"Imagine peeling the roof off the building and watching people go about their lives, like in an ant farm," he says. "You can't identify individual ants or keep track of them as they scurry past each other, but you can watch as they move food into the nest or dig chambers."
Researchers at Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratory (MERL) have devised a 'dumb' surveillance system that monitors the movements of workers without identifying them individually. The idea is to have a computer system automatically configure the air-conditioning to save money, or illuminate the most appropriate escape signs in an emergency.
