New mobile search service for Sprint uses photos as criteria

A new search service available for Sprint Wireless users claims to be able to retrieve information about anything they can take a picture of.

After users send a photo to [email protected], the Thrrum MMS Search will send search results back to their phone that pertain to what's in the picture, especially if that picture contains something textual. 23half also designed the service so users can take pictures of book covers, product labels, printed material, and train schedules; the system can respond with extended information about what it finds.

For example, it's possible to capture an image of a music CD or DVD and send it to the service to receive product reviews and perhaps pricing and availability elsewhere.

First introduced publicly last month, 23half's search technology was demonstrated in the "nThrum" technology demonstrator in 2005. 23half now offers one of the first services that mixes images to capture the physical world with a way to gain relevant information via text messages.

The company also offers a Visual Browser that can be downloaded to a mobile phone so users can capture images and get results without having to send a text message to the Thrrum MMS service.

Gartner Research indicates more than 500 million camera phones are sold per year, and will likely exceed 1 billion annual sales in two years. Thrrum MMS Search is in beta and available to Sprint Nextel subscribers for free, at least for now. Pricing information for the service's final release has not yet been made available.