first time you go to a tweetup............

Go to a what?

[Jellotime91]

Go to a what?

A local meetup where you meet other twitter people.. lol my sister goes to them sometimes O_O

[Alli]

All those people you follow on Twitter - some of them are really nice folks! We've been getting together once or twice a month now for almost a year. But it's tough the first time you show up alone!

[chobbs1]

Tweet up. Never heard of em. Are they advertised? Are they scheduled in different cities?

[chobbs1]

Oh! To the OP. He'll yeah I'll use it! It is the next big thing!

[Alli]

All you have to do is find people who tweet in your area. If they don't already have them - suggest one.

[chobbs1]

Copy that alli. Thanks

[thinkTwice]

I'll use it, bur sparingly.
Imagine what it will do to battery life...

[ryrycalguy]

I agree with the creepiness. Though that doesn't mean I won't use it. However, it is getting a little too Wall-E-esque for me. Pretty soon, we'll not only have screen in front of our face all the time, we'll also be lounging around in chairs in a spaceship, with our bone mass dwindling away while two little robots have a love affair back at the Earth that we ruined.

Just saying...

[snakes2003g]

I agree with the creepiness. Though that doesn't mean I won't use it. However, it is getting a little too Wall-E-esque for me. Pretty soon, we'll not only have screen in front of our face all the time, we'll also be lounging around in chairs in a spaceship, with our bone mass dwindling away while two little robots have a love affair back at the Earth that we ruined.

Just saying...

lol i could so see that happening. the robot part of course.

[Duvi]

Not sure I will.

I was part of a CrackBerry Meet-up; pretty much the same as a Tweet-up.

[redbeard]

Yes, there are all sorts of really cool things they can do, I'm hoping to see an augmented reality GPS app before too long.

[icebike]

It will be great for so many things! Especially the first time you go to a tweetup and don't know any of the attendees...just aim your iPhone at random strangers until you find who you're looking for. And meeting a stranger off Craigslist at the local B&N to sell something? Awesome.

Ah, sorry, that's not going to happen in your lifetime. Facial recognition takes HUGE databases and Monstrous processing power. If Apple object to Girls in swimsuits imagine how ape**** they will go over any application allowing anyone to fetch their details.

Not going to happen.

[icebike]

It will be great for so many things! Especially the first time you go to a tweetup and don't know any of the attendees...just aim your iPhone at random strangers until you find who you're looking for. And meeting a stranger off Craigslist at the local B&N to sell something? Awesome.

All you have to do is find people who tweet in your area. If they don't already have them - suggest one.

Why?

Isn't knowing when they are brushing their teeth enough info? Is it necessary to watch them too?

[ctt1wbw]

Well, as long as the apps don't cost as much as GMap or Navigon, then I'll use them. Although I think it might be a waste where I live. I'm sure I'm the only one in Stanley with an iPhone. I did see one or two other people in Luray with an iPhone...

[Alli]

icebike, evidently you are content knowing there are dozens of people in your area who share your interests in many things without ever getting to know them. Personally, I like to meet people with whom I share common interests. It's what's called a "social life." I still get together once a year for my spring break with people I met on forums 5 years ago. My best friend in the world is someone I met in a chat room 10 years ago. And now, thanks to tweetups, I have friends who come to my house weekly to watch Lost, (finally!) have local friends with whom to enjoy sushi every week or two, and have been invited to join an institution in the south that would previously have been out of my reach.

So stay home. No skin off my back.

[CoryJP]

From watching the demo video on it .. Augmented Reality is definitly the FUTURE.. i believe its the next step to put the iPhone in the "revolutionary" spotlight again

[alcedes]

Ah, sorry, that's not going to happen in your lifetime. Facial recognition takes HUGE databases and Monstrous processing power. If Apple object to Girls in swimsuits imagine how ape**** they will go over any application allowing anyone to fetch their details.
Not going to happen.

I was thinking about some facial recognition scenarios some time ago. You wouldn't need a database of the faces themselves, only of the features extracted from their face (biometric data). The biometric data is comparitivly small compared to the size of a facial image. When I was finishing my degree the last project I was working on was a system that would learn how to classify photographs. The dataset I gave to train the system was composed of several thousands of photographs. Compared to the size of the photographs the pattern recognition data was small (only a few megs). For a facial recognition system the faces for training a recognizer could be gathered from social networking tools. Facebook comes to mind. I

While a sequention search through a large collection of facial data could be timely depending on the amount of data that you've collected. The complexity of the search can be lowered by several orders of magnitude by taking other factors into account. If the recognizer makes moderate success in distinguishing between males and females the average success rate would be improved. If the program takes geography into account then the success rate could be improved some more. I won't go into a full list of how to improve the outcome of a facial search here but it can be done.

For processing power if one didn't want to gather their own network farm it can be rented. Microsoft just released their pricing for their cloud database and processing services (Azure)and there are other providers available too such as Amazon (I've still got a trial account I've yet to use).

Some one could put a prototype for such a system together quickly. Neurotechnology has a Windows Mobile Facial Recignition SDK. You can try it for free for 30 days. Omeron also licenses their facial recognition technology. The SDK can actually do a fair amount of recognition on a moderate powered Windows Mobile device on it's own. I've tried it ouw by feeding it photographs of my family members and then the software on my phone was able to successfully recognize them. That's just using the software in a stand alone environment with what ever power the Windows Mobile device I was using at the time could give. Now let's say you made a facebook crawler that was giving faces to the same algorithm running in a distributed computing environment. A phone could send a photograph of some ones face to the service and a few seconds later the service could respond with the identity of the person.

[Alli]

And let's not forget the fact that Apple has already included basic facial recognition on the Mac. It can identify the people in your photo collection and sort accordingly.

[whmurray]

Well, as long as the apps don't cost as much as GMap or Navigon, then I'll use them. Although I think it might be a waste where I live. I'm sure I'm the only one in Stanley with an iPhone. I did see one or two other people in Luray with an iPhone...

Yes? And how about Leaksville, Stony Man, and Cavetown?

[whmurray]

And let's not forget the fact that Apple has already included basic facial recognition on the Mac. It can identify the people in your photo collection and sort accordingly.

Sorry. Not the same scale. What can be done easily with tens to low hundreds breaks down rapidly with larger populations.