It used to be that if you wanted to know you felt, you would just consult a mood ring. But now, new technology has taken over this entertaining piece of jewelry with a new emotion-recognizing capability.

After the purchase by Facebook of Face.com – a tool that is used to identify people in photos based on their facial characteristics – recognition technology has become more intriguing for many people and businesses alike. Now, one of the biggest innovators in this market, Orbeus, has taken facial recognition a few steps further and is claiming their technology can also recognize emotions, gender, objects and scenery.

While the technology is seemingly silly – and admittedly very freaky – it does show some significant potential for advertisers.

• Images can determine demographics – When a photo is uploaded, a program can determine the person’s age and gender, allowing for targeted marketing even when demographic information may not have been provided by the individual.
• Images can determine a person’s tastes – Images can also determine what a person likes based on scenic photos and pictures of objects uploaded. Ads and content can then be marketed to people based on what technology deems them interested in from the photos they upload. For example, if someone uploads pictures of primarily vegetables, the software could conclude that they are vegetarian and limit the number of steak or meat ads they see.
• Images can determine a person’s feelings – Emotions captured on film can be determined based on complicated algorithms. Can you imagine what pharmaceutical companies could do with this information?

The increase in facial recognition software has sparked debate surrounding privacy issues. Now, not only is Facebook under fire for how they plan to use their recent purchase of Face.com but, the innovations of Orbeus have led to some new concerns with how much technology can tell about our behaviors and secret feelings. As over 200 developers experiment with the Orbeus API, people are wondering how other websites will use this technology to their advantage.

What do you think about this technological advancement? Freaky or intriguing?

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