OneAndOneIs2

It's hit the news lately that Dennis Durkin, the big man in Microsoft's Xbox division, talked to investors about the Kinect's role in advertising:

How many people are in the room when an ad is shown? How many people are in the room when a game is being played? When you add this sort of device to a living room, there’s a bunch of business opportunities that come with that.

That's really kind of a spooky thought. The Kinect has a normal camera, an infra-red camera, and facial-recognition capability.

I mean, simplistically, you could get something as intrusive as adverts that pause the instant you stop watching them, thus forcing you to watch the whole thing. Those annoying adverts at the start of DVDs that you can't (easily) skip could go into a whole new level.

Intriguingly, with facial recognition in play, you could get something like "Your girlfriend hasn't been around in a while. Here's an advert for a dating site." or "You're looking a little tubby today, here's some weight-loss adverts." You might even get something helpful like "Your body movements have been erratic every time you've played - here's your local AA phone number."

But if your hardware has facial recognition, then it could in theory recognize not just faces, but facial expressions. Imagine a world where your TV watches your face to see how you respond emotionally to the content it's showing you. And reports on it.

1984, anyone?