Microsoft’s Kinect system does a pretty good job of recognizing your face and automatically signing you into your Xbox account. That same technology though is being used by other companies in fascinating and potentially frightening ways. Monte Richard wrote:

• Japanese railway staff are required to have their smile checked by a computer every morning to see if it is genuine.
• Saab, a car manufacturer, has started installing systems that monitor your face to see if you’re paying full attention to the road. If it seems like you’re drifting off to sleep then it’ll ring an alarm to jolt you.
• However this same technology could be used in the workplace to calculate exactly how much attention you were paying to the work you had to do.
• Security services are developing lie detectors that monitor your face for subtle, unconscious muscle movements that indicate deception.
• One company is trying to set up cameras at the entrance of night clubs which identify the gender, race, and other physical characteristics of the people entering and exiting. People could then find the bars with their preferred demographic mix of partiers.

Read more about how dictators could use this technology, mood-sensitive advertizing, and what legal protections you have to prevent yourself from being monitored (hint: none) over here.

Source: Cracked

Shazam is a music tagging service that listens to music through an app on your phone or tablet and then identifies it for you. The company behind it just released their stats for the year:

• Gotye’s Somebody That I Used To Know was tagged 15 million times – almost twice as much as second placed We Are Young.
• Rihanna with 15.4 million tags narrowly beat out Gotye to be the most tagged artist this year.
• Alex Clare’s Too Close was a relative unknown until Microsoft picked it up for its Internet Explorer commercials. After that Shazam fueled its rise to the top of the charts.
• Based on their data up and coming artists who are poised to dominate the charts in 2013 include:
  • French Montana
  • Becky G
  • Angel Haze

Find the entire list of the most tagged songs, and see region level data over here.

Source: Business Wire

Via: Fast Company

On Amazon it’s possible to get free shipping on millions of eligible items. For many items, if the total price comes out to $25 or more then it’ll be sent to your home for free. If you’re signed up for Amazon Prime, then not only can you get free shipping on all eligible items, but Amazon will deliver the product to you in two days. Jeremy Olshan talked about what an incredible deal this was and what it may be costing Amazon:

• The most expensive thing for Amazon to ship may well be the $3,486 Cannon safe which would normally cost over $700 to ship. Yet shoppers can have Amazon send it to them for nothing.
• Amazon loses money at a rate of more than $2 billion a year because of shipping costs.
• The cost of free shipping reduces Amazon’s profit margin on any product from the 5% that retailers typically earn, to 1%.
• The company made a net loss last quarter and if it weren’t for its shipping offers it would likely have made a substantial profit.
• Amazon, for its part, seems to hope that it will recoup its costs by making customers so loyal to the company that they will buy everything from them.

Read more about the company’s financials, questions that the company won’t answer, and other mysteries about the true cost of goods for Amazon over here.

Source: Market Watch

Soon it might be possible to get the citizenship of a country simply by buying a house there. Henry Grabar reported:

• After the recent financial crisis western countries have had an over-supply of housing. Spain has decided to deal with this problem by offering Spanish residency to foreigners who are willing to buy a house in the country.
• Other countries have similar programs. Portugal, Ireland, Hungary and the United States all make it possible to be a resident in exchange for money.
• In the European Union the Spanish plan might create tensions. Under the Schengen agreement individuals can move freely among the countries. Those European countries with stricter immigration policies might not be as happy with Spain’s newer, more liberal rules.
• There are also concerns that it could lead to speculators from all over the world investing in Spanish property, and driving up rental prices, while contributing nothing.

Read more about the issues and concerns raised by the plan over here.

Source: The Atlantic

Via: Marginal Revolution

The cheapest apartments will cost you about $30 a night. The cheapest hotels cost about $90 a night. Why are hotel rooms so expensive? Matthew Yglesias explained:

• The American tax code treats homeowners favourably; the rationale is that they invest in the community and this should be encouraged.
• Hotel guests, in contrast, do no such thing, and thus hotels are charged sales taxes and hotel occupancy taxes.
• Hotels are generally located on prime real estate and this raises prices.
• When you pay for a hotel you also pay for daily maid service, telephone operators, and concierges.
• Business travelers have expense accounts that they use to pass on the costs to their clients. They don’t really care about costs and this creates demand which drives prices up.
• Finally the headline price that the hotels advertize isn’t necessarily the lowest price available. Instead the same rooms are marketed to lower-income, cost conscious people at bargain rates. Thus hotels only charge high prices to those who are willing to pay.

Read about other quirks of the tax code that make it preferable for business travelers to get higher priced hotels, the money value of time, why Airbnbn might change things, and how hotels sell their unused rooms at low prices over here.

Source: Slate

Cristina Odone wrote about Independent Diplomat – a consultancy that helps marginalized non-state actors gain access to the upper echelons of diplomats:

• Independent Diplomat helps set up meetings between the world’s top decision makers, such as members of the security council, and those who want to present a case to them.
• It played a role in helping South Sudan become its own state and it is currently working with Somaliland, Kosovo, and the Marshall Islands among others.
• While it is a consultancy, it is not a lobbyist organization. It does not make the case for its clients, rather, it creates a forum where its clients can have their voices heard.
• It is also selective about the groups it chooses to work with. They only help “the good guys”.

The full article offers a fuller critical perspective of what Independent Diplomat is and what it is trying to do, as well as its place in a changing international system. If you’re interested in the topic, it’s well worth a read.

Source: Foreign Policy