Comedy Club Charges By The Laugh With Facial Recognition

Trending News: A Spanish Comedy Club Is Now Charging By The Laugh

Why Is This Important?

Is there potential for a future in which we pay for entertainment based on how much we enjoyed it? A new scheme in Spain suggests so.

Long Story Short

A comedy theater in Barcelona has started charging audience members by the laugh using facial recognition built into the seating. According to the agency behind the scheme, it's resulted in bigger audiences and higher revenues, and it's now rolling out to other locations.

Long Story

Asking for your money back at the end of a disappointing stand-up gig could soon be a thing of the past if a scheme piloted by a comedy club in Barcelona takes off. As part of a publicity stunt, the Teatreneu comedy theater installed tablets in the back of the auditorium seats that used facial recognition technology to count laughs and smiles — audience members were then charged based on how much they laughed during the performance.

The show was free to get into, but €0.30 (about 38 cents) was added to the ticket price every time a laugh was detected, with the limit set at €24 (about $31) so that no one was seriously out of pocket for chuckling too much. That works out at 80 moments of mirth and anyone who hit this milestone was encouraged to share their 'high score' with friends over social media, thus building buzz about the comedy show.

Spanish creative agency The Cyranos McCann was behind the stunt, organized in response to a sharp rise in tax for theatrical shows in Spain in mid-2013. According to the company it led to a 6 euro (8 dollar) increase in the average ticket price (that's about €28,000 or $35,700 extra per show) and a 35 percent rise in the number of spectators coming along to catch a performance. The system has since been copied by several other theaters across Spain.

With the music, television and film industries looking for new and novel ways to increase revenue, there's no reason why live shows and plays shouldn't look to do the same. Not only do the audience members get better value for money, but the performers are kept accountable when it comes to putting on a good show.

The only potential loophole: if you're very good at controlling your emotions, you could get away with a free night's entertainment.

Own The Conversation

: Does this mean I can get my money back for Grown Ups 2?

Disrupt Your Feed: New technology and data mining promises better value for everything from car insurance to comedy shows, as long as you're comfortable with the privacy cost.

Drop This Fact: The highest-earning comedian of 2013 was Jerry Seinfeld, who raked in $32 million in earnings over the year.