It seems companies are ever-searching for the newest way to get the consumers’ attention.  Just a few weeks ago, we talked about a new video commercial that plays in a magazine - that’s a perfect example of what I’m talking about.  But it’s not just reinventing the way they advertise.  It’s also about narrowing down the audience.

A company in Japan is already selling a face-recognition technology to let advertisors tailor what ad is showing on a digitized screen based on the viewer’s sex and age.  Apparently this system scans your face, and determines your approximate age, sex, and ethnicity.  Then it will automatically change the ad accordingly.  It’s kind of like in Minority Report, when Tom Cruise is walking through the subway.  (article continues below video)

Fair enough, I’m sure many people are now screaming “Big Brother is watching you” and really not thrilled at the idea of companies doing this - and that makes sense.  On the other hand, I think of my boyfriend who complains over ads that really aren’t targetted for him.  He’s tired of watching tampon commercials.  It’s really not beneficial to him or the company.  I’m sure the company would much rather narrow their marketing to their target audience.  And at the same time, my boyfriend would much rather watch beer or car commercials.  So, it got me thinking, maybe cameras aren’t so bad.

I found two other uses of cameras in public spaces that clearly do much more good than evil:

There’s a system in the works that could spot an assault on a bus before it happens, so authorities can intervene.  Now, this system won’t exactly target an individual and say “this person is going to attack another person”.  Rather, it would analyze people’s behaviour for “possible signs of crime” (ie: moving seats, closing in on a passenger, shouting, etcetera).  And when it does detect such behaviour, it flags that footage as a priority for a supervisor at a control base.  In essence, it bumps it to the front of the queue as the most important video for an analyst to watch in case something violent happens.  Sounds like a pretty good idea to me.

Another example of cameras doing us good is a program that could be the end of card counting at the blackjack table.  Card counting, of course, is the act of watching what cards have been played so you can anticipate what will come next.  Not illegal, but the casinos really don’t like it.  This new program will apparently use cameras to track a game as it progresses, monitor the cards played, and track a players betting patterns.  This way, they can flag a card counter much faster, and give him the boot.

So, maybe cameras aren’t necessarily as bad as many people think.  Or maybe I’m wrong and it’ll start out all well-meaning, but slowly turn into a full blown surveillance of everything we do.  I guess only time will tell…