Ever have someone guess your age? How well did they do? Were they exactly right, off a few years, or off an entire generation? Let Microsoft take a guess.
That’s right; Microsoft is building a robot that will take any of your pictures, no matter how or how bad, and try to guess how old you were when the photo was taken. Microsoft had no problem finding volunteers for this experiment. Within hours, tens of thousands rushed to check this app out. At a BUILD conference, the age guessing robot was so popular they could hardly keep the servers up. It works with any photo under 3MB. Note I didn’t say this app was perfect. In fact, it has a long, long way to go. First off, it starting crashing almost as soon as it got hot. That tells me it can’t yet handle the big crowds Microsoft is looking for. They took one photo of an elderly gentlemen and guesses of his age ranged from 7-73. I saw one demonstration on TV this morning. They took a recent photo of Madonna and guessed her age as 27. She’s in her middle 50s. I’ve seen pictures of baby dolls being guessed as aged 2-4. They even got CEO Satya Nadella’s age wrong, by quite a bit. The robot said he is 59. Nadella is really 47.
While they’re making improvements, the Microsoft age guessing app would make a great game. I can see how entertaining it can be to upload a photo and have them guess an age. This could be a hit at parties. The age guessing robot can tell you a bit about yourself. If their age is below yours, you’ve been taking good care of yourself. If the guess is older than you, maybe it’s time to make some changes. But I hope this app it’s just for fun and games. Could facial recognition and age guessing be used for more sinister purposes?