Smile at work--or the happiness detector will ding you
Putting a new spin on the phrase "service with a smile," employees of Keihin Electric Express Railway in Japan will need to have their smiles checked in daily by face recognition software.
Remember the gender recognition system we saw at the Singapore-based CommunicAsia trade show last month? Well, those zany Japanese have a more creative way of implementing a somewhat similar face recognition software.
Putting a new spin on the phrase "service with a smile," employees of Keihin Electric Express Railway will need to check their smiles in every morning. The software will determine the quality of their smile, and display visual alerts if they don't look happy enough.
According to an article in the Mainichi Daily News, the software assigns smile values to various parts of the face. It then adds those values up and determines a score.
The device recognizes eye movements, lip curves, and wrinkles. If an employee gets a low score, messages such as "You still look too serious" or "Lift up your mouth corners" will be displayed on the screen.
Maybe it seems cruel, but to us it's still a lot more humane than not having chairs at work. Or maybe Keihin Electric Express Railway was inspired by the ancient Chinese proverb "Hide your dagger behind a smile"? We wouldn't want to provoke them to find out.
(Source: Crave Asia via Geekologie)