SEEING IS BELIEVING
The pace of innovation in visual search these days is breathtaking to watch.
If you thought the new service offered by Riya.com recently was cool, whereby one can identify dozens of pictures that feature a handbag or a pair of shoes you like, you'll likely groove on where Microsoft wants to take things in visual search.
As this Reuters piece notes:
Lost in Seattle with nothing but a camera phone? Just snap a picture of a nearby building, send off the photo to a database and soon you'll get back a map and information about where you are.
The new Web service is one of over 40 new technologies and ideas displayed by Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq:MSFT - news) at its research department's annual TechFest fair on Tuesday.
Although finding where one is is likely easier done with a GPS chip in one of any number of devices, the notion of "building recognition is still a cool one". The specific application will likely need more tweaking. (On a related note, check out this GigaOm post on "Presence" via one's cell phone).
I'm probably intrigued by the Microsoft "Building search" demo particularly since it looks like it could be based on Photosynth, a technology being percolated at Microsoft Research Labs. I raved about Photosynth last returning from the Web 2.0 conference last November.
It'll likely be a while before we see a service, even beta, that rolls this out in multiple cities, but it's a good peek at one of the directions visual search is going.
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