Google’s Arts & Culture app has been around for about a year and half. But it’s taken an art selfie feature to generate a bit of viral interest in the app — with a steady stream of delighted/outraged tweets bubbling up over the weekend as users assessed the results of their fine art doppelgänger. Oh what price vanity, etc etc…
Special thanks to the google arts & culture app’s doppelgänger feature for keeping me humble. pic.twitter.com/dhTese3mE5— Susie Meister (@susie_meister) January 14, 2018
While complaints about the app’s matches included not being offered any matches (with some putting this down to the Eurocentrism of art history), or being facially matched with an artwork of a different gender or age, the most outraged Twitter chatter was on account of people not being able to access the feature at all.
Playing with the Google Arts & Culture app (iOS and Android). It'll search international museum collections for portraits that are similar to your selfie. https://t.co/Q7qq6h5dMp pic.twitter.com/8qDKdghDgE— Andy Ihnatko (@Ihnatko) January 4, 2018
We understand that’s because it’s still experimental and has been region-blocked — specifically it’s limited to the US right now.
Also read- Google deleted 60 games from the Play Store that showed porn ads to users
Judging by reports from some US Twitter users, it’s not even universally available within the US either. Google declined to comment when we asked about its rollout intentions for the feature. So if you’re really desperate to try it out then you could try signing up to a (reputable) VPN with a US exit node to workaround the region-block.
Or else you could just enjoy the rest of the app’s features — such as virtual art tours, info about nearby museums and cultural events, and an art recognizer feature that uses computer vision so you can point your phone at an artwork and be served tidbits of info about it.
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