Techmeme was leading with TechCrunch’s take on the Riya relaunch as Like.com — true image search. This permits a user to search for images that “look like” other images.
Arrington writes:
“The Like.com engine takes both text and images as queries, something no one else does. To return results based on an image query, Like.com compares a “visual signature” for the query image to possible results. The visual signature is simply a mathematical representatioin of the image using 10,000 variables. If enough variables are identical, Like.com decides the images are similar.
What this means – If you see an image on the web, like a watch that Paris Hilton is wearing in the picture to the left, and use it as an image query, Like.com will return results showing watches that look very similar.
If you enter a text query, like “brown boots pointed toe,” Like.com will convert that query into variables in the visual signature and look for related image results. See screen shot below for the results from this query.”
This is insanely cool stuff. Check it out
I’m still processing that you have a picture of Paris Hilton on your blog, something I never thought I’d see 🙂 Agree this is cool; many magazines and tv shows have information such as this listed regularly now ie ‘what was Dr. McDreamy wearing in the scene in the bar’.
Watch out there…next he’ll do a bit on how to Google up Britney and KFed’s divorce filing…
Cool image matching, but I don’t think Fergie’s handbag goes with any of my outfits.
We ought to have expected this one. It’s product placement taken within one step of it’s ultimate…the ultimate being integration with your tv so you can hit the remote and search for a bottle of oxycontin like House, or a machete like Jason. Of course, they can’t do one click to buy, as that’s a owned by Amazon. How about half a click?
Similar technology might be of use to me in searching the Google Image archives, where I often need “something like this photo”.
Check out the original Riya site. You can select a face and then scan for others like it.
This is cool stuff that was heavy in the labs a decade ago. I wrote a cover story on image processing and detection at Forbes in the early 90s when this stuff was pure science fiction.
Now it’s a free web service designed to sell shoes.