Google Aquires Like.com: How it Effects Event Production

Last year Google purchased Like.com, a website that specialized in visual search technology. The initial use of their visual search engine geared towards e-commerce; allowing shoppers to select images of an item and return search results of items in similar styles, colors and sizes. However, the image based search engine has also been developed to include facial recognition!

Many industry leaders feel that Google’s incentive to purchase Like.com was due to their interest in the facial recognition software. This is important to the event production industry because it could ultimately change the way we network. Imagine going to an event without business cards, armed only with your smart phone camera. Once you’ve met someone you’d like to connect with, simply take their picture and upload the image into the visual search engine. The results page will yield Facebook, LinkedIn and various other social media profile pages of your new contact! The possibilities are virtually limitless (no pun intended).

Does finding new contacts by visual search engines intrigue you or freak you out? Let me know; the technology is just around the corner!