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CCTV - The Fifth Utility
An anonymous reader sent in a solid story discussing the fifth utility, or, the closed caption surveliance systems in Britain. Lots of background information on encryption and privacy issues. But in the end, a very good story covering a lot of issues that might be second nature to many readers of this site, but maybe not to the average newspaper reader.
The fair, brotherly cops and respectable politicians are the source of enough institutional racism that the UN is getting involved. Your government has investigated the cops and found them guilty of pervasive racial bias. Heck, your own officers don't even believe that their fellow cops are fair or brotherly.
BTW, the rate of church attendance is more like 44% in the US and 27% in the UK. The University of Michigan has one of the most respected social sciences/statistics departments in the world, so please don't come back here claiming otherwise.
And as far as New Labour and the "Third Way" being responsive to the people... well, it's about as believable as hearing the same thing from Clinton. It is true that the British government isn't bought and sold as brazenly as ours is, but it is just as responsive as any other government when dollars (or pounds, as the case may be) are at issue. When those businesses want to start invading your privacy more brazenly, you can be sure that MI5 will be there to help out.
In conclusion- either you are a damn good troll or you are pretty deluded about the society you live in. Hope it is the latter... it is never too late to learn.
~luge
IAAL,BIANLY
- The right not to have the police following you around all the time, waiting for you so commite some crime so they can arrest you.
First of all, the police are not watching you - for the simple reason that it would cost too much. Councils contract private security companies to staff CCTV systems, since the police are already over streached - and the CCTV operators will only bother calling the police if they see a crime in progress.Secondly, some people do want to be watched. For example, I heard of a pilot scheme in one city in the UK, where there is a phone number that a single woman walking home alone at night can ring. She can leave her description, a time, and roughly what route she will be following. Now, rather than walking home alone in the dark afraid of being attacked, every time she turns a corner she will be greeted by the sight of a CCTV camera turning to focus in on her. Having a big brother to watch over you is not always a bad thing.
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used or posesed any illegal drugs
To quote the subject at the top of this thread, "CCTV is a reflection of cultural differences." Please bear in mind, that in this country, if you are caught smuggling 5 grams of pot into the country it is assumed to be for personal use and you will be given a £70 on the spot fine. Compare that to the US view on drugs smuggling. Cultural differences.- Don't you ever watch any Mark Thomas?
Note for non-Brits:Mark Thomas is a politically motivated comedian-slash-borderline-terrorist (that's meant as a compliment) and probably one of the biggest pains in the government's ass.
One thing that he had great fun playing with in his recent series, (not what prev. poster was talking about, but relevant to CCTV), was the Data Protection Act.
This is a wonderful piece of UK legislation, which allows you to demand any company/organization which holds information about you to give you a copy (with certain exclusions ie some government agencies). So you can walk into MacDonalds, fill out a form while you eat your burger, giving the time, date, a description of yourself, the clothes you are wearing, etc, then hand it in before you leave forcing them to send you a copy of the footage of you sitting there filling out the form.
This is all wonderfully silly.
The other purpose of the license fee is to set minimum standards of competence for television viewers. It is quite a while since I passed the test but I still remember some of the questions.
Q. Who played Emma Peel in the Avengers before Diana Rigg?
Q. True or False, Reginald Bosequett's hair [False]
Q. Why is Star Trek the most commonly shown US TV series A: The BBC purchased the UK rights outright for $80 per episode during the initial runs
To pass you had to score no more than 5 out of 10, thus demonstrating that you were not a total couch potatoe.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
Yep, this is how new channels are funded. But the license fee is a historical artefact... when it began, the BBC was the only channel. If you bought a TV, you were going to watch the BBC on it because there was nothing else to use it for, so it made sense for the license fee (read as 'subscription fee') to be compulsory for anyone who bought a TV.
Why not use adverts? Firstly, because people don't like watching ads and complain at every suggestion that the BBC should be funded this way. Secondly, the BBC historically has the aim of producing quality public service broadcasting, which would be compromised by the need to pursue advertising revenue. (Of course, the extent to which the BBC achieves this is debatable, but that's the theory.)
Why not subscription? Well, the license fee is effectively a subscription. The only problem with this interpretation, as you say, is that you are forced to pay wether you want to watch the BBC or not - but in practice the number of people who own a TV without ever using a BBC service is extremely small (I'd be very surprised if it was as high as 1 percent). Not really fair on that small number, of course, but the license has been in place for fifty-odd years now; people are just used to it.
In short, the license fee is a typically British solution of the form, 'it's only slightly broken so don't bother fixing it'.