I was just reading about advances in technology that allow machines to recognise facial expressions - to the extent where a computer is able to tell if (for example) an employee is smirking, grinning or smiling at a customer (scary stuff). What caught my eye was that computers are now apparently able to connect images with the internet. The Accenture Mobile Object-Recognition Platform will let people send pictures from their cellphones to look things up on the internet. I was just thinking how neat it would be for learners to point and shoot at everyday objects and get information about them. This could be either through regular Google searches but it could just as easily connect to a translation site. So, you walk around town and see an object you don’t know the word for. Simply take a picture and get the word both in your own and in the target language! (See the Economist from March 7 for information about the technology and an interesting Technology Quarterly supplement).