Saturday, December 2, 2006

Like.com: Search for the likeness of items...

To be successful in business, they say, you either do different things, or do the same things differently. Like.com is an excellent example of the latter. An image recognition powered search engine, where you specify the portion of the image you are looking for, say celebrity shoes, and then search for similar items. Your search can be based on both color and shape, with an adjustable meter for color, shape, and pattern relevancy importance. You can also specify the color you want, and price range. The site will automatically reorder the items based on your criteria.

While there are many shopping and price comparison sites, this one (still in alpha) is going into a different approach to deliver a unique service. Image recognition is a hot field that's been under going researches for years, and this so far is the best real application of the technology I've came across. What could be more interesting is if the site allows users to upload their own images and search for likeness inside. Right now you can only do this search for images and products that are already provided by sellers. Imagine how wonderful it would be, although costly for the husband, if the wife can photo the necklace she likes and search for it in Like.com for similar items. I am just talking technically here and wouldn't really enjoy the price of it so much!

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