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I find this highly interesting from a personal perspective, as I am an author of a Personalized Advertising patent[1] from the early 2000's. I was unable to cap

I find this highly interesting from a personal perspective, as I am an author of a Personalized Advertising patent[1] from the early 2000's. I was unable to capitalize on my work, and ultimately sold the patent. Interesting to note, the month the patents' expired (due to aggressive early filing dates of my original patents) I noticed Facebook's AR Kit was released, which touched multiple aspects of what is protected by the global patents. This tech is key for Personalized Advertising where consumers are inserted into still and video adverting in place of current spokespersons and side-by-side with celebrities. Advertising is about to get surreal and the fake news consumers are about to get exploited something unbelievable. "Deep Fakes" for porn is kid stuff compared to what this tech opens: Pandora's Box if you ask me. [1] https://patents.justia.com/inventor/blake-senftner https://patents.justia.com/inventor/blake-senftner

searine 8y ago
>This tech is key for Personalized Advertising where consumers are inserted into still and video adverting in place of current spokespersons and side-by-side with celebrities. What a boring dystopia. Seriously though, if a company ever did without my permission I would sue the pants off of them.
- fabianhjr 8y ago
  The issue is that Facebook, Google et al. already get a ton of consent for targeted/personalized advertisement and usage of your images and data. So you might not see this in a mall, but you will surely see it online.
- hbosch 8y ago
  By creating a Facebook account you should assume they have your permission.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    No, it's personal data, you need specific consent under the GDPR :)
- pavel_lishin 8y ago
  Even assuming that there isn't already some precedent that a checkbox allows them to use your uploaded likeness in whatever they want, is your premise here that you have more time and money to spend in a legal battle with Facebook or Google?
  - 394549 8y ago
    > Even assuming that there isn't already some precedent that a checkbox allows them to use your uploaded likeness in whatever they want, is your premise here that you have more time and money to spend in a legal battle with Facebook or Google? There's currently a class-action lawsuit in progress against Facebook's use of facial tagging of Illinois residents: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-facebook-tagging-privacy-lawsuit-20180417-story.html http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-facebook-taggi.... Regardless of how deep Facebook's pockets are, I could see another class-action lawsuit taking them on over recruiting its users into becoming uncompensated spokesmen in deepfake ads hocking products to their friends. Also the legal situation in other jurisdictions may be less friendly to Facebook's usage of this technology, to the point where their deep pockets won't help them. I'm no international lawyer but I think that's definitely a possibility.
  - bigiain 8y ago
    And there are _still_ people complaining that the GDPR is not a good idea... If this becomes "a thing", I fully intend to use my UK citizenship and send GDPR boilerplate deletion requests to all the data brokers, social networks, and digital advertising services I can find.
    - taejo 8y ago
      > use my UK citizenship Better hope it becomes a thing before March.
- bsenftner 8y ago
  The idea was to use them as fantasy fulfillment: take any A level film or music artist, and many consumers will pay for a video clip of them as Black Panther or you-name-it high grossing entertainment of the moment. You put yourself in, willingly, and for cost reduction allow product placements.
lioeters 8y ago
Funny and scary that you describe it as a Pandora's box, as an author of a related patent! "Advertising is about to get surreal." Minority-Report-style ads, here they come..
- black_puppydog 8y ago
  Personally, I'm waiting for AR UBlock. That would put the "augmented" in AR. :)
  - bernardom 8y ago
    Would AR UBlock allow you to replace all the people in ads with people of your choice? So all spokesmen for me could be Gilbert Gottfried in a neon colored t-shirt?
    - drb91 8y ago
      I imagine it’d just cancel or black the ads out, I’d hope.
  - andrewmcwatters 8y ago
    Someone here on HN had recently shared some hairstyles, facial accessories, and alterations that prevented common face detection implementations from recognizing your head, which seemed relevant and pretty cool from a tech punk perspective, too.
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  I wouldn't really blame a person for not realizing, back almost 20 years ago, the full extent to which this technology could be used, when coupled with similar tech for audio processing, cheap compute, and the world consuming information primarily from the Internet.
- bsenftner 8y ago
  I realized the potential, and wanted to steward the deployment in such a manner that civil society is not subjected to fake news, or privacy attacks such as public and private persons inserted into media against their will. The ultimate reason I was unsuccessful was a firm stance against pornography, which VC, media partners and angels insisted on an ability to exploit.
xg15 8y ago
Respect for your efforts - but I'm also amazed that apparently the tech was already there 18 years ago! Yet nothing was ever written about it. I wonder what other technological breakthroughs are locked away behind patents.
andrepd 8y ago
Interesting from a technical perspective, sure. Absolutely terrifying from any other perspective.

searine 8y ago

>This tech is key for Personalized Advertising where consumers are inserted into still and video adverting in place of current spokespersons and side-by-side with celebrities. What a boring dystopia. Seriously though, if a company ever did without my permission I would sue the pants off of them.

fabianhjr 8y ago
The issue is that Facebook, Google et al. already get a ton of consent for targeted/personalized advertisement and usage of your images and data. So you might not see this in a mall, but you will surely see it online.
hbosch 8y ago
By creating a Facebook account you should assume they have your permission.
- icebraining 8y ago
  No, it's personal data, you need specific consent under the GDPR :)
pavel_lishin 8y ago
Even assuming that there isn't already some precedent that a checkbox allows them to use your uploaded likeness in whatever they want, is your premise here that you have more time and money to spend in a legal battle with Facebook or Google?
- 394549 8y ago
  > Even assuming that there isn't already some precedent that a checkbox allows them to use your uploaded likeness in whatever they want, is your premise here that you have more time and money to spend in a legal battle with Facebook or Google? There's currently a class-action lawsuit in progress against Facebook's use of facial tagging of Illinois residents: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-facebook-tagging-privacy-lawsuit-20180417-story.html http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-facebook-taggi.... Regardless of how deep Facebook's pockets are, I could see another class-action lawsuit taking them on over recruiting its users into becoming uncompensated spokesmen in deepfake ads hocking products to their friends. Also the legal situation in other jurisdictions may be less friendly to Facebook's usage of this technology, to the point where their deep pockets won't help them. I'm no international lawyer but I think that's definitely a possibility.
- bigiain 8y ago
  And there are _still_ people complaining that the GDPR is not a good idea... If this becomes "a thing", I fully intend to use my UK citizenship and send GDPR boilerplate deletion requests to all the data brokers, social networks, and digital advertising services I can find.
  - taejo 8y ago
    > use my UK citizenship Better hope it becomes a thing before March.
bsenftner 8y ago
The idea was to use them as fantasy fulfillment: take any A level film or music artist, and many consumers will pay for a video clip of them as Black Panther or you-name-it high grossing entertainment of the moment. You put yourself in, willingly, and for cost reduction allow product placements.

lioeters 8y ago

Funny and scary that you describe it as a Pandora's box, as an author of a related patent! "Advertising is about to get surreal." Minority-Report-style ads, here they come..

black_puppydog 8y ago
Personally, I'm waiting for AR UBlock. That would put the "augmented" in AR. :)
- bernardom 8y ago
  Would AR UBlock allow you to replace all the people in ads with people of your choice? So all spokesmen for me could be Gilbert Gottfried in a neon colored t-shirt?
  - drb91 8y ago
    I imagine it’d just cancel or black the ads out, I’d hope.
- andrewmcwatters 8y ago
  Someone here on HN had recently shared some hairstyles, facial accessories, and alterations that prevented common face detection implementations from recognizing your head, which seemed relevant and pretty cool from a tech punk perspective, too.
TeMPOraL 8y ago
I wouldn't really blame a person for not realizing, back almost 20 years ago, the full extent to which this technology could be used, when coupled with similar tech for audio processing, cheap compute, and the world consuming information primarily from the Internet.
bsenftner 8y ago
I realized the potential, and wanted to steward the deployment in such a manner that civil society is not subjected to fake news, or privacy attacks such as public and private persons inserted into media against their will. The ultimate reason I was unsuccessful was a firm stance against pornography, which VC, media partners and angels insisted on an ability to exploit.

xg15 8y ago

Respect for your efforts - but I'm also amazed that apparently the tech was already there 18 years ago! Yet nothing was ever written about it. I wonder what other technological breakthroughs are locked away behind patents.

andrepd 8y ago

Interesting from a technical perspective, sure. Absolutely terrifying from any other perspective.