Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more
Dog tags
IT鈥橲 a feat that will set tails wagging: facial recognition software that works on dogs. Thierry Moreira at the University of Campinas in Brazil and his colleagues have developed not one but two such systems 鈥� named WOOF and BARK 鈥� to help match animals in shelters with runaway pets.
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The team initially tested three commercial systems that recognise human faces, feeding them photosets of huskies and pugs. All flunked. That brought home to the researchers that 鈥渄og facial recognition is not a trivial extension of human facial recognition鈥�.
But WOOF and BARK, trained on furry canine faces, did slightly better than a panel of dog show judges and breeders. Still, the researchers say, the successful identification of lost pets will require their owners to be 鈥渟timulated to register as many pictures as possible鈥�. Given the oft-quoted observation that owners come to resemble their dogs, Feedback wonders if mugshots of the masters will suffice?
Alaska governor Bill Walker the state must expand its oil drilling 鈥� to pay for the damage caused to local communities by climate change
Feeling out of order
FEEDBACK previously discussed feelings that lacked a word to describe them (3 October). Iain McDonald was inspired to write in having realised how damaging it is for those with a genuine condition when people with mild quirks say: 鈥淥h, I鈥檓 so OCD.鈥�
鈥淲hether it鈥檚 because we can鈥檛 stand our playing cards to be crooked on the table, or we have to eat only the blue M&M鈥檚, it鈥檚 not actually OCD,鈥� says Iain. 鈥淪o I鈥檝e come up with a good term to describe it instead: FauxCD.鈥�
Quick, off the mark
A STROKE of genius caressed James Golbey as he accidentally sent an incomplete email on his thoughts about feelings we don鈥檛 have words for. The follow-up suggested: 鈥淭he term for sending an email before it was complete ought to be 鈥榚-mal鈥�.鈥�
Degree hopes cut short
LETTERS continue to flow in defending the scientific credibility of hairdressing (10 October). Roy Smith reports that some years ago, managers at his university sought ideas for new interdisciplinary degrees, and he suggested a BSc in Hairdressing Studies.
鈥淚t would have included chemistry (covering hairdressing products and their interactions); life sciences (biology of skin and hair), psychology (concepts of body image and self-expression), sociology (social construction of beauty and fashion), enterprise (running a small business) and communications (advertising and marketing).鈥� In addition, the course could include stints working in salons.
鈥淚t sounded pretty intellectually demanding to me, but needless to say, no one wanted 鈥榟airdressing鈥� in our traditional university鈥檚 academic prospectus,鈥� he sighs.
Boy oh boy
MORE tangled roots: Linda Grant previously defended hairdressing against the charge that it is a 鈥減uerile, superficial art鈥�. But John Ponsonby says this description is 鈥渁 curious thing to write, as few think of hairdressing as a boyish activity. Yet puerile is derived from puer, Latin for 鈥榖oy鈥�.鈥� Given that it was gender stereotyping that got our styling tongs warmed up in the first place, Feedback imagines that hairdressing might be more pedantically disparaged as puellile.
Tube boob
FEEDBACK searched for the right words to describe statements so stupid they were not even wrong (19 September). Mark Pettigrew writes: 鈥淚 remember colleagues during job interviews having a coding system for potential candidates. One such was 鈥楨H鈥�, used to describe a candidate who was beyond redemption. This stood for East Ham, which any fan of the London Tube will know is 鈥榦ne stop short of Barking鈥�.鈥�
Courting rituals
TZU Technologies is a company using a 1998 US patent for teledildonics to sue small firms making high-tech sex toys (28 August). Holland Haptics and Kickstarter were the latest recipients of its unwelcome advances over a crowdfunded product called , which promises a more genteel kind of congress in the form of remote hand-holding.
Kickstarter wasn鈥檛 in the mood to take this lying down. Its lawyers made it clear that they would fight the case in court, where the patent鈥檚 validity could have been challenged. Its confidence wilting, . A small victory for lonely lovers, though Feedback suspects this isn鈥檛 the last we鈥檒l hear from TZU.
Stealing the show
OUR colleague reports that Synology, a firm that makes networked security systems, ended its annual industry conference in London this year with a promotional video best described as a gift from the gods.
While at a trade show in Taiwan earlier this year, a staff member suddenly realised that his laptop had disappeared from the Synology exhibition booth.
Thinking fast, he fired up the company鈥檚 software and zipped through CCTV footage filmed by the demonstration model over the previous hour, right up to the moment when the laptop vanished from the booth. Captured there was a clear image of a youth snatching the loot.
The staffer was able to find and confront the culprit before he had time to leave show. So the laptop was restored to its owner, and Synology now has demonstration footage that no amount of money could buy.
(Image: Paul McDevitt)