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Real-LIfe Distributed-Snooping Web Game To Launch In Britain
corerunner writes "A new internet game is about to be launched which allows 'super snooper' players to plug into the nation's CCTV cameras and report on members of the public committing crimes. The 'Internet Eyes' service involves players scouring thousands of CCTV cameras installed in shops, businesses and town centres across Britain looking for law-breakers. Players who help catch the most criminals each month will win cash prizes up to £1,000."
But we *can* afford prizes up to £1,000 for public citizens that are effectively doing police work ? This world is getting way too weird for me... Or perhaps im just getting old :)
You Brits should demand to have unfettered access to these cameras. It might have been possible to claim that this was not technologically feasible before, but not any longer. You paid for those cameras. You paid for that information to be gathered. You should be able to access it.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
Anyone who argues against the "slippery slope" argument for More Cameras == Bad should be shot. Now. So anybody can be challenged for anything now, just because somebody who's trying to win a chunk of money thinks they saw something wrong?
If someone is going to be snooping, it's only fair to have everyone snooping. The only oppressive element of CCTV is the idea that only a select few people get to snoop and thereby gain some sort of advantage over everyone else. If everyone gets access, you still lose privacy but at least no one gains power.
What goes to the person who reports the most false positives?
Giving the public access to the big brother camera network will open up unprecedented opportunities for cyber-bullying, especially for people living in dwellings whose front doors are within the frame of a camera.
You only need a few miscreants spying on some poor bugger, then sending harassing and threatening SMS messages as s/he moves about the city in the normal course of his/her day.
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
No, this is dangerous. Very Stasi-like. This is a disturbing trend in official and informal law-enforcement because it encourages things like community-based harassment. People will band together and participate in government-sanctioned stalking of atheists, commies, homosexuals, or whomever else they just don't like.
It is simply turning the people against each other to distract them from their discontent with their government.
£1,000 for the person with the MOST crimes.
Say you have 100 people wanting to try and win this prize.
1 person reports 400 crimes, but the average is around 40-50 crimes.
So for £1,000 a month, you get 5000 crimes reported.
-
It'll be interesting if 4Chan decides to start trolling this.... thousands of people reporting Pedo Bear at the Palace, or just any single crime somewhere cops aren't.
Available in the US? Imagine if it becomes available in India (or elsewhere in . 1000 pounds is a lot of money for many people living there.
Firstly, this is the Daily Mail - a rabid right-wing tabloid newspaper that typically has headlines about how Polish immigrants are going to knock down all our schools to open up christian vegan lesbian holistic bomb-making camps, or something.
Secondly, it would be entirely illegal to do this under UK law. We have things like the Data Protection Act.
There are two types of "crimes" one is crimes that harm others and in general are a big deal, things like murder, rape (real rape, not some 18 year old having sex with a 17 year old), theft and even some forms of vandalism. Those things should be reported. Other things are still "crimes" but they harm no one except possibly the person doing the actions, things like light speeding with little to no traffic, underage drinking/smoking, some things classified under drugs, etc. However, its not the crimes that are a big deal that will be reported it is the stupid little crimes which shouldn't even be prosecuted or in some cases have laws forbidding the actions.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
This game is really fun but does anyone have a driver for this peripheral? Can't get it to work yet and am looking forward to turret-based content next year.
My work here is dung.
You don't get to choose which camera you see each session. In fact, the location is 'secret' (though you may be able to figure it out). Single person surveillance won't work.
This is an opt-in service where specific people can pay a fee to have their cameras monitored by the game's players. It has no connection with the CCTV network already installed by British officials. It's basically just a very stupid and sensational business venture that will probably fail, because who's going to be willing to pay 20 quid a week for random internet people to watch their CCTV?
In addition to all the above legitimate concerns, add sexual harrasment and a live "hot girl at location X" Twitter feed or whatever. Not to mention filming and recording of partners, ex's, bullying victims, etc. And if you thought "happy slapping" with a phone camera was something, wait till you see what people can do when broadcast live on the Internet. If a group wants to harras you, it's going to much easier for them to do so, as you say. What do you think will happen with a system like this in the hands of Anonymous or some group like them.
Of course you might be able to use this to monitor the police, but if so, expect them to implement controls on that asap.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
Nothing will be able to stop my Fake Crime Street Theater gang. I'll keep those snoopers glued to their monitors for years. Crimes that never happen. Victims who don't exist. Jam the system.
Any ideas what happens to reports on cops committing crimes?
I'd say they disappear down the memory hole, but users will be able to capture the video they are using locally, and repost on YouTube for fun and profit.
Ergo, this program will be shut down within weeks as it reveals cops committing crimes. Either that, or the feeds will be scrubbed of all police presence "for the protection of our hardworking constables on the street" prior to distributing them.
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Yes, but people aren't stupid (okay - not in all ways). It will be pretty obvious to most people participating that they're not going to win against the strange obsessive person who has no job and no life and racks up 100 crimes a week. So cash prizes aren't going to be much of a motivation for playing this. Which means most people playing it will be doing so for other motivations.
Let's face it - the primary use of such a system would be lonely males jacking off over live feeds of unsuspecting young girls. In fact, if we want to oppose this system (and we do because we don't like living in a combined police state and mob-rule society), pointing out its wonderful desirability to peadophiles is probably the best approach to take for most.
Of course there will be those with other motivations also. Those with a particular hate-agenda will love this.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
"You have nothing to fear if you are doing nothing wrong" Yeah right... ...First they came for the communists, and I did not speak outâ"because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak outâ"because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak outâ"because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak outâ"because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for meâ"and there was no one left to speak out for me...
Going on means going far
Going far means returning
This idea is wrong on so many levels. I hate Hitler analogies because they tend to be polar opposite examples of the argument they attempting to counter, but this one seems to fit.
The BBC did a documentary a few years back "Nazis: A Warning From History' http://www.amazon.com/Nazis-Warning-History-Samuel-West/dp/B00097DY66/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1255030547&sr=1-1 that touched on this very subject. Granted, the UK isn't the Third Reich and I'm pulling a very specific instance from that documentary, so please understand that I'm not suggesting a one-size-fits-all with regards to that regime's policy, but an accounting of state-sanctioned surveillance by civilians.
In that doc, there's a segment that reveals that the Gestapo actually didn't have very many official staffers out in the field and relied heavily on "neighborhood watch" participants to implicate other citizens in activities that fit a broadstroke definition of 'suspicious behavior'. Years later, a woman was confronted about a statement she had submitted to the Gestapo about a woman neighbor that she had reported for suspicious behavior; the 'suspicious' woman was detained by the Gestapo and never heard from again. The original documents were presented to her, showing her signature and her statements which were read back to her. She remembered the woman mentioned in the statements, recognized her handwriting and signature, but disavowed that she wrote or submitted the statement.
The documentary example is the far end of the spectrum for state-sanctioned civilian surveillance. Given that people will recieve rewards for their efforts and the program is marketed as a game, it adds more fuel to the fire that people will misuse it. Once implicated in such a program, a person's name or guilt can never be expunged.
All we need to finish off the program is a Norsefire logo http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ab/Norsefire-logo.png and a picture of the High Chancellor Adam Sutler http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8d/250px-Sutler2.jpg.
In a way that's very non-Orwellian. You see the fundamental concept of the Orwellian idea is to have one instance impose on your privacy, in which case this instance uses this data against you, but if we're all imposing on eachothers privacy, what has changed? Other than the very extension of our privacy. I'll give a comparison. Say that none of us had eyes, thus no vision (no echo location isn't allowed either), our privacy would extend much further than it does today, but what if one person, or a group of people suddenly gained vision, these people could use this to receive information about you when you thought you weren't being observed. That would be Orwellian. In the case where everybody (well except the few blind people) get to have vision it no longer becomes Orwellian. It might still be frightening, mostly for those that fear getting something unwanted caught on tape, but in the end it's equal for everyone. If (when) we have a surveyed society I hope that we all get access to the footage at anytime, live or recorded. Equal makes it fair, might be right or wrong -- but still fair.
I am the lawn!
I wonder who's snooping on the snoopers?
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? ["Who watches the watchmen?"]
People will band together and participate in government-sanctioned stalking of atheists, commies, homosexuals, or whomever else they just don't like.
By "people," you apparently mean Christians, capitalists/conservatives, heterosexuals, and moralists. I guess atheists, communists, homosexuals, etc., are all peace-loving hate-hating people that have an inherent aversion to stalking or harassing or any sort of "bad behavior," whereas others - like Christians and conservatives - only profess to believe in "higher authority," God, law-biding citizens, etc....
You probably just mentioned the ones that you particularly dislike or feel are discriminated against/harassed (I could show you a lot of Christians/capitalists/conservatives/heterosexuals/moralists that are, though....), but it's an interesting bias? :)
This must be a stalker's wet dream.
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
No, no, no, that's too American. You don't have enough bureaucracy or scapegoating.
In Britain, the police would deny that any officers have broken the law. Then the video footage would go on YouTube, and some newspapers would get the story. The IPCC (Independent Police Complains Commisson) would open an investigation, and the police would deny any wrongdoing again, even when shown the video.
Some time later, the IPCC will say there's a systematic problem and the blame lies with the police managers. A junior police officer will be sacked, and the manager will be promoted.
Later, another police officer will claim he should have been promoted instead, and claim he was discriminated against. After an investigation into police prejudice, he will eventually get the job, with his predecessor getting a large pay-off.
This all costs lots of money, so four police officers will be replaced with part-time community support officers. They don't know what they're doing, so they'll arrest someone for photographing a train -- hopefully captured on CCTV.
He also says it is inevitable -- with cameras getting cheaper and smaller and better by the day, the time will come when everyone will be wearing several cameras for 360 recording of what's around them, sent wirelessly back to central servers, probably never to be deleted, ever, with the cost of storage dropping as fast. The time will come when any bad guy will leave traces on so many recordings, all of which will ne annotated with time and lat/lon, that it will be a trivial matter to back track thru all the cameras in the area and trace the perp back far enough for identification. Physical crime will become pretty rare. So will phoney alibis, all sorts of cheatin' hearts, the murky deeds of hypocritical politicians .... it's going to be an interesting future, this global village with no privacy. I look forward to it. It will take some time to get used to the lack of privacy, but the tradeoff -- the *inevitable* tradeoff -- will be well worth it, and those who grow up with this will have a fantasticaly different mindset from those of us living now..
Infuriate left and right
And while your fake crime is ringing up the false positives, the real criminals will be doing what they do best - making street crime invisible to the cameras. A subtle pickpocket in a crowd won't be easily solved this way. An assault at the periphery of a camera's range by a hooded thug won't result in an arrest. But I'll bet they catch a whole lot more dogs pooping illegally than they ever have.
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
The problem is that the CCTV cameras have proven to be very ineffective in deterring crime.
The MOST effective has been cops patrolling - either walking the beat, on bikes, horse, or patrol car.
This is going to increase crime:
This is just taking a bad idea and making it worse.
I think he was using typical US-centric boogeymen. If it was Cultural Revolution China your list would be the one to consider.
I think the interesting bias here is that his original comment didn't say anything about "moralists", but you added them in to the hit list. I guess that means communists, homosexuals, and atheists are immoralists in your Book?
Anyone who snoops incorrectly will be meta-snooped and won't get as many snoop points. Thus, everything will be forever moderated correctly on Slashdot. I mean Britain.
"When the atomic bomb goes off there's devastation...but when the atomic bong goes off there's celebraaaaation!"
You missed out the bit where they are unable to find an actual criminal, so they shoot someone else instead.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
In 1984, citizens were encouraged to spy on each other and report possible dissidents to the authorities. So yes, this is very Orwellian.
RTFN
I agree.
But I don't think we're going back. The best solution is to "watch the watchers", so anyone can go back and see who was viewing any particular cam at any particular time.
Last post!
It's not Orwellian. Orwell was intelligent. This is likely just foolish or dishonest. This:
"Players who help catch the most criminals each month will win cash prizes up to 1,000."
should be, in my opinion, translated as this:
"CCTV cameras have so far been a huge waste of money. The reason is that it takes 1,000,000 hours of looking at cameras to find one illegal act. [I'm guessing.] Criminals are not so stupid that they perform for the cameras. So, we will try to get the work done without paying. We are wording the announcement so that we won't have to pay at all if someone catches only one illegal act."
This is the last paragraph of the story: "Last month it was revealed that Britain has 4.2 million CCTV cameras - the equivalent of one per 14 people - one-and-a-half-times as many as Communist China."
It would require 36,792,000,000 hours, 36.8 billion hours, each year to watch 4.2 million cameras. Booo-ooo-ooordom.
What's happening in the British government? Things seem to be becoming crazy.
The story says it is a scheme by a "former restaurant owner". Quote: "He will charge those who use the service, which could eventually include local authorities and even police forces as well as shop owners, £20 a week per camera to have their CCTV included on the site - amounting to thousands each year." Who will pay 1,040 pounds each year to possibly have someone watch one camera?
Actually in this case it is rather easy and clear-cut: the organizers and promoters of this "contest" are quite deserving of this sort of attention indeed. Anonymous should simply turn these would-be Gestapo members' self-righteous shit on them. See how they like the taste of their own medicine, the feeling of their own petards up their asses ... you get the idea.
You'd think this worked by charging monitored businesses. No. It works by charging viewers to report crimes.. Read the Terms of Service. It costs viewers £1 to report an event. The captured image is sent to the camera customer by phone. The recipient rates the report, but the viewer doesn't get credit back if the report was good. The only payoff is the the monthly prize of £1000. They're going to take in far more from the viewers than they pay out.
Viewers do get a credit of £3 per month they can use for reporting, so it's not totally pay to play.
Each viewer is shown four random cameras at a time. Every 20 minutes, or if they report something, they get a new set of cameras. So viewers never get to see the results of their reports.
Apart from the fact that long before the novel was written, there were governments, and governments in those days did the same thing.
So it's about as Orwellian as horsedrawn chariots are Chryslerical.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Anonymous' idea of a "deserving target" is not something usually lines up with any rational persons' idea, rescuing abused felines aside.
But *who* will watch the watchers? Almost certainly, someone with a stake in continuing the program; so abuses will still go unreported.
http://www.blueservo.net/ lets you watch the Texas border for illegal activity. I don't think you can win prizes, though.
It's a Daily Mail article. To put this in context for US readers, that puts it somewhere between The X Files and Fox News in terms of relation to reality.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
You clearly have no idea what kind of people are going to be watching this like a hawk.
Old home bound busybodies with nothing to do focusing particularly on calling the cops on the hippie degenerates and their maryjawana cigarettes and their long hair commie music while keeping a stern eye on any 'Negros' and the darned hooligans in their communities.
People with lives and more sensible moral character will be out doing better things than watching CCTV cameras and tattling on their peers, while major crimes with victims will likely already be reported, minor crimes are really all this has the potential to unearth.
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
Alright, I'll make sure to remember that. On a side note I'd love to rat on those leaving their dogs turds on the street. I'm serious, there is no easier way to ruin someones day than to leave dog shit behind for him to step on. When I see someone leaving dog shit on the street I always lecture their ignorant asses, and if they don't listen I walk behind them screaming "hey everybody, you know that dog shit you try to dodge everyday, forcing you to stare down at the street with every step you take, the shit you occasionally step on, this guy is the reason for that, he refuses to take his responsibility", and repeat. I'll be honest -- I don't even care that it's against the law, but if your actions affect me, then I'll make sure that my actions affect you. Fair and square. I just hope there were less pussies in the world and more people like me, at least in that sense.
Oh and by the way I've worked both at kindergardens and elderly homes when I was younger, and I've had to clean up more shit than you'd even imagine -- asshole. And there's your paragraph.
I am the lawn!
In 1984, citizens were encouraged to spy on each other and report possible dissidents to the authorities. So yes, this is very Orwellian.
RTFN
I did read the novel, but there's a big difference. The citizens in 1984 were never allowed to view surveillance, so they were never on an equal scale as the government. And fundamentally this is what frightens people, that someone with an upper hand controlls you. When that upper hand is given to everyone the concept isn't the same, and you taking things out of context doesn't make it so.
I am the lawn!
Can we please all not forget that George Orwell was a nasty little man who would have gladly seen the universities closed and everyone who wears glasses jailed? He hated higher education and wanted a world where everyone was a worker and lived drab lives of bare sustenance. He idolized the uneducated working class and believed in the worst parts of communism and fascism. His "ideal world" would have been a nightmare that makes the one in his comic-book novel look like utopia.
His real beliefs were as close as you can get to a bipolar mixture of the worst of communism, populism and fascism. George Orwell was an earlier version of Glenn Beck, without the winning personality.
Like Ayn Rand, he was a damaged personality whose bitterness and hatred resulted in novels that are misread, misunderstood and used by equally damaged people to justify antisocial behavior.
The problem is not that people read George Orwell and Ayn Rand, but that a significant number of people who somehow enjoy their books decide never to read any others.
You are welcome on my lawn.
What happens when a citizen volunteer spy reports on police or government officials breaking the law?
In Ireland of old, possibly still today, one of the great insults was to be called an "informer". This derived from the old rule under the English where informants were very real and the information they passed on to authorities was a very central element of British rule over the country. When discovered, actual informers could face very serious repercussions from the local population, and there was really no worse sin, particularly in the days before independence. Even during the Troubles in the north well into the 90's, informers, and even suspected informers faced summary execution at the hands of the IRA.
While the English have long gone in the Republic, the taboo lingers on in a fashion. As in most former colonies, people tend to report crimes less, and respect for those that do is not very forthcoming.
Looking on the bright side, perhaps after they have been subjected to this system, the British may finally get an idea of why the government (or anyone else), knowing too much is actually a bad thing. Recent developments in their country suggests that they haven't yet grasped this, but may actually be capable of doing so. Americans on the other hand... .
May the Maths Be with you!
"What do you think will happen with a system like this in the hands of Anonymous or some group like them."
Lulz?
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
or: ... for 1000 pounds sterling a month, you get the same crime reported 5000 times, then you need to employ 300 secretaries to sort through the reports
Here in Florida we took our dog out on the beach once and within 20 minutes a local police officer had showed up after receiving "numerous complaints from residents". Basically, the shore is bordered with miles of condos with bored elders who have nothing better to do with their time than call the PD when they see something they don't like.
My dad has been an officer here for almost 30 years and once worked a homicide case where a guy was killed on this same section of the beach ... and nobody reported a dead body in the sand until the next day. As my dad used to say, "if only the guy had a dog with him when he died."
Actually I imagine the first Prime Minister that gets caught coming and going from his girlfriend's house on CCTV will be in favor of cancelling this program. They were all quite upset when that paper uncovered their improper expenses last year (more upset at the reporting than the actual impropriety), so I could easily see a scandal of that sort getting this whole thing cancelled.
If there's a scandal, the Prime Minister is removed by his party and a new one brought in. The new one does not remove the system because that would just be a concession that he was going to behave similarly. What would happen (and it doesn't need to be anyone as dramatic as a Prime Minister) is that exceptions will be made for a vaguely defined class of people (which basically translates as people with power) that you are prevented from spying on by law and by technological measures.
The only reason parliament would ban this sort of thing would be if there is sufficient public disgust voiced to make it clear that it harms their electoral achievements and benefits their rivals.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
I hope you get modded up. I think it is an important distinction. But the privacy-at-all cost people on here may want to suppress your post because it doesn't agree with their freaking out.
I didn't want to say it, but you took the words out of my mouth. Truth is, no matter how many books we've read or how many movies we've seen we're never going to be able to foresee a scenario at such a large scale. There are just too many factors in play. What people do know is their fear, and their fear will unfortunately play on many of their decisions in life causing irrational behaviour.
Maybe we will have a surveyed society, and maybe it will turn out ok, I know I don't suffer from hubris, thus I cannot tell either way. I can speculate, but I will never throw myself to the ground screaming "my god can you not see what awaits ahead!?", such as many here do. Fundamentally we humans are curious creatures, and we will always try to snoop on our neighbours, but there's a difference between invading privacy and monitoring public domain. I agree the thought of Orwells world is frightening, but he was no god, and his books are not prophecies. They are merely the product of a curious human playing with the thought of what could be. I believe that if a government becomes the way that Orwell describes in 1984, then there's a good chance the effects will also be as described. However this is not the only outcome of a surveyed society. We are already surveyed, just at different levels. That cell phone you carry: it is used to track your location to prove your guilt or innocence. Those keycards you use: same thing. Internet: need I continue? And apart from this there's already a series of cameras on public locations.
Every person should have the right to privacy, that is given. My property is not public domain, thus I should have all the rights to decide if I want a camera in my house, or even aimed at my property, or not. However the streets are not mine, they are ours. And fundamentally it is a choice we make. If you truly feel that you want to fight something, then do it. The further you take it, the more people will listen to you. Ultimately it's up to you. If you believe that politics is all corrupted business then fine, but it doesn't mean that there's no room for honest opinions -- look at all the pirate parties merging around the world. There's a swedish pirate in the european parliament, who's actually one of 14 members in charge of developing the new telecom package! That is change my friends. Or you could just waste your time speculating, in fear, about what horrors the future may hold you.
I am the lawn!
Fixed!
And yes, I've read 1984 but just in case anyone doubts, this can/did happen in real life also.
Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it.
Groups of angry zealots could easily coordinate by phone, possibly with one or more persons actually following a mark around.
/b/ . That style of stalking is always driven by self-righteousness and is done in a secret, Kafka-esque manner because the people who gang up have no spines individually. Being able to hide behind a camera only makes it worse. It is tacitly tolerated by U.S. law enforcement, but I have a bad feeling that this kind of crap may be the future of the idiocracy.
It's all too easy to get people riled up against a common enemy - as an example, my (conservative) hometown newspaper recently tried to convince everybody, via editorial, that the enemy were fellow Californians who were collecting unemployment checks, in a county with a 24.7% unemployment rate in a state with a unemployment rate which is 12+% and rising!
The target audience are, of course, people who still believe that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are keeping America safe from terror...but what can you do when you live in a whole city full of them and you choose to be an atheist communist homosexual?
Alternately, what about a large group of laid-off factory workers who have nothing else to do all day? It would allow them an opportunity to displace their anger upon other citizens and not on the government which caused the loss of their jobs in the first place.
Community-based "policing" is always a bad idea. It's mob rule! Neighborhood watch groups, community church groups, "not-in-my-neighborhood"-ers, will all get together and find somebody to harass. Humans are but animals, and this is the pack mentality at work. The funny thing is that these are the same hypocrites who would publicly condemn the actions of 4chan's
You did get *who* big brother was in the end?
"Big Brother" was not some guy or dictator, "Big Brother is watching you" was about the PEOPLE spying on itself!
If you have a system where some government agency is formed from the people (like the Stasi) or if you create an atmosphere of fear and make people spy on each other and to report "bad behaviour" seems to become a quite minor difference.
But to be honest... this is nothing but web 2.0... no one said only Wikipedia can "benefit" from a group effort, we see that the government also can get to use a group to "improve" reaching a certain goal for cheap, cheap cash (that such a system will get used for spying on your neighbours and your love interest does not even have to be mentioned in a place like this).
By "people," you apparently mean Christians, capitalists/conservatives, heterosexuals, and moralists. I guess atheists, communists, homosexuals, etc., are all peace-loving hate-hating people that have an inherent aversion to stalking or harassing or any sort of "bad behavior,"
It's not about "bad behavior". Christians, conservatives, and moralists have a long history of committing harassment, stalking, and blackmail against minority groups in order to make the minority behavior conform to their views. Atheists and homosexuals have virtually no history of using harassment, stalking, or blackmail to change Christians into atheists or heterosexuals into homosexuals.
whereas others - like Christians and conservatives - only profess to believe in "higher authority," God,
Believing in a "higher authority" is offensive and immoral. But as long as you as you keep it private and to yourself, that's your business. But you don't "only profess", you try to impose your offensive and immoral beliefs on others, and that's where you cross the line.
The citizens in 1984 did view the surveillance. Winston himself was part of perpetuating the system he hated and which oppressed him - this was more or les the entire point.
Same thing today, the guy manning a CCTV system (or who just one a prize through this scheme) will also be watched on his way home.
There does not have to be an evil group of 12 men in a smoke-filled room on the 13th floor in order for you to be oppressed (this is the erroneous thinking which leads to conspiracy theories). The system can be oppressive, and this one is. Or rather, it is a way to make the invasion of privacy (a clear oppression and one which paves the way for a lot of future oppression) more efficient - or at least that is the idea.
I also think it is more like 1984, exactly because it distributes the oppression-task to the larger citizen-ship, like it was in the novel... When the first participant of this game/scheme is sentenced as an accessory for not calling the cops, this is made even clearer.
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Freedom is hard fought for and easily lost. Those that try and take rights and freedoms away try and do so under the radar. For instance who would have thought that RIPA would be used to spy on half a million uk citizens a year. Most uk citizens I speak to don't know about the eborders scheme, where everyone is catalogued each time they enter or leave the country (with up to 2.5 billion journeys stored at any one time).
The vast amount of information being gathered, as you say via your phone, cards, internet, etc, is worrying. You merge this into one coherent database and you have no privacy left. I would hardly call a slip towards totalitarianism an irrational fear, especially when it is being legislation into existence in front of people's eyes. Many laid down their lives to earn the freedoms we take for granted today, and it would be disrespectful to give them away for temporary convenience.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
Care to expand on the relevance of that quote to the point in question? Are you saying that I don't have the right to pay for my own cameras and record my surroundings and keep the results in my own private archive?