Ricey Bob sat nonchalently in the departure lounge, reading a cheap paperback.

Or so it appeared.

The paperback itself concealed a small laptop, minus keyboard and mouse. Casting his eyes around him, he sought the face of the man he was seeking - Alex the Florist.

Alex the Florist was a man of many faces, but the up-to-date image library on Ricey Bob's laptop contained photographs of every disguise Alex had worn over the past ten years.

Fingering his false beard, Ricey Bob was grateful to UnaBubTech for letting him beta-test their soon-to-be-fameless 'keybeard' input device. Tap, tap, tap....he flicked through a dozen recent photos, comparing them with the faces around him.

Tap, tap....wait! Back...yes, that one! The face in the photograph was small and indistinct, but it had the same profile as the gentleman in the suede vest and polo- neck sweater sitting not more than two yards from him. Ricey Bob strained to make out more detail in the image without appearing consipicuous. He needed to zoom, but no easy pattern of keyboard strokes would accomplish this, and plugging a mouse into his "paperback" would be as conspicuous as it was cruel.

Thank goodness, he thought, for the Buchanananonymous mousetache that he was wearing. Twisting his mouth to the left as if in thought, he wrinkled his nose to click-and-drag, bringing his lips across and up to sweep out the rectangle around the face. A quick relaxation of the nose, another facial tic and a quick nostril-flare and he'd selected "zoom".

Yes, no doubt about it now, the man sitting opposite him was indeed Alex the Florist. He'd lost a lot of weight since the photo was taken, and had become much less pixellated, but there was no mistaking him. Alex the Florist would soon be pushing up the daisies.

Now to email Joanna Coffee to let her know everything was going well. He wondered if this airport had pubic WiFi access.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 25 2008

Keybeard Keybeard
[MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 25 2008]

A facial recognition software could do the trick in place of your mousetache, I think. Instead of scrolling for similar images, the computer camera could just scan 360 degrees by a globe linked to your key chain you twirl inconspicuously with your fingers or just hang it out, then hold it in place to snap a focused image so that the computer could narrow the search. Then the additional basic features of the software would handle commands from you when you shift the focus to your own face and make facial expressions to stream commands to your computer, just like twitching your nose and mouth, similar to what you like to do with your mousetache on. The beauty of my proposed system is that you make a range of different facial expressions for one command, like clicking, so that no one would think you got funny mannerisms. Your mousetache would probably invite candid cameras to single you out: Hope you won't be arrested by a surveillance robot with it, to be turned over for pyschological diagnostics with the aid of their facial recognition softwares. Hmmmmm.... A good facial recognition software you can carry about may somehow scan for possible terrorist threat [an Alex(ander) The Terrorist (not a Florist)], so you will synchronize with their robot to instead help you then to safety. (Don't use the stare command, you could be shot at, as if you are the terrorist... The future has scary glitches, I'm afraid so. Don't you?)
-- rotary, Feb 26 2008


Love it!
-- Pericles, Feb 27 2008



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