Science Fiction Dictionary
A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z

 

BluScreen Minority Report Ads

BluScreen, an interactive advertising technology that identifies passers-by using their Bluetooth-enabled cellphones, is being tested at the school of Electronics and Computer Science at Southampton University in the UK.


(BluScreen prototype)

At the school, the system will chose from different announcements about school events and scheduling. Once out in the real world, the system will present advertisements tailored to individuals.

The BluScreen system has a unique way of determining the ad shown; it holds a microsecond auction in which different advertisers can see the characteristics of the person and then bid on showing an ad. The "winner" of the auction selects the advertisement and pays accordingly.

Obviously, passers-by must have Bluetooth turned on, and profile information marked as available. Participants could influence ad content by the content of their profile.

Developers of the system are interested in having sensors in other parts of the building to build a profile of each individual, to better present them with information (ads) that are relevant to their recent experiences.

If you enjoy dense marketspeak, contemplate this weighty fragment from the BluScreen site:

Within a ubiquitous environment, market-based approaches can be used to select the most appropriate material for a public display, depending on factors such as the audience's preferences and diversity of interest. Likewise, strategies used by agents to compete for customer attention should strive to be rational, based on contextual observations of user-preferences within the local environment, and should include a reward mechanism based on audience responses. Ubiquitous devices such as bluetooth-enabled mobile phones, can be used to uniquely identify and detect the presence of individuals within a localised environment, without the need for deploying bespoke hardware.


(John Anderton bombarded by personalized advertisements)

If you want to understand this in a more entertainment-oriented setting, take a look at the personalized graphic advertisements from the 2002 movie Minority Report, directed by Steven Spielberg. The film, derived from the story Minority Report by science fiction writer Philip K. Dick, is set some years into the future. It also presents specific ads on screens to individuals after positive identification of the individual has been made.

It appears that the advertising machine is determined to implement this idea in real life. Another experiment similar to this one was conducted in France earlier this year; see French Billboards Call Your Cellphone for more information. For a look at other science-fictional technologies being implemented in the ad world, take a look at Ad Saturation Approaches 100 Percent. Find out more about BluScreen.

Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 9/13/2006)

Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.

| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |

Would you like to contribute a story tip? It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add it here.

Comment/Join discussion ( 1 )

Related News Stories - (" Communication ")

Holobox? Who Doesn't Want A Home Hologram?
'...there appeared standing upon the disk, the image of a man...' - Edmond Hamilton, 1928.

EBS-260 Handjet Free Hand Dot Matrix Printer
'McKie held a chalf-memory stick over the dusted surface.' - Frank Herbert, 1964.

CD, DVD Bit Rot And PKD's Civic Notification Distorter
'...copy two of the original document no longer can be superimposed on copy one.' - Philip K. Dick, 1965.

Zoom Education Idea Is 100 Years Old
'... the frosted glass squares began, one by one, to show the faces and shoulders of a peculiar type of young men.' - Harry Stephen Keeler, 1915.

 

Google
  Web TechNovelgy.com   

Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.

 

 

 

 

Science Fiction Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's   1950's
1960's   1970's
1980's   1990's
2000's   2010's

Current News

SpaceX Wants A Moonbase Alpha
'And he had been sent with troops, supplies and bombs to command Russia's most trusted post, the Moonbase.'

Vast Apartment Living Will Get Even More Vast
'What is your population', I asked. 'About eighty millions.'

NASA Wants Self-Driving Or Remote-Controlled Vehicles For Lunar Astronauts
'THE autobus turned silently down the wide street of Hydropole. Robot-guided, insulated from noise and cold...'

Elon Musk Says Robotaxis Will Be Ready This August, 2024
'The car had no steering wheel, and no one drove!'

Moonwalkers AI-Controlled Electric Shoes
Now that's power walking that Hugo Gernsback would have approved.

Steve Jobs: 'Capture The Next Aristotle - With AI'
'It was disturbing to think of the Flatline as a construct...'

No Tips! Robotic Food Delivery In Phoenix
'...he rewired the delivery robot so that it would serve him midnight snacks.'

Electric Catamaran 'Explorer Eco 40m' Has 'Solar Skin'
'On went the electric-yacht faster and still faster.'

Orbital Mechanics, The Liftoff, The Turnover, The Retrograde Burn
'...the huge vessel had spun, with a sickening lurch, through a complete half-circle, the instant the power was reversed.'

Harvest Power From Tears And Blinking With Smart Contact Lens
'...he realized that it was not quite a clear lens. Speckles of colored brightness swirled and gathered in it.'

Europa Clipper Plate Carries A Special Message
'...a universal cryptogram — yet it is one which can be interpreted by any intelligent creature on any planet in the Solar System!'

Micro-Robots Are Smallest, Fully Functional
'With a whir, the Scarab shot from the concealing shadows of the corner where it had hidden itself.'

AI Enhances Images Your Brain Sees
'I could have sworn the psychomat showed pictures almost as sharp and detailed as reality itself'

Illustrating Classic Heinlein With AI
'Stasis, cold sleep, hibernation, hypothermia, reduced metabolism, call it what you will - the logistics-medicine research teams had found a way to stack people like cordwood and use them when needed.'

Deflector Plasma Screen For Drones ala Star Wars
'If the enemy persists in attacking or even intensifies their power, the density of the plasma in space will suddenly increase, causing it to reflect most of the incoming energy like a mirror.'

DIY Robotic Hand Made After Loss Of Fingers
'I made them... with the fine work of the watchmaker...'

More SF in the News Stories

More Beyond Technovelgy science news stories

Home | Glossary | Invention Timeline | Category | New | Contact Us | FAQ | Advertise |
Technovelgy.com - where science meets fiction™

Copyright© Technovelgy LLC; all rights reserved.