restoring 2012 April fool's joke

_posts/2012-04-01-biometry.md

@@ -0,0 +1,109 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "Biometry application"
+description: "What we do is not evil."
+category: "news"
+tags: []
+---
+{% include JB/setup %}
+
+<p>
+April 1st, 2012
+<p>
+
+<p>
+Dear CGAL developers, Dear CGAL users,
+</p>
+
+<p>
+In order to put an end to rumors about GeometryFactory
+selling CGAL to Facebook for a biometry application,
+let me give you the background, and let me explain why
+we think that what we do is not evil.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+Just as nuclear energy can be good or bad, biometry is
+neutral as such. The particular application we contribute
+to is about matching lip prints on cigarette butts with
+Facebook users who threw the butts away. This allows people
+to act, who are fed up with cigarette butts lying around
+virtually  everywhere: in front of the Statue of Liberty,
+as well as along trails in Yellowstone National Park.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+One of the goals of social networks is social engineering,
+that is making mankind better. The workflow of the
+biometry application is
+<br> 1 that you take a picture of a cigarette butt lying at a
+   place where it should not,
+<br> 2 that you upload this picture to FB together with the GPS
+   coordinate of where you shot the picture, so that FB can
+   identify the culprit by matching the lip print on the
+   cigarette butt with the extensive database of faces.
+<br>3 that FB tells him or her that this is not a well educated
+   behavior (smokers in fact know that it is not nice), and
+   puts repeat offenders on a wall of shame.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As it is technically rather fascinating, let me just
+tell you why it is not a trivial problem. We can't reveal
+all the details as we filed a patent. Lips leave prints,
+just like fingers do, but fingers tips are flat compared
+to lips, cigarettes are cylindrical, the max curvatures
+of lips and cigarettes are mostly orthogonal where
+they touch. Just as maps are distorted towards the poles,
+so are the photos of lips and cigarette butts.  Additionally,
+only a small part of the lips touches the cigarette,
+only one side of a cigarette butt is visible, and it needs
+several uploaded photos of FB users to get a high
+fidelity lip model.  To get a grip on the orthogonal
+curvatures and distortion we throw in the anisotropic
+surface mesh generator Jane Tournois works on, and
+we implemented the Lipschitz distance estimator to
+get the confidence value for the lip-cigarette-butt match.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+FB opted for CGAL, as the exact computing paradigm
+helps to avoid false negatives (FB has to avoid accusing
+people who not even smoke). The floating point filters
+are key to not only being exact but also fast, as there
+are millions of smokers who have to be identified.
+Obviously, FB combines that with yellow-finger detection,
+the timeline information they have ("Hey, I am in Venice"),
+and whatever other data available.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+As I wrote in the beginning, biometry is not evil as
+such, and improving society seems a more moral goal
+to us than target advertising. Similar applications
+we have in mind, are the detection of counterfeit Dolce
+and Gabana glasses, Lacoste T-shirts, and Louis Vuitton
+handbags. FB Singapore pointed out that identifying
+chewing gums on the sidewalk would interest them, but
+it is not clear yet how to adapt the Lipschitz distance
+estimator.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+It was a mistake not to have discussed this at the last
+CGAL developer meeting or openly in the forums, but I
+had not expected such strong reactions when some of you
+heard from Jane that we work on "some biometry stuff".
+</p>
+
+<p>
+best regards,
+</p>
+
+<p>
+andreas
+<br>-- 
+<br>Andreas Fabri, PhD
+<br>Chief Officer, GeometryFactory
+<br>Editor, The CGAL Project
+</p>