Here is a list of questions we often get from subscribers and others. If your question is not on the list, feel free to get in touch with us.

What exactly does KwikNik™ do?

KwikNik™ is a face recognition and identification service. Just take a photo, using your cellphone's camera, and send it to us. If your photo of the subject matches a face in our database with a sufficiently high probability, you will instantly receive the name of the person via a text message or email.

Our face recognition technology analyzes the photo you took and compares it to the many faces in our database (which was compiled using sources such as high school yearbooks and MySpace web pages). If there is a match with a sufficently high probability, we return the name of the person associated with the photo in our database.

You may see a person and wish to know their name and something about them before approaching them. Alternatively, you may suffer from prosopagnosia, a disorder which makes recognizing and identifying faces difficult.

Yes, but it should be a fairly recent model with a good camera with a resolution of at least 2 megapixels.

No. You only need the ability to send multimedia or email from your mobile phone.

The photo must be a head shot portrait, taken head on, or with an angular deviation of not more than 5 percent. The photo must be taken in good light and sharply focussed. For best results, the photo should be taken with full zoom, or not further away than 15 feet, from a position level with the subject's face.

Our database covers female individuals who graduated from high school in the United States in or since the year 2000 through 2006, as well as female MySpace users.

No, we integrated the two. For some subjects, we will return both full name + high school and MySpace username. For other subjects, we will return only the full name + high school. For other subjects, we will return a MySpace nick only.

We anticipate minimal demand for male identification, and in the case of males, facial hair has a negative effect on the accuracy of the match probability.

We have a range of pricing options according to how often you plan to intend to query the database. Please see our rates.

The value of this type of service decreases in direct inverse proportion to the availability. Therefore, if the cost is set too low, and use of the service proliferates into the mainstream, the service will not be as valuable to the users. The bar is set high to maintain the exclusivity, and consequently usefulness, of the service.

You will receive a message saying "No Match." If the match probability is zero, or any number less than 95%, you will not be billed, and the query number will not be deducted from your available queries.

We select the highest match. If they are equally weighted, we select the match based on your geographic location and the subject's high school. For example, if there are two matches at 99.3%, and one graduated from high school in Florida and the other in California, we will return the former if you happen to be querying from Miami, and the latter if you're querying from L.A.

You can apologize to the subject for a genuine case of mistaken identity, and move on. You will be billed for the query, but our pricing plans take into account a small number of false positives, i.e. a match of 95% or higher which turns out to be wrong.

No. False positives constitute a tiny fraction of the returns from our system, and this fraction has been taken into consideration by our pricing scheme. Reimbursing false positives would create a disincentive for our subscribers to make an effort to shoot clear, full-frontal photos. Moreover, a refund policy would be prone to abuse.

Am I charged for negative matches?

No. If our system fails to find a match or the match probability is less than 95%, you are not charged for the query (or the query is not deducted from your available count of free queries).

Because some enterprising individual might start reselling our product, or, worse, make it available on the web for free.

No and no and no.

No, we are using only public information (such as yearbooks and web pages), and public knowledge (the presence of the subject in your vicinity).

We don't see it that way. There is no difference between personally coming across a photo with a name (in a yearbook or other publication), looking at it with your own eyes, and memorizing the face and the name, or using our technology to do it. There is no ethical or moral problem in knowing a person's name.

Any technology is harmful if it falls into the wrong hands and is willfully misused, but we can't see how KwikNik™ changes the dynamic for those intent on doing evil. For instance, far more than a name is required for ID theft to work.

MySpace has the largest number of users, so this was an easy choice to make. However, we may add other social networking sites in future.

Yes, we are actively seeking funding from Venture Capital firms at this point. All funds invested to date have come from the founders. Please go to our contact page and send us an email.

Yes, pursuant to the verification of your status as a bona fide investor, you will get 12 free queries.

If you are an investor, yes. We may ask you to sign an NDA. Otherwise, no. We are not entertaining any inquiries from the mainstream media as we do not want knowledge of our service to become widely known.