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Samsung System Tailors Ads To Its Audience

Posted by timothy on from the you'd-like-a-philip-k-dick-book dept.

angry tapir writes "Samsung has developed an outdoor digital advertising system that tailors ads based on its audience. There are three main components of the system: an LCD display panel, a dual lens camera and a processing computer, which runs the company's proprietary facial recognition software. If the technology identifies several female members in a group, then it can target advertisements at them, for example. Even if the group is mixed, the technology can identify whether onlookers are children or adults. If they're adults then maybe a wine ad could run whereas an advertisement for toys might play for kids."

6 of 172 comments (clear)

  1. Imagine the embarrasing tie-ins by fluffy99 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Say it recognizes specific types of people. Would you really want ads for adult dating sites popping up if it thought a bachlor was strolling by? Or it could detect "that time of the month" and started advertising feminine products. Or how about it pops up porn ads when it only senses adult males in the vicinity.

    1. Re:Imagine the embarrasing tie-ins by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      I'm sorry. Could you please explain why advertising is good for the world? It is one thing for a company to be easy to find if I am looking for them and provide good information about their products (even in a way that implies they are better than they are if they for some reason believe they aren't good enough already), but having companies constantly yelling at me about products when I am not looking for them is just annoying and I do not see how it could possibly be a good thing (as opposed to a necessary evil as TV/radio/newspapers/a lot of the web is advertising-funded and no one has a better model -- I suspect one would be found if advertising were to suddenly disappear).

    2. Re:Imagine the embarrasing tie-ins by AmberBlackCat · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Speaking as a Black woman in computer science, I would be fairly offended the first time the sign sees me, stops displaying the ad for Dell Computer, and starts displaying ads for chicken and lip gloss. But I guess that's no different from what happens on television.

  2. I wonder who's going to be first to sue by hedwards · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm wondering what's going to happen when somebody sues because the ad content offends them. A woman that hates girly things or perhaps a black person that likes golf, or possible a gay man that gets sick of the inappropriate ads for jewelry for the wife.

    This sort of technology may be an advertiser's wet dream, but it's pretty screwed up.

  3. A world without advertisement? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'd rather pick my laundry detergent based on the results of independent testing, than based on who advertises the most. Why doesn't the world work that way? Consumers would be much better off.

  4. Advertisements directed towards children = banned by KreAture · · Score: 4, Interesting

    In Norway, advertisements directed towards children are banned on TV and radio. Unfortunately this is being circumvented by basing the broadcasting network abroad.
    I just hope this type of advertising can be dealth with by modifying the laws. If not, maby a big hammer will do the trick.