Thursday, March 12, 2009

NotSavvy Shopsavvy: Epic Fail

Anyone watching the TV recently may have seen some adverts that show people in Liverpool Street Station carrying a Google G1 Android phone and using an application for it called "Shopsavvy" which has been developed by "Big in Japan". The blurb for the app says,
ShopSavvy is a shopping assistant developed for Google’s Android mobile phone platform and was T-Mobile’s featured application for their US launch of the G1 in October of 2008. Users can scan the bar code of any product using their phone’s built-in camera.

ShopSavvy will then search for the best prices online and through the inventories of nearby, local stores using the phone’s built-in GPS. ShopSavvy won Google’s Android Developer Challenge and is available in Google’s Market.
Sounds great doesn't it? Fun at least. So I just scanned this:

And this is what Shopsavvy told me it was.
Two words. EPIC FAIL!
I'm thinking there is great potential for a meme here of other amusing Shopsavvy system failures.

6 comments:

Letters From A Tory said...

To be fair, Crimpy Critters would probably be less damaging to your health.

dizzy said...

Depends what you crimp

Anonymous said...

It's probably designed to do that if you scan an "unsuitable" product.

Try a bottle of Absinthe next.

Anonymous said...

Epic Fail? Really? Hundreds of thousands of people use the application to save money everyday. We do have a growing problem caused by UPC spammers - i.e. people who pollute public UPC systems with incorrect UPC and EAN numbers.

For big ticket items like consumer electronics we have a very high (99%) accuracy rate, but with items like water, Coke and cigarettes there is a LOT of UPC Spam. Some of it isn't even spam, today retailers like Amazon sometimes return three different items for the same UPC. We are working on a new SPAM model that will compare UPC/EAN numbers and titles from several retailers and select the most common response.

Try some more items like Books, DVDs and consumer electronics and give us a chance...

Alexander Muse
http://www.biggu.com

dizzy said...

Errrr assuming this comment is real can you not see the hilarity that a packet of cigarettes would produce the result of a childrens toy? Chill out.

Anonymous said...

Maybe that's what they think the inside of a smoker looks like?