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Google Sued Over Privacy Invasion On Street View
mikkl666 writes "A couple from Pittsburgh has sued Google because a photo of their house appeared on Google Street View. They are demanding in excess of $25,000 to make up for the 'mental suffering' and the diminished value of their home. Their street is apparently marked with a 'Private Road' sign, and they claim that putting a photo of their property online is an 'intentional and/or grossly reckless invasion' of their privacy. Google, on the other hand, claims that this lawsuit is pointless since anyone can ask them to have pictures removed without legal action. We've previously discussed some of the privacy concerns surrounding Street View."
While I can somehow understand the 'mental suffering' part - although 25000$ seems very excessive - I don't see how their home should suffer from "diminished value".
Their home is going to be worth *more* if anything (more visibility = more famous = more value).
I had the opportunity to speak with some people on the Maps team when I interviewed with Google and mentioned that they need to address the privacy issues of street view before someone sued them, whether it was technically illegal or not. They didn't listen, and I can't say I'm surprised by the result.
I just love it when people grab any occasion to try to sue as much money as they can from large (and rich) companies, no matter how ridiculous it sounds. A chance these companies also have dozens of lawyers for whenever that happens.
You just got troll'd!
Telling people that there is no damage because you can ask for something to be removed is silly IMO, that doesn't cover the time it was up until the request was followed and I dislike the idea of opt-out in general, asking someone for permission should happen BEFORE acting, not just acting and telling people they have to come to you to revoke their permission.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Here's what makes this case different than the other StreetView suits... the Google van wasn't supposed to be on this road in the first place. A private road means that the owners of the road take no government funding or care for it, and therefore get to decide who they'll allow on it. Google wasn't wanted, so there's the problem.
I don't like opt-out memberships. The ability for companies to get away with opt-out usually comes from legislation. Not simple company choice.
Google never ceases to teach me new things. I guess it's okay to do impolite things as long as I remind the victim that they could have asked me to stop at any time.
How long until google is indexing my underwear drawer?
I dunno it seems like a case of bad judgment on the driver of the mapping vehicle. If you look at the pictures it seems like they drove right up to their garage, taking pictures the whole time.
It also seems like provider of the maps is also at fault, if you follow along on Google maps you can see that the street appears to extend all the way to their garage.
But, there doesn't seem to be any "private road" labeling on the map nor was their any sign visible when I followed the street via Streetview to their house (though they did delete the offending pictures, so maybe the sign was there?)
Regardless though, I would expect that the drivers of these vehicles would know better then to keep the pictures they took of a property while parked in front of a garage.
...unfortunately no one can be told what The Mat^H^H^HGoatse is...they must experience it for themselves...
I think the judge should have a big red button on the bench, connected to a solenoid and trap-door located under the plaintiff and his lawyer. As volcanoes are in short supply, a pool full of hungry crocodiles would do.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
I can go down to the courthouse and pull up any residence in town. Oh the suffering! Oh the property values!!
IANAL, however it seems like this should come down a question of visibility. Is the house visible from the street? Then it seems that publishing a photo that includes the house shouldn't be a problem. It would be different if it were a close-up photo of the house, or one looking inside it, but if it's just the same view available to a passer-by, what's the harm? My only question is whether the 'Private Road' sign could cause problems. What's a 'private road?' Do the residents pave it and light it, or is it really a public road maintained by the municipality with a sign that discourages visitors?
This reminds me a bit of companies that place security guards to stop people from photographing their buildings. My reaction has always been that you shouldn't put a building in a public place if you don't want it to be photographed.
The question is: "You might be a redneck if ..."
They're just pissed they've been outed as white trash.
First off, I don't understand how their home value is diminished. Second, even if it is, so what? If Google is engaging in legal acts (making that assumption), why is it Google's concerns for their home value? I've always questioned this "property value" argument when others are engaging in legal behavior. If painting my purple polka dots on my house that are allowed by local statute, diminishes your home by $25, it's not my problem, it's yours. Same goes for this house in question. Oh yeah, don't forget the Streisand Effect.
I remember when people were trying to sue McDonald's because they said the restaurant made them fat... gotta love America!
Either way, they must have a very strange life
oh, yeah... I guess they could be looking to make a quick buck.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Has Microsoft's Talking Parrot now moved to individuals to drain opposing corporations? I figured that program would rise again, but not in the form of an invisible bird perched on the shoulder. This is just an imaginary message from a dream world, my opinion based on an invented subreality, dismiss.
They don't have a case. Anyone can take pictures from a public location; if you don't want to be photographed, you have to put up a fence.
Contrary to what they claim, the road in question wasn't even clearly marked a "Private Road" (you can see that in street view itself; there's no sign anywhere).
However, Google has apparently voluntarily removed the images anyway, which makes their case collapse.
In Texas a private road is defined as one maintained privately, as opposed to a public road that is maintained by a government (municipal, county, state, or federal). Usually the residents who use the road share the responsibility to maintain it.
I assume in Pennsylvania it's the same. If you don't want people driving on a road, you need to mark it as such. Put a gate, or a sign forbidding unauthorized access.
-- Support a free market in the field of government
It's about the free moneyz.
Remember that famous event where Gates appeared on a screen behind Jobs? It was then I knew Jobs had sold out to Microsoft. Hidden deals go on all the time. Don't be fooled, Apple/Mac may be seen as a rival or competitor, but IMO they sold out long ago. They are a "tolerated" rival. Anything to date in Microsoft's path has been bought, merged, absorbed, destroyed, scuttled, or blurred somehow. Linux is the current target, with a patent battle yet to come (you think Microsoft will lose in the land of the corporations? think again, we see how powerful MS remains and how ineffective the DOJ was in dealing with them as their monopoly continues on the desktop - tell me how many operating systems you can choose from preloaded on systems in how many computer stores other than Windows) as Microsoft circles the wagons of Linux companies buying protection. As Microsoft enters deeper into connections with US government (see recent LOC deal) other powerful players are being shut out (see recent IBM news).
I firmly believe the worse of Microsoft is yet to come. IMO, I believe Gates won't rest until he has worked his way into President of the United States or holding even more of a global grip on the world. Make no mistake, IMO as soon as Gates is away from Microsoft, expect to hear much more from him in the news about other issues, the compassion will start to flow, all the while Microsoft will reap the benefits.
Nor mental suffering.
This whole hype is to pump up the value of their house.
Hope they will get some hate mail, so at least the mental suffering will be true.
They might suffer some mental problems, though. But that's not Google's fault.
Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
Allegheny County has a real estate assessment website which has pictures of every house in the county. Including the Borings:
http://www2.county.allegheny.pa.us/RealEstate/Image.asp?CurrBloLot=0823E00136000000&Street=Oakridge
This story was posted to Fark earlier this week, and linked to The Smoking Gun. Apparently these people should sue their own government also, because the assessors office has a picture of the house online as well, complete with all the dimensions of the house/
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2008/0404081google8.html
These knuckleheads should have just done the opt-out and this whole thing would have been over. Now theyâ(TM)ve invoked the Streisand Effect and everyone in the world has seen their private house. They are most definitely in it just for the cash, who would give a rip about their crappy little home, it looks like a half step up from a broken down mobile-home.
Kevin
Irrational Diversions
vs "Opt In"
Whenever a company operates from "consent by omission" (by not getting permission first, as in "opt in" they are opening themselves up for such questions.
Frankly, I dislike a lot of what Google is doing with this feature. There is a big difference between showing street level photos of commercial areas and residential areas. I think Google has crossed that line here.
If Google operated on an "opt in" basis they'd be using those photos with permission and thus, be immune from lawsuits.
Frankly, Google is acting more like Microsoft and less like Google of 4-5 years ago every day...
Corporatism != Free Market
I'm glad we have folks like you to white knight poor defenseless Google, but the fact is that these numbers people sue for are supposed to be PUNITIVE, not COMPENSATORY. They are supposed to punish. To punish Google, you sue for as much as possible to get publicity, to get the CEO to fucking notice that not everybody is signed up for his brave new world.
Google's agents, to take the photos they did, had to trespass. Even though this is a minor offense, it is still a crime, and do we really want corporations to be able to ignore laws they consider beneath them financially?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
mental suffering! are you freakin kidding me?
they just showed your house.. they didn't blow it to bits! that's whats happening to houses in war torn countries in other parts of the world.
It's better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
End of story.
I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
I think that's a totally different situation.
For one thing, presumably any image of my house is incidental: you were photographing your friends and family at a barbecue, not deliberately going up to my house just to photograph it.
For another, your photo probably doesn't record much detail from inside my house through the windows or doors caught in your shot.
Next, presumably such images are for your own private use, and not for general distribution to the public.
Finally, you're not systematically going about getting pictures of everyone's houses and building a searchable database of the lot. With a lot of privacy issues, the existence of one piece of data is only a small part of the problem, and the greater danger is in the systematic collection and data mining of lots of such data.
These issues are rarely black and white, but comparing taking an incidental picture of someone's own home for private use to Google's behaviour with Street View is like comparing quoting a small excerpt from a book in a review for critical purposes with industrial copying and redistribution of the entire work. One of those we consider reasonable and inoffensive, and the law in most places provides a pretty clear exception for it. The other we consider unreasonable, and it is illegal in most places.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Allegheny County (where Pittsburgh is) has all houses on their property assessment website.
Here is this one: http://www2.county.allegheny.pa.us/RealEstate/Image.asp?CurrBloLot=0823E00136000000&Street=oakridge
The county has been causing all of us Pittsburghers untold amounts of "mental suffering" for years.
Google should just claim they didn't parse the "Private Road" sign, because it didn't conform to web standards.
Please stop stalking me, bro.
I did a project more than a decade ago with EMTs and other first responders about vehicle INS systems ( before GPS became ubiquitous ). The drivers jokingly ( or maybe not ) noted that the eventual real effect of people that had overgrown vegitation, concealed drives, locked gates, non-existent or faded curb numbers, missing or angled house numbers and unlit or burned out porch lights was that response time effectively doubles or triples with a corresponding effect on medical survival rates. As society becomes more dependent of spatial technologies like StreetView, a similar counter-survival friction will occur as Fedex, Dominos, and EMTs are delayed by uncertain spots in their data. So that EMT's opinion was that eventually these 'hiding' people would be selected against and be left in the shallow end of the gene pool.
Remember last month when a Danish journalist was talking on his cell phone and wandered into a woman's lawn? She came after him with a gun of all things!
Run and catch, run and catch, the lamb is caught in the blackberry patch.
I was going to respond that this suit is BS, since no-one has a right to "privacy" per se, just to private property. But since it is a private road that they had to drive down, it's really more like a long drive-way with "sub-driveways" off the sides. Hence, Google had no right to be there to take the photographs in the first place.
On the other hand, that assumes they didn't go somewhere on the other side, and use a telephoto lens. This should be easily discernable from the photograph (depending on how much of the background is in focus and the perspective).
They did say their problem was that Google had to trespass to have taken the photos as they appeared. However, they unfortunately phrase it in terms of "privacy violation". There is no such thing as the "right to privacy", per se. It is merely a right derived from private property, or self-ownership in some cases (e.g., for someone wearing clothes, no-one would have the right to come by and rip them off to "get a picture of what's underneath"; but this isn't because of privacy "rights", it is because of their right to their body and property).
Thus, the proper way to phrase it is that their private property rights were violated -- Google trespassed. As a result, their reasonable expectation to a certain measure of privacy, due to their property configuration, was not fulfilled. Hence, the damages they are asking for.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
to allow pictures taken from a public place (the street). Granted, this case involves a private road, but your idea is invalid as it only takes one person to opt in to allow a picture from a public place - in this case it was google that opted in for the pictures to be viewable. Or another way to look at it is that I pay taxes for all the roads in my city... I want to allow google to use this service on all the roads I pay taxes for.
So a single picture shows 3 houses... who allows that? What about apartments?
It is a compicated issue, but it would seem that a good majority doesn't have a problem with this (based on what I have read and talking with others). So most are okay with it and anyone that is greatly opposed has the ability to remove the pictures... I don't see an issue.
No comprende? Let me type that a little slower for you...
If someone working for Google drove onto private property to take those pictures then they screwed up. It happens. They're not asking for an insane amount. Google ought to settle and move on.
The bigger picture is that you and Google don't value property rights.
Let us know when it is convenient for us to come over and take your shit.
Its amazing how people are already picking sides - googlers are the only ones who so far have a valid point - they have a system in place to have offending images removed if found. While yes it means they could CYA without legal penalty, the law WILL weigh in upon that. You can't sue someone because you're too lazy to click a link - they have a system in place to handle the situation which is considered legally acceptable in numerous other situations (look at youtube with their report-this-video function in the case of copyrighted material). As for the couple, since they are inciting the claim, it is THEY who are responsible to prove their side of the case. How do you know they didn't see a cash cow and get a private road sign recently put up? Was the 'private road' an extension of a public road which would not be posted as private on GPS? Let the facts tell the story, not your emotions for or against google.
I live on a private road. It is clearly marked "private road". Occasionally, someone accidentally drives down my road. In California, this is not a crime, as there is not a closed gate on the road. I could legally ask them to leave, and if they refuse to comply, I could arrest them for trespassing (C.P.C. 602J). I choose to ignore them and leave my curtains closed. Another option, I suppose, is to emulate the contumacious asshole across the street and attack anyone who blunders in. I am unable to fathom the damage that occurred in this instance, perhaps the laws are different in Pennsylvania?
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.
Well, the FA does indicate that they are also suing for trespassing, in fact. Just RTF... oh nevermind.
BTW -- they also ask not only that Google remove the pictures from Google maps, but also destroy all the original data too (and remove it from anywhere on "teh interwebs" too), something I am guessing Google doesn't do with the little "opt out" form.
I guess these people don't know i can goto their local clerk and get their name and assessed value too. Or a host of other public or easily purchased record sources are available.
Views from the *street* are public. Don't like it, move further back from the road and put up trees. ( and put a cover over your property or move underground since satellite images are public too, since i could see that same view from the street, with a REALLY large ladder. )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Assuming that's the right house, where is the "Private Road" sign? I backed out along Street View, and couldn't find it.
Besides which, this looks like just another dirt road, with a fair number of houses along it. Their claim that the Google van drove down their long driveway just to take pictures of their house is a little bit of a stretch considering it looks like a normal (dirt) road with other houses branching off, and they just happen to be at the cul-de-sac.
Umm, by the looks of that house, my best guess is that they're concerned about the street-view shots exposing their meth lab and/or moonshine still!
All you need is lurv.
If you dig through TFA you may notice this is not exactly Biltmore.
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.
Isn't that cute? They still think there's privacy in the United States...
This sig is false.
So far, Google has been in only minor trouble with the "Homeland Security" goons. Of course, Google StreetView has no Washington, D.C. area coverage. They're being cautious about that. Full coverage of Manhattan, though.
Coverage of my old house near Palo Alto is so good that you can read the license plates of the cars in the driveway. You can even see me through a window, but it's just a faint outline because their images don't have enough dynamic range to look inside a dark room from a sunny street.
I know these people! All the women in the family have a rare condition, where, when nude, they appearence is easily mistaken for lawn chairs!
You can see them sunbathing in the back yard by the pool! I can't believe they didn't sue for more money!
FLR
I am not an american, and hence had a small question. Cases, (however flimsy) do at the end of time, take up some of the state/national judicial bandwidth.
Does the person suing pay for that bandwidth or does the taxpayer pay for it ? Just a question, since this case sounds a bit illogical to me and so I was wondering whether the taxpayer would be comfortable paying for it.
If Google traipsed onto the "private road" to take the photo, that's trespassing, and the law should handle it. If they instead stood on the adjacent public highway and the house can be seen from there, well, too bad -- that's fair game. If the owners of the house want visual privacy, they can invest in a fence or large hedge. I'm as big an advocate of privacy as the next guy, but hell, you can't keep people from looking at or taking photos of your house if it is in plain sight. (That's why my dream house would sit in the middle of thick woods, surrounded by a 12-foot fence, surrounded by a moat. And maybe some gators in the moat if I can get a good deal from pets.com.....)
"Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket." -- Eric Hoffer
I used to live at the end of a dead end road, and my roommate (whom was purchasing the home) actually owned 1/2 of the road from a telephone pole back to the fence/property line.
We had lots of signs up stating "PRIVATE PROPERTY" "NO TRESPASSING" "Violators will be shot, survivors will be shot again." On a few occasions right after we moved in, we had police patrols in our neighborhood (due to "gang" activity, but that's another story) and they would turn around in our driveway.
The cops were cool, and eventually let us know those signs didn't mean much, unless we actually owned the road, luckily we had the paperwork showing property lines. After that the cops wouldn't (couldn't?) use the very end of the road to turn around in, unless we had personally talked to that officer and gave him our permission. Heck, we let them use our property to conduct a few stake outs too.
So if these people live on a "Private" road, they better be ready to prove they own that land. If not, I say Google had every right to take some pictures.
The main purpose of a house is keeping people outside from looking in on your private affairs. As such, the outside of a house is the part offered for public consumption.
Anyone has the right to look at the outside of a house visible from a public place to stand. And we have the right to publish photos of anything we've rightfully seen.
If they want more privacy, they can draw the shades. They can raise a hedge. Or they can accept the reality that a "private road" doesn't prohibit people from looking past it, unless they make it really big. And then they'll probably get fined for raising a public eyesore on their property, which should really show them where the line lies.
--
make install -not war
This couple is probably just playing the lawsuit lottery, and Google, being a company with lots of dough, seems to them a perfect candidate. Google doesn't have to claim anything. All they have to do is remove the photo, and the lawsuit will be promptly thrown out by the court, since the case will by then be moot. The couple could then claim that the photo having been there for any period of time calls for them to receive some settlement, but Google can easily file motion after motion and drag the case out like gum stuck to one's shoe until the couple runs out of money to continue the case.
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
Here is the proof. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9004971557883691425&q=google+maps+street+view&total=258&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=2
Turns out the house belongs to a "Barbara Streisand", whoever that is.
Some thought has just occurred to me while using StreetView just now. With all the panoramic pictures the same stuff under different angles we've got there, why won't someone make something to turn that in 3D? Surely it can't be that hard (besides for the moving vehicles). Basically we already know well enough where all the panoramas were taken, plus they're 360 panoramas and all quite close in space to each other. That wouldn't be too hard to correlate points/features between them and with some trigonometry obtain some 3D stuff. Then you could explore the result in a virtual car. Surely it would look a bit crappy and lifeless, but nonetheless interesting.
You just got troll'd!
As a Pennsylvania resident I agree with those that have sued Google Inc. When a sign says private, it means just that. This is however only after knowing if this road is maintained by the tax payers or if it's in fact a private road. If it's a private road unmaintained by the tax payers, then Google had no right venturing on it, just like they have no right using our tax based air forces bases to fly their airplanes out of. If this is however a taxpayer funded/maintained road, then that sign has no bearing and Google had every right to photograph while on it. I do disagree with this venture by google, even on public streets. Google openly censors information (about it's management) and about other countries. They shouldn't take advantage of the laws we have here by being able to openly photograph everything when they also respect the laws of other countries that tell them to stay out. If yahoo didn't suck so bad I wouldn't use google at all:)
This is strange for me to see right now, because I just discovered that Street View now works in Pittsburgh. If you pan the camera a little bit, you can see the roll of duct tape keeping my side mirror on my car. My dad would be proud.
On one hand, this is a little spooky, but I can't really quantify why. I suppose if I put a stone tablet in my yard named 'robots.txt' it would not help.
On the other hand, street view could be very useful for people moving to new cities. I got my place in Pittsburgh off craigslist sight unseen because I was too poor to afford plane tickets and hotels and the like. I got incredibly lucky, but I could have ended up in a rathole in a horrible area of town (of which there are many). I'm about to move to Montreal, and it would be very nice to have a way of checking out the city so I know (vaguely) which areas I like.
Check it out for yourself:
1567 Oakridge Lane, Allegheny County, Pittsburgh, PA 15237
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=1567+Oakridge+Lane,+Allegheny+County,+Pittsburgh,+PA+15237&sll=33.639186,-111.90264&sspn=0.010808,0.014484&ie=UTF8&ll=40.578596,-80.078187&spn=0.00986,0.014484&t=h&z=16&layer=c&cbll=40.574923,-80.078939&cbp=1,76.25929741794107,,0,-14.838188955384481
Use the arrows to "drive" up the road and then zoom in and around. I just looked and I didn't see a private drive sign anywhere. How's the Google car/van supposed to know that a road with an official name "Oakridge Lane" is a "private drive" ???
Sounds like someone trying to make a quick buck (though $25,000 is modest by today's comparison) or a lawyer gave them bad advice (or is also looking for a quick buck). Perhaps they think keeping the price down will get Google ot pay them to go away since the cost of "defending" this would probably be a lot more. Just another nuisance lawsuit.
...lawsuit is pointless since anyone can ask them to have pictures removed without legal action...
Don't you think they should ask you for your agreement first? I mean, would you agree if anybody could publicly tell anything about you - without you knowing that, and whether it is true or false - without fear of retribution because "you can ask them to have the content removed"?
And what if you do not have internet?
For the most part you are also allowed to take photos of government and (some military) locations. from http://www.krages.com/ThePhotographersRight.pdf [read the whole paper for the details that I've ommited]
The General Rule
The general rule in the United States is that anyone may take photographs of whatever they want when they are in a public place or places where they have permission to take photographs. Absent a specific legal prohibition such as a statute or ordinance, you are legally entitled to take photographs.
Examples of places that are traditionally considered public are streets, sidewalks, and public parks. Property owners may legally prohibit photography on their premises but have no right to prohibit others from photographing their property from other locations. Whether you need permission from property owners to take photographs while on their premises depends on the circumstances. In most places, you may reasonably assume that taking photographs is allowed and that you do not need explicit permission. However, this is a judgment call and you should request permission when the circumstances suggest that the owner is likely to object. In any case, when a property owner tells you not to take photographs while on the premises, you are legally obligated to honor the request.
Some Exceptions to the Rule
There are some exceptions to the general rule. A significant one is that commanders of military installations can prohibit photographs of specific areas when they deem it necessary to protect national security. The U.S. Department of Energy can also prohibit photography of designated nuclear facilities although the publicly visible areas of nuclear facilities are usually not designated as such. Members of the public have a very limited scope of privacy rights when they are in public places. Basically, anyone can be photographed without their consent except when they have secluded themselves in places where they have a reasonable expectation of privacy such as dressing rooms, restrooms, medical facilities, and inside their homes.
Permissible Subjects
Despite misconceptions to the contrary, the following subjects can almost always be photographed lawfully from public places:
accident and fire scenes
children
celebrities
bridges and other infrastructure
residential and commercial buildings
industrial facilities and public utilities
transportation facilities (e.g., airports)
Superfund sites
criminal activities
law enforcement officers
Fuck you.
I have an expectation of money falling from the sky.
This expectation is born of both pure greed and the feeling that the world owes me something.
does that sound stupid to you? it sure does to me.
there is no such thing as common courtesy or acceptable polite behavior. These are just terms that you (or someone like you) has made up to cover the fact that they don't have a clue about what they are talking about. Where was the common courtesy of asking Google to take the offending images down, before calling a lawyer?
If you think that taking pictures from a public road (and it is public until you post a sign, put up a gate or do some thing to say otherwise) is a violation of your privacy, just wait until someone goes through your trash or starts writing down your car's license plate number every time you pass by.
get over it.
if you want privacy in your home, close the drapes. If you want privacy for your home, build it under ground, on an Air-force base, at night, by your self.
until then, get over it and your ethics too.
-- Sig under construction...
If I was Google I would remove the picture of their house and put up a picture of an outhouse. See which one they prefer.
These people are either crackheads are on a quest to becoming clowns. As for the court case, before the judge laughs in these jokers faces, Google's defense may easily be as follows:
."
a. The obvious point of, "you never asked to have it removed."
b. Find clausable reason that the plantiff is trying to turn this fiasco into a publicity stunt in an effort to increase the property value, not devalue it, as they claim. Furthermore, Google paid resources to have their property imaged (van, tires, oil, gas, human resources), and should be exempt for providing a public service for FREE.
I truly beleive that if Google proactively removed/morphed the view of their property, they would have wanted to sue Google for the same exact shit; "We demand in excess of $25,000 to make up for the 'mental suffering' and the diminished value of our home for omitting it from StreetView
Stupidity like this goes on and on everyday.
To say that this is something you can opt-out of is an outrageous claim. If I'd had never used the internet (or used it infrequently), and had never heard of google streetview (an entirely plausible scenario), then how COULD I out-out? People keep pointing out that their house is also on the county website but this couple just might not be aware of it. Is it really fair to say that a company doesn't have to offer you the ability to opt-out, rather than having the ability? When I want to stop receiving group emails, there is normally a link to opt-out. When you want to opt-out of installing the yahoo or google toolbar, you normally get the option while you're installing the other program.
Those are opt-out where you're OFFERED the ability, not just burying it somewhere on your own website.
Sorry for being a bit off-topic, but do is there a way to use street view without flash player ? Google says "to use street view, you must download flash player 9".
So does this mean next time someone pulls into my driveway to turn around I can sue the pants off of them? God what has ever happened to common sense? If I REALLY want my road to be private, put up a frickin gate & fence. If I really really want privacy, put up a electric barbed wire fence. I'd never make it as a judge. I'd be tar-ing and feather-ing people all day.
I don't know about the US, but in the UK and Australia trespass is actionable per se, that is, without proof of damage. That is because it protects your exclusive right to enjoy your property. As such, damages are essentially intangible and punitive, rather than reflecting the quantum of a proved, tangible loss.
Sorry, IAAL. But you don't always have to "lose" $X to be entitled to recover $X.
Read Pynchon.
it is critical to google's future success that they acquire a reputation as fighters rather than payers. (but only when the fit hits the shan - and all other methods are exhausted)
But you understand where this is heading. Google more than could see that this was an unimproved road. That is a legal classification of roadway. In your case, the police have no legal right to use that road you talked about. Once you reminded the police that it was your road, they must, by law, respect it. Which, it sounds like they did. I also would like to thank you for allowing the police to use the road for keeping the community safe.
One Token Ring to Rule them All, One Search Engine to Find Them, One WAN to bring them in, and TCP/IP Bind them...
for a good example of why you should look around for the google van before doing anything in public.
it is only after a long journey that you know the strength of the horse.
Well, here in the U.S. too. But someone wandering up something called "private road" may technically be illegal, but unless there was intent to do harm otherwise or was repeated, a normal police department will probably tell the homeowner to "get over it". Nicer, of course. I live about 400 yards back from the road on my own private road. If a car drives up and turns around, it is highly unlikely I could have that person prosecuted. The police would let me know they're dealing with actual crime, and that they don't have time to waste on my inflated sense of self-importance.
As to your "lose X" argument, well, of course. But no one has lost anything. Google used a satellite to take a picture of my house from space. Oh dear! My house lost value! They owe me $500,000! See? Silly argument. Taking a picture of their home did not cause it to lose value. Even if they drove up a private drive.
Finally, the two acts are unrelated. If they feel the trespass was actionable, they should contact the police and ask them to prosecute. This involves no money to the people living in the shack. If they feel their home value was negatively affected by taking a picture of it, they probably need to put together a set of documents detailing the loss of value, including expert testimony about the nature of the loss. That could be the basis of a civil suit.
My guess is neither of these passes the smell test and that a judge would take a dim view of either one. If I was google, I would (a) leave the picture in (b) send a letter of apology to these people for the sorry state of their "home" (c) dare them to take Google to court.
I think they're hoping google is a piggy-bank that they can shake down for $25K plus "lawyer" costs.
I think that you missed my point.
my point was "Fuck You"
the rest of the reply was just an explanation of why.
my manners are in fine shape thank you.
-- Sig under construction...
I think street view is neat but really should be opt in.
I've seen pictures of forum member's houses where you can see things a would be thief would love to get their hands on just because they had their garage door open at the time google drove bye.
A lot of good opt out does when your atv, rims or classic corvette are already stolen.
At PlexLex: The Law of Google.
My city as well as many others in this country already have photos and MORE info about the property on their websites. So the fact that google also has them doesn't mean anything at all.
I'll even ignore the comments about how this makes it easier to find the pictures, if your looking to purchase a house in a city I'd be surprised if you didn't go to the cities website.(that is assuming your also computer literate enough to check google street view) I mention purchasing a house since that is sort of what the article is about.
Those who can, do.
The problem here is that you (and the law, arguably, I'll grant) are equating Google Street View with random shutterbugs. There's a difference between a dude taking random photos of houses that they see on the street, for their own private enjoyment, and a corporation systematically taking photos of every street in an area, and linking them into a publically searchable, geographical database that can be easily correlated with all other sorts of public databases.
Your argument, frankly, is uncomfortably similar to someboday back in the early days of portable cameras had argued that if you, walking on the street, see a woman undressing in her window, you should be allowed to take and publish photos of her, on the premise that anybody who was walking by at that moment could see her naked. The point of the comparison is that a new piece of technology (in your case, Google Street View, in my case, a portable photo camera) changes the privacy implications of something being visible from public property. Before portable cameras, a visibly naked woman through a window would only be seen by those who just happened to walk by at that moment; after portable cameras, a photo of said event could potentially be seen by millions of people over many years. Likewise, a photo of your house didn't have the same implications before the arrival of publically searchable geographical information systems that cross-reference systematically collected databases of street view photos to the street addresses depicted, which can be easily further correlated to all kinds of public records trivially accessible online.
Ponder the following (hypothetical) case: if the photo of the naked woman at the window is disseminated on the Internet along with its approximate location, Google Street View can be used to confirm or disconfirm hypotheses about the exact street address where the woman lives; this address, in turn, can potentially be used to obtain her name and phone number. This is a serious privacy implication of Google Street View, that goes beyond the privacy implications that such a photo may have had in the era before the Internet. I expect there to be countless other such implications.
Note that I've not argued so far whether Google are within their rights to offer Street View; so far I'm just trying to make you see that there is a very serious question whether they are within their rights. In the USA at least, the right to privacy is a right that's been recognized and interpreted by case law. Case law proceeds by deciding particular disputes, and often must revise or expand upon previous case law to deal with new situations or technology. Privacy law must balance people's right to control the dissemination and use of information about them, with other people's right to obtain and use such information, and different kinds of information and uses are judged differently; you're not allowed to conceal your criminal record from others, for example. You can't just flatly claim that the law allows Google to provide Street View, because the law is not final, and the courts may well require you to provide positive argument about why the law should not forbid Google from providing it.
Are you adequate?
Do they live next door to the Slowskys?
Regardless of whether it follows from his definition, there is a legal difference (in the USA, in general) between an intentional, recognizable depiction of a specific person or building, versus a picture that just happens to include the person or building. If I take a picture of a crowd that just happens to include you, the range of uses I can make of that photo is broader than those I could make of a portrait that included only you. By the same token, there's a difference between a photo of a building, and a photo that just happens to have that building it.
And you're missing an even more fundamental issue here: the difference between the right to take a photo and the right to use a photo in a specific manner. If I see you in a public place, I have a right to take a photo of you. I don't thereby have the right to put your photo in a print ad for a company, with a fake quote in the bottom saying that you approve of that company's products or services.
Are you adequate?
Really, suing Google for $25,000 for one image? Ask for them to take it down. What's next? A person sues Google for a MySpace page that is in the results?
hxxp://nthegreat.co.nr
The argument was that Google's pictures devalued their house BECAUSE Google was trespassing, and if Google can trespass on private roads to take pictures of people's houses, then so can Microsoft and Yahoo and everyone else who comes up with a scheme like Google's. Who knows, maybe even companies like Blizzard (Warcraft in Real Life! Aggro mobs of angry banjo players!)... so they want to establish that publishing photos taken while trespassing is a risky business, and at the very least shouldn't be done by big companies with lots of resources to do a lot of trespassing.
The other picture was taken from the front of the house, not on the private road, and it was taken by someone who probably has the right to be there anyway.
i really enjoyed this blast from the past in the sidebar review:
"Plan on spending an extra $50 or $60 for a 512-MG SD memory card"
I'm not a lawyer, but I have been on a jury in the U.S. involving assault and battery.
Yes, you are absolutely correct that placing a hand on someone is battery. But it is never prosecuted that way. The DA doesn't have that time and energy to prosecute something where there is "no harm, no foul".
Let me give you a perfect example. I live at the end of a long private drive. I had a case where a "homeless" man would drive his car along my drive and stay for the night. When challenged, he would drive away. [let's ignore how a homeless man has a car, it's a different issue]. I called the police, and let them know. Their response was to contact the man and tell him to "cut it out". Which he did for a few months. He then came back, and I called the police again. They said "unless he is doing something else wrong, we're not going to do anything about it".
So I went to his car, tapped on the window and explained "This is private property, you are not welcome here, I have a wife and children, and I I can no longer tolerate your being here and will take 'appropriate' action if you shows up again". I stressed that I bear him no ill will personally, but that it would be unfortunate of him to show up again.
And that was the end of it. I talked to a police officer and told him what I'd done. He said I showed too much restraint! I guess like Chris Rock said "Some guys just need to have their asses kicked". I think he's right! (Look it up on YouTube).
My point in all that B.S. was to point out that just driving up and taking a picture of a house for a well-known company will not result in any police action or criminal prosecution. Further, given the docket of courts, you'd better be prepared to show real damage, not just "pain and suffering". A judge will throw that out quicker than you can say "prosecute".
Now in terms of the theory of the law, you're probably correct. In terms of what a judge will accept or a police officer or a DA. This won't get beyond a preliminary hearing. Not a chance.
the name "Street View" implies pictures of what it would look like if you were walking down a street like a normal person, not walking up random people's driveways like a creep when their houses are clearly set back from the road. That is a problem even if the road is not marked private, but especially so when it is. Instead of casting them as greedy bastards, has no one considered that they might be trying to increase the publicity for what Google is doing with Street View? I don't know if that is what this couple is doing, but doesn't that possibility come up in almost every discussion of a seemingly frivolous lawsuit?
Street View and other GISes being widely available for anyone to search could have an effect on the housing market, but only as far as shady realtors/sellers/landlords who purposely leave out pictures of their properties no longer need bother trying to keep you from seeing it until they are twisting your arm and bending your ear.
"But if your house is on a private road, and the photographer took a picture of your house from your private property then that would be a problem. TFA leads me to believe this is what happened. And if it is then Google should pay."
You're half right. Google made a mistake in photographing that house, but they shouldn't pay $25,000, that's insane. They should apolojize and take doen the pictures.
I suppose you've never driven down a private road or driveway without permission? Should I pay the owner of a house $25,000 because I got lost on a narrow street and needed to make a three point turn? Get real.