Of course it's not racist but pretty funny. Looks like HP is aware of the problem and trying to update the issues with face recognition. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/t4DT3tQqgRM&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/t4DT3tQqgRM&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> Article on HP looking into issue - http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/12/22/hp.webcams/index.html
Definitely funny, but I wouldn't ever record myself making comments about race while at work and then upload it to youtube. With the way employers are these days, I could easily see someone getting fired for something (harmless) like this.
HAH! I was just watching that Better Off Ted episode last night. Hilarious to see it actually happen in real life.
The first thing I thought of when I saw this was the Better Off Ted episode where they install automatic doors that won't open for black people, so all the black people have to have white guys shadowing them.
"The technology we use is built on standard algorithms that measure the difference in intensity of contrast between the eyes and the upper cheek and nose," wrote Tony Welch, the lead social media strategist for HP's Personal Systems Group. "We believe that the camera might have difficulty 'seeing' contrast in conditions where there is insufficient foreground lighting." AKA, our camera is racist.
Does it work for Asians? It's hilarious, but it's a bug in the system which I can't believe they missed.
This is a funny enough joke even though I assume any computer company as big and presumably global as HP probably has some, and would probably get test subjects of all races in any case. It probably works for a large enough portion of potential dark-skinned black customers - which might not even be 5% of their total market - that they just decided to run with it anyway. Regardless, they could just treat it like real estate, and price us out. The irony is if I had this computer at work I would probably turn off the feature or punch the screen after the first few minutes.
