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Facial Recognition Vending Machine Debuts
Peter Hanami writes "Yesterday in Japan, a facial recognition vending machine went on sale that can tell the age of the buyer based on a range of features including number of wrinkles, bone structure and how the skin sits on the face. It was developed as a way to stop minors from buying cigarettes from vending machines. In Japan, cigarette vending machines are a common feature on the street and presently few safeguards exist to stop younger users from purchasing them. This new machine is seen as a positive step to reduce under age smoking. If the machine doesnt deem the buyer to be of suitable age, 20 years old, the buyer must provide further identification such as a drivers licence."
This was obviously created in Japan with Japanese in mind. I am curious "out of the box" how it functions against other nationalities who's facial features are significantly different. I would suspect it would be unable to identify the age and require an identification card of some sort.
Well at least it is a fairly novel idea.
If it's that good, why don't they just require standard government ID and use the face recognizer to determine if the buyer is the person on the ID and let the ID provide the age?
http://www.amazon.com/Gag-Works-FAKE-MUSTACHE-WAY/dp/B0006GK08K
Engineering is the art of compromise.
How come no matter what button I push this damn vending machine keeps spitting out Clearasil?!
The enemies of Democracy are
No, not for the vending machines, but so that blind-drunk guys can get a machines 'expert opinion' as to whether their prospective, er, 'date' is under age or not...
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
I can recall when vending machines in Japan sold cigarettes, coffee, beer, condoms & pantyhose...all out of the same machine. As Slim would say "That's a goddamn 3 day vacation in Las Vegas".
:)
Some of the beer machines would power off at a certain time to try to discourage street drunks.
When asked what kept under age drinkers from using the beer vending machines, the locals would reply "well, they just don't..."
Certain enterprising business men would pay the local high school girls for used underwear. Then they would shrinkwrap them, along with a signed Polaroid and put them into those arcade 'claw' machines. Had a thriving business until the neighborhood moms began wondering why their daughters were always asking for new Hello Kitty undies. The moms went to the cops. The cops were stumped, at first, as they had a hard time finding a specific law on the books that the pre-owned-panty vendors were breaking.
Finally, the cops decided to apply an antiques law that says you have to be licensed accordingly for the sale of certain 'used' or aged goods. No permit to sell antiques? Come with us...you're under arrest - and don't forget the evidence
Well here is the Honne and the Tatemae (The real thing and the appearance or facade) of Japanese culture at work.
It is not about actually preventing minors from purchasing cigarettes, it about making the appearance of doing so. By making the appearance of oing so, these vending machines will continue to be allowed, and it may even stop them from being "turned off" at 11:00 PM as they are now. It may also allow Beer vending machines to make a comeback (they are still here, but in far fewer quantities than they used to be.)
Japan is about image, and showing that you are respecting the group consensus. Japan is not about actually making something foolproof.
Whats next? A machine that calculates your weight based on a picture it takes of you and if it deems you obese refuses to sell you a coke?
Put a Vending Machine with masks of old people in it next to it. Intelligent kids can buy cigs for their friends and make a profit too. Everyone wins.
God spoke to me.
I've had enough smokers stand upwind, throw cigarette butts everywhere, walk around stinking like a smokestack, etc., that I just don't care if smokers are inconvenienced once in a while too.
http://outcampaign.org/
It is not racist for someone to be unable to visually determine some else's age. Neither is it racist for someone to be unable to tell two people apart (eh, "all asians look the same to me"). If he was blind and he said, "all asians, blacks, and whites look the same to me", would that be an issue? No, it would be the truth, because to a blind person, they do look the same. Someone with an untrained eye is nearly as incapable as a blind person at facial pattern recognition.
The whole "you're being racist" thing itself is racism, making an assumption that the other person might be racist just because the other person isn't of your race, is racist. If the parent post was asian, but adopted by a white family without contact with other asians, and said, "I cannot tell two asians apart", would it still be racist?
Facial pattern recognition is a learned ability, and each race has a unique set of facial patterns. You cannot expect someone that has had minimal contact with people outside their own race to be able to detect these differences.
I think the only reason that people get offended because they hear someone say, "<race> all look alike" is because people dislike being grouped by their race, even if there is no ill-will meant. If you're going to be upset by this, you shouldn't stop there. Tell doctors to stop testing black people for Sickle Cell Anemia, because it is racist for them to think that the decease could possibly be more prevalent in those with a particular heritage or skin color -- after all, "race is only skin deep", right? Oh, thats right, those people would rather be healthy than complain that they're being singled out for screenings based on their race.
The truth is that different races have different physical attributes which can cause certain challenges for those not intimately familiar with those differences; be it facial recognition to recognize someone's age or sex, or be it differences that affect a medical practitioner's ability to save a life.