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The ‘Brand Killer’ could block ads in real life

Welcome to post-capitalist paradise.

 

Miles Klee

Tech

Posted on Jan 24, 2015   Updated on May 29, 2021, 4:58 pm CDT

You’ve probably already got an ad-blocking extension for your Web browser—and if you don’t, what are you waiting for?

But that won’t check the barrage of brands you endure every waking hour in meatspace. This crazy new wearable technology just might.

The “Brand Killer” is still in its clunky prototype phase, to be sure. Seeing it in action, however, does much to allay fears of a future in which Minority Report-style targeted advertising overwhelms our senses. The only problem: The world is going to look awfully blurry.

More from the inventors:

Corporate branding and advertisements are ubiquitous in society today and almost impossible to avoid. What if we lived in a world where consumers were blind to this surplus of corporate branding? Brand Killer is a technology demonstration that envisions a future in which consumers can use augmented reality to opt out corporate influence. We built a head mounted display which uses computer vision to recognize and block brands and logos from the user’s view in real time. It’s AdBlock for Real Life.

These dudes should definitely work on making They Live sunglasses next. Oh, and should a head-mounted display be a deal-breaker, there’s always São Paulo, Brazil—the city banned outdoor advertisements in 2006, and residents seem pretty happy about it.        

H/T Kotaku | Photo by Lord Jim/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

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*First Published: Jan 24, 2015, 1:48 pm CST