Microsoft Kinect could detect emotions and enrich ads targeting process

“A person buying ordinary products in a supermarket is in touch with his deepest emotions.”
- John Kenneth Galbraith, Economist

Since its launch two years ago, Microsoft’s Kinect has come a long way and found applications in fields as diverse as medicine, online shopping and home automation. And the motion sensing device is not done surprising us.

Last week, Microsoft registered an intriguing patent: “a computer-implemented method to determine emotional states of users that receive advertisements on client devices” through a monitoring of online activities.

Emotions as new data. This could allow companies to build behavioral patterns that would improve more “traditional” targeting process.

We’ve seen though that consumers can be resistant to data leeching. Would the implementation of this technology be the straw that would break the camel’s back?

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