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Gadget Tracks Brainwaves As You Watch TV
Taking a cue from A Clockwork Orange, San Francisco neuromarketing firm EmSense has launched what it says is "the first ever scalable, non-invasive psychological and brainwave measurement technology — made specifically for market research." The EmBand measures your brain activity, your emotional responses, and your level of engagement in what you are watching on TV. The collected data is then sold to marketers who can come up with more interesting ads to be skipped over with your DVR.
Wow, a device that measures brain activity while watching the idiot box? Be prepared to record a whole lot of nothin', especially during American Idol.
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I've often had ideas involving marketing people and strategically placed electrodes; but this wasn't quite what I had in mind. Pity.
Was reading this with quite some interest. I wonder what they could do with this. User Adaptive systems which help choose films you might like based on the parts you enjoyed. Some way of choosing channels automatically based on your mood...
"The collected data is then sold to marketers". End of fantasy.
Might as well draw a flat line reminiscent of a comatose vegetable...
The collected data is then sold to marketers who can come up with more interesting ads to be skipped over with your DVR.
The data is then sold to marketers to come up with better ways to do product placement inside the shows.
Did anyone else read this headline as "Google Tracks Brainwaves As You Watch TV" and find it unsurprising? The Google is everywhere!
This might sell in the home.
I'm thinking ... semi-adaptive real time multi-view pr0n.
Three ... whatevers ... pan across the screen. The one that gave the ... highest response controls the chapter the DVD player skips to ...
Or movie on demand instead of old fashioned physical media.
Even non-pr0n apps could exist, like watching ads on the TV guide channel automatically selecting the 'best" one.
The "DVD games" industry might go for this, a "truth or dare" game or "think your way thru the mystery".
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Non-invasive refers to the fact that the electrodes are not implanted in the brain. After all, Citizen, removing your Cap is counterrevolutionary.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I view this as doubleplusungood.
Another "look at the bright side post"
The collected data is then sold to marketers
At least its not sold to editors / directors / etc. If it were, you'd literally have mathematically formulaic programs.
One interesting problem might be finding test subjects... Everyone knows via tv tropes etc that the idea target market victim is a .... and before you had a device to plug them into, they had to just talk about it. Now they have a device to plug them into, so instead of talking about it, they're going to start raiding mental institutions etc in order to hook up their ideal target audience. Creating all kinds of interesting ethical concerns, as they will be taking advantage of lower functioning people.
It may even make it into marketing, COPS TV (is that still on?) might be edited based on the measured emotional response of test audience cops this week vs criminals next week. That's novel enough that I might even watch TV again.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
The marketing department has found tin foil hat jokes to cause mostly negative emotions. However we are currently developing a new gold foil hat joke product line.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
These supposed cheap EEG monitors are basically toys, so don't worry yet. That a marketing company uses slick marketing to oversell the capabilities of their own product shouldn't surprise anybody.
Have the Tripods arrived already?
It takes a lot of training to properly place EEG electrodes...and a whole lot more to read them. Most of what you see on an awake EEG is actually EMG artifact. Other than seeing normal awake rhythms (mu and posterior dominant rhythm)...there is not much info to gain. Even advanced EEG labs have trouble determining anything deeper than if the patient is relaxed, eyes open or closed..and sleep architecture. That is, unless, they are encephalopathic or have seizures/interictal epileptiform activity..or a bad peice of brain ;)
It should like like a giant green blender that sits on top of your TV.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Why aren't we using this for child care? You could get some feedback on your kid's response to different things. Or use it to make a robot nanny that can tell how a kid is feeling.
This is wrong, on so many levels:
- Manipulative advertising at the very least
- Complete psychological profiling at the worst (They'll be able to track more than ads - they'll know what type of male/female turns you on, what foods excite you, discover your fetishes, etc.)
I'll pass. Unfortunately, someday I predict this technology will be built into the TV via a webcam able to detect visible reactions, subvocal communication, etc.
You stereotypers are all the same...
Like most "brainwave" technology (ie game controllers) this is a bunch of horse shit designed by people who are clearly clueless on these matters. Electrodes are not well placed, individuals at home probably have no idea how to put it on right, the list goes on. Not to mention the lack of a system to account for eyeblinks. Head movement can screw things up, as can cell phone use. Seriously, if they took a day of psychophysiology they would know this. The fact that it was started by folks from MIT is an embarrassment to that institution.
There is more to science than physics!
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I'm waiting to see when someone rigs up a TMS unit trying to find a spot in the brain to interfere with that renders the watcher more susceptible to suggestions in commercials.
Hey, it's more plausible than a lot of this sort of neuro-babble.