An app featuring an alarm that won't turn off until you smile is the latest in a series of wacky wake-up apps promising to help you get up in the morning and start your day right.
Dubbed "Smile Clock," the app uses face-recognition technology to study the user's facial features and determine whether or not the person is smiling. If the app determines you are sufficiently happy, it then stops buzzing and lets you go off to enjoy your day after getting it started on the right foot. If you aren't smiling, or your grin isn't wide enough, it comes back with a "Why so serious" query and continues buzzing until you turn that frown upside down.
Created by an Israeli developer, the app currently only functions in landscape mode, and in addition, does not currently work for bearded men, as the presence of too much facial hair interferes with the face-recognition technology that is set up to determine whether you're smiling or not. The developer offers an apology to all bearded men, with a promise to fix the issue in later versions of the app.
In addition, you can select the app to play a song that you have preselected that gets you in a good mood and will help result in the required smile. If that's not enough, you can also add images which cause you to flash a toothy grin.
The Smile Clock app is the most recent in a wave of bizarre wake-up apps available to smartphone users. Recently, Oscar Mayer developed an app that wakes the user to the sound of bacon, along with a picture of the sizzling meat being cooked in a frying pan. The app requires a separate device to be attached to the user's smartphone, which then emits the scent.
Another recent wake-up app that has recently been released is called Wakie. The app connects random members who call each other to wake each other up at set times. Each call lasts only a minute to avoid awkwardness or potentially delay the member from actually getting up and taking care of their responsibilities by instead engaging in a lengthy conversation with their new friend.
