Some years ago, I read of a research initiative at IBM to develop a visual search engine. The goal was to create an interface where the user could sketch, say, a blue stripe and a red stripe and the search engine would return images that matched the theme -- perhaps a sunset at the ocean, for example. Now MSR (Microsoft Research) is going public with a very intriguing image search project of its own: Dubbed the World-Wide Media eXchange (WWMX), the idea is to index digital images by where they were taken using GPS data. Researchers contend that people are more likely to remember where they took a particular picture than when.
Part of me thinks this is an excellent idea -- and one that could be extended to all objects, not just digital images. Today, you can sort a Windows file folder by date. Imagine if you could filter those files by where you were when you worked on them. ("I remember working on that with you when we were in that coffee shop on Main Street....when was that again?")
The other part of me thinks this is terrifying. Pair this idea with a Google-like search engine and the rapid proliferation of camera phones and you've got pervasive real time surveilance. ("Hmm...I wonder who is in line at the hot dog stand down the street? Let's see -- Find all images at 5th and Main within the last fifteen minutes....")
Comments