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Big Brother: Facebook camera that can recognise you every time you walk into a shop
- Could be used by shops to offer discounts to customers
- System already being trialled in Nashville shops and bars
- Users must sign up to take part and ‘teach’ system what they look like
Shoppers could soon be automatically recognised when they walk into a shop using a controversial new camera.
Called Facedeals, the camera uses photos uploaded to Facebook to recognise people as they walk in.
Shoppers who agree to use the system, which has not been developed with Facebook, will be offered special deals.
Facedeals – a new camera that can recognise shoppers from their Facebook pictures as they enter a shop, and then offer them discounts.
A promotional video created to promote the concept shows drinkers entering a bar, and then being offerend cheap drinks as they are recognised.
‘Facebook check-ins are a powerful mechanism for businesses to deliver discounts to loyal customers, yet few businesses—and fewer customers—have realized it,’ said Nashville-based advertising agency Redpepper.
They are already trialling the scheme in firms close to their office.
‘A search for businesses with active deals in our area turned up a measly six offers.
‘The odds we’ll ever be at one of those six spots are low (a strip club and photography studio among them), and the incentives for a check-in are not nearly enticing enough for us to take the time.
‘So we set out to evolve the check-in and sweeten the deal, making both irresistible.
‘We call it Facedeals.’
The Facedeal camera can identify faces when people walk in by comparing Facebook pictures of people who have signed up to the service.
Facebook recently hit the headlines when it bought face.com, an Israeli firm that pioneered the use of face recognition technology online.
The social networking giant uses the software to recognise people in uploaded pictures, allowing it to accurately spot friends.
The software uses a complex algorithm to find the correct person from their Facebook pictures.
The Facebook camera requires people to have authorised the Facedeals app through their Facebook account.
This verifies your most recent photo tags and maps the biometric data of your face.
The system then learns what a user looks like as more pictures are approved.
This data is then used to identify you in the real world.
In a demonstration video, the firm behind the camera showed it being used to offer free drinks to customers if they signed up to the system.
SEE ALSO: Facebook buys facial recognition startup Face.com>
2012-08-14 02:43:32
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