Slashdot Mirror
McDonald's Denies Prof's Claim Staff Attacked Him For Wearing Digital Glasses
Sparrowvsrevolution writes "In an update to a story posted on Slashdot earlier this week, McDonald's has responded to the claims of Steve Mann, a University of Toronto professor and augmented reality pioneer who says McDonald's staff in Paris assaulted him tried to pull off a computer eyepiece he's worn for decades, then threw him out of the restaurant. McDonald's confirms that Mann was ejected from the premises, but denies that there was a 'physical altercation' with staff or that they destroyed any of his property. That last claim is especially dubious, since Mann has posted photos taken from his eyepiece that show McDonald's staff ripping up a doctor's note that he showed them to explain his need to wear the device. The company still hasn't explained why Mann was removed from the restaurant, but Mann has speculated that it has a policy against recording."
release the security cams!
And looks like someone failed hamburger college!
Ok, McD's... let's see the security footage.
You're in the court of public opinion and it ain't lookin' good.
Terminator or some other evil cyborg from the future.
Well, I guess technically, since Canada is in North America, Professor Mann would be an american. However, usually when people refer to someone as an american, they mean a citizen of the U.S.. Professor Mann is a Canadian.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
...using organic video and audio sensors, onto a storage medium consisting of neurons and synapses. Does this mean they would throw me out, too?
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
I always thought of the McDonalds experience as follow:
1. You know their food is shit before you start.
2. It tastes like shit while you eat.
3. You feel like shit afterwards.
4. (They) Profit
Now they've apparently added steps:
1.5 They treat you like shit while in store
Nice to see they're still working to grow the general shity-ness of the experience.
This is a PR nightmare for McDonald's and they're only making it worse.
Nonsense. I read a number of newspapers and Internet news sites, and this is the first I've heard of it, and like most people, really don't care that much. I frequent Burger King (Home of the Whopper), but I think that realistically, only a very tiny number of McDonald's customers know about this, and of those, few care.
Your first paragraph is entirely hyperbole.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Weigh all the evidence before leaping to judgment. This is the last "restaurant" I would consider for any meal in Paris. Perhaps he had tastebud implants, too?
by keeping him from eating McDonald's.
I stand behind the freedom for someone to claim they've been assaulted, and to concoct an unbelievable story in which they carefully avoid any description of what happened just before the alleged assault.
I stand behind their freedom to show pictures of people ripping up a piece of paper and to claim anything they want about what that paper said or who owned it.
I even stand behind their freedom to claim that, despite a description of a brazen attack and insistence upon the availability of evidence, police and other officials simply ignored their report.
But assault? No, of course I don't stand behind that. But I don't see what assault has to do with this story.
MacDonald's hostility to photography, like that of Starbucks, is ridiculous.
Modern digital cameras easy to conceal. Besides, anyone with genuine interior design talent could visit one of their business, eating a burger while seeming to be doing no more than casually glance around. They could then go away and recreate what they saw almost as precisely as a photograph.
These blunders are probably the result of lawyers getting involved. A lawyer will attempt to deny anything that he thinks the other side can't prove. MacDonald's lawyers apparently aren't aware of just how much got recorded.
One suggestion to Slashdot readers. If you're in a situation like this, do your best to use your phone to record what's happening without being noticed. That'll help the good guy in the dispute. You might even practice what you should do, from starting up a camera app to perhaps slipping it in a shirt pocket with the lens able to see everything that's happening.
--Michael W. Perry, author of Untangling Tolkien
But it's cool for McDonald's (and most retailers) to record you, with their own security cameras?
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Apparently, the device only starts recording when it's damaged.
yeah, it's obviously one of the thousands of pieces of paper that McD employees routinely tear up during any normal shift.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The company still hasn't explained why Mann was removed from the restaurant
It's pretty obvious - we've all seen the photo of Mann and his headgear. That McDonalds obviously has a "no shirt, no shoes, no service" policy in place.
#DeleteChrome
nations.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Why doesn't he do a Data Protection Act (all EU members have one) request on the CCTV footage, he will have to pay a small fee but he can get any footage he appears in.
Didn't McDonald's remove pink slime about 3 months before the story became mainstream?
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
there are signs on every McDonald's across europe (no pictures/no dogs/no smoking)
Yes, restaurants usually hate dogs on premises, but even in France, a restaurant can be fined from 150 to 450 Euros for refusing service to a disabled person because of their service dog (at least, that was the fine in 2003, that fine may have gone up since then). And in the end, it really doesn't matter what the sign supposedly says. A sign at the door can never supersede what the law of the country you're in dictates.
And it doesn't matter if the person at the food counter doesn't believe in someone's disability. Usually, a Medical Doctor is asked to make that call, not some fast food minimum wage worker. This point is important because many people can be considered legally blind even if they're only half blind, or have a form of blindness that doesn't make them appear blind to the casual observer.
The same goes if you don't believe someone's medical documentation. It's not your call to tear it up, even if you believe it's BS. If you have any doubts, just call the police and ask them to investigate it. Do not take the law into your own hands. A McDonald's T-shirt doesn't imbue you with special authority to just tear up other people's medical documentation.
They asked the "perps" individually, and they all said they treated Mr Mann with the utmost respect. No Kidding! What did you expect them to say? "Oh yeah, we beat that customer up."
At least when I was there...
I was in a Paris McDonalds in 2005, and pulled out my camera to take a photo of the menu board. Before I could even focus a man tapped me on the shoulder, point at the camera, and shook his head. He had on a McDonalds uniform but I think was security. He didn't leave my side while in the store. I just wanted my Royale with Cheese photo!
A McDonald's T-shirt doesn't imbue you with special authority to just tear up other people's medical documentation.
But.. But.. what about Mayor McCheese and Officer Big Mac?
The company still hasn't explained why Mann was removed from the restaurant, but Mann has speculated that it has a policy against recording.
Not sure about the arches (have refused to eat there for the last 36 years - that's my right, don't mod me down because you eat there), but I've seen a sign on company owned Burger King restaurants that forbid customers from using cameras on the premises. This warning is on the same door sticker that advises customers that the store is recording them! I asked the manager and he said, yes, it does apply ever to someone wanting to record a child's birthday party there. When I said "It makes you wonder and worry about what the company is trying to hide" he just laughed and said "Yea.".
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
No sign legalizes physical assault.
Great Intellect...
And if the European Union were a nation, the citizens would be referred to as European -- and while the term would still apply to those of Europe as a whole, it would also apply to those of the nation with the word in its name. Unitedian? Statesian? No, citizens of the United States of America are -- following me camera guy? -- American.
If your usage of the term is ambiguous you use North or South American. Referring to both continents at the same time is about as common as referring to Europe and Asia together.
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.
Buy a ski mask or walk at night.
And people couldn't, you know, have taken a photo of your open window and posted it on 4chan if it was really worth looking at, without the involvement of Google?
You're not as fucking interesting as you tell yourself.
Great Intellect...
I am skeptical of Steve's side to all of this.
Note the following:
*I see many commentors claiming that Steve's apparatus is screwed to his skull and is necessary. Many of Steve's students have routinely seen him walking around without a computer. I have never seen any evidence that he has any sort of implants, and am pretty certain he doesnt have stuff screwed to the skull. Notice how he doesnt clairify these things.
* As far as I can tell, his single entry blog is the first place I've seen him refer to his HMD as Eyetap Digital glass. This is undoubtadley for him to associate with the Google Glass project.
*Take a look at his wikipedia entries under "gloggee". He has a penchant for making up neologisms an claiming to ha e invented things that he wasnt really involved with.
anyone with genuine interior design talent could visit one of their business, eating a burger while seeming to be doing no more than casually glance around. They could then go away and recreate what they saw almost as precisely as a photograph.
But that couldn't serve as evidence against health code violations (or proof of customer assault). When a company forbids taking pictures at their store (even for a kid's birthday party) but also says that they are recording you, one should wonder what they are trying to hide.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
av
--
o
Sure, but this is clearly not the case here. The main point is that many people UNDERSTAND "American" to mean "U.S. Citizen", almost exclusively. This is the root of this predominant confusion. When you say "Eurasia" you include both Europe and Asia, not Europe alone.
In fact, the word in Spanish is "Estadounidense" which is pretty much the "Unitedstatian" you seem to be mocking.
Here's the thing: It's a device he had implanted because he wanted it, not because he needed it. If I decide to implant a camera on my feet and then go walking around in sandals in a Catholic school that has a "no cameras aimed up a girl's skirt" policy, they would be in the right to kick me out. The guy has a history of being a jerk in order to promote himself, and this fits that history.
He hasn't released detailed video because he wants to give McDonalds the chance to respond first. He's only posted some images with the faces edited out and basically made the threat to release the rest.
And I hope he does release the rest now.
Of course I'm mocking that term. It doesn't exist in English, and pissing over the proper term in English is foolish.
The Germans don't call themselves German, in German. It's Deutschlander. That doesn't mean that I get to call the Germans stupid for calling themselves something other than German.
Fun Fact. New Guinea is part of Australia. The continent, not the nation. Australia is also a nation, and its citizens are Australian. There's no confusion there, is there? No? There's no confusion when referring to Americans, either. It's understood that you're speaking of citizens of the United States of America, not Canadians, not Brasilians, not Mexicans, not Cubans.
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.
There's an old conversation about the word "Yankee". If you're in Mexico, anybody north of the border is a Yankee. If you're over the border, its someone from above the Mason-Dixon line. If you're above the Mason-Dixon line a Yankee is someone from New England. If you live in New England, you know a Yankee is some one from Maine. You go to Maine looking for a Yankee and they'll tell you its an old hard tack farmer out in the country. Finally, if you go up to Maine, find yourself an old hard-tack farmer, and ask him where you can find a Yankee? He'll tell you "Well, yuh take thet ruhd theh, noth 'bout 12 miles, till yuh come tuh the fok, n'beh right, go 'nother 8 miles till yuh get t'the end. When the ol gent with the shotgun comes out t'meetchuh, why thet's a Yankee. Eyuh."
As someone who is a dual citizen with Colombia and the US, and who has worked all over Latin America. An Americano generally means someone from the US, a gringo is a Canadian, a US citizen, and even in many cases white europeans. Candadians are always considered Gringos, despite what they think.
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
This is the 2nd report of physical assault by McDonald's staff at that same location to hit the news:
http://onyoursi.de/2011/08/whats-your-problem-assaulted-for-taking-a-photo-of-le-menu/
McDonald's insists Sheldon wasn't touched during the confrontation. But Sheldon remembers it differently.
"She grabbed me by my arm and jacket and threw my back against the open door, all the while grabbing at different parts of my coat with one hand and pinning me there with another," Sheldon told me.
And McDonald's explanation of what occurred does not match the photo. If lying about the situation seems to work, then of course the employees at that location are never going to feel like assaulting customers has any consequences.
The responses from all the asshole ugly Americans here doesn't surprise me one bit. This country (USA) isn't civilized anyway, it's more like what you'd get if Zimbabwe won the lottery.
What surprises me is that this happened in France. I guess France isn't as civilized as I thought.
Dr. Mann has had this sort of thing happen to him his entire professional career. Here's one from 2002
http://it.slashdot.org/story/02/03/14/2051228/airport-security-vs-cyborg-steve-mann
Private security in France do NOT have the right to physically assault someone even if they did something like break some anti camera rule in a fucking fast food. The ONLY thing they can do is to call the police. They do not have any other right. And certainly NOT the right to destroy private property.
The only time violence is permitted for any group besides the cops themselves is when someone's in danger and you don't have any choice but make the assailant submit with physical means.
This isn't the Far West. This isn't America. This is civilized France. As a French myself I can guarantee that the McDonald's employees were in the wrong.
Guards in supermarkets and malls don't even have the right to search your bags if they suspect an act of thievery although they CAN make an attempt at stalling/preventing you from fleeing. But only a cop can search your bag. (there are a few exceptions but irrelevant in a day to day context.. those few exceptions being stuff like airports, ports...)
I commend you on your proper Maine dialect, particularly the spelling of 'fok'.
Funny story: when I was a sixth-grader, I made it all the way to the Maine state spelling bee, which was hosted at UMaine Orono. I was living in Castine at the time, so it was a big deal to go to the "big city" (Bangor... oh the irony). The winner got a college scholarship. Anyway, they made us draw straws to determine the order of the spelling bee lineup. I got #1.
So, we're standing there on stage, before the curtain opens and they decide to throw us a practice round. I get the word 'banana'. Piece of cake. B-A-N-A-N-A. After the practice round, they whisk open the curtains, say some things to the crowd, and then we're off. Again, I get the first word. The judge says "The word... is 'biggert'."
"'Biggert'?" I ask.
"Yes," say the judges.
OK, I've never heard this one before, but... here we go...
B-I-G-G-E-R-T
"Wrong. The correct spelling of 'biggert' is B-I-G-O-T."
I was crushed, and humiliated, because I was out on the first word in the first round. My mistake was twofold:
1. I should have asked for the word in a sentence, and
2. The Law of Conservation of R's means that New Englanders take the R's out of some words, but they always end up putting them back in somewhere. For example, "Law and Order" is pronounced "Lohr and Ohdah".
If you REALLY want to have some fun, try calling any major corporation (Comcast, Sprint, Microsoft, Marriott, whomever) and announcing to the CSR that you're recording the call for training and quality purposes. Assuming they don't hang up on you INSTANTLY, the conversation isn't going to progress beyond "I'm sorry, we can't continue until you stop recording."
Pointing out to them that THEY'RE doing the exact same thing to YOU will get you nowhere. Telling them that you'll discontinue recording when THEY do will get you hung up on. Telling them you'll quit recording when they tell you how to obtain your own copy of their recording later will get you hung up on. Simply put, no corporation will EVER voluntarily or knowingly allow you, a peon, to record your conversation with them, even though they feel perfectly entitled to record their conversation with YOU, and use it against you if it suits them.
There should seriously be a law granting consumers the automatic reciprocal right to silently record any conversation where the other party announces that the call is being recorded & makes it clear that you do NOT have the option of continuing the call unless you agree to let them do it.
The company still hasn't explained why Mann was removed from the restaurant, but Mann has speculated that it has a policy against recording.
Now that's where his credibility falls off a cliff. Let me reinact his version that would reach that end result: "Sir, we're asking you to leave but we're not telling you specifically why. Try to speculate on why it may be while you're in the parking lot."
Here's my version: "So...this paper says it can take pictures? GTFO, perv! You can't covertly snap photos of people with a camera hidden in your glasses, it's making our customers uncomfortable."
Which sounds more reasonable to you?
Alanis, is that you?!?
how often do you really use, say, "Eurasian"?
Maine biggerts use it a lot when they see the mail ohdah brides they wah shipped.
"Our goal is to provide a welcoming environment and stellar service to McDonald’s customers around the world."
No shit! =]
Mr. Mann saw stars for hours after visiting a McDonald's ! =P
Lisias@Earth.SolarSystem.OrionArm.MilkyWay.Local.Virgo.Universe.org
In some states you can go ahead and record all of the calls that you want and you do not have to tell anyone.
I don't know the specifics about why this guy has a camera attached to his head, but it's a part of his day to day life and has medical documentation confirming that the device is attached to his head. I don't know what else the documentation says, but this is enough. Now, if the store in question didn't like it they should have asked him to leave, not tried to physical remove said item. Personally, I'd call the damage an assault and would press criminal charges.
Now, granted he may have wanted this device implanted for nothing more than his own amusement, no reason for physical assault by employees. Let's change the specs a bit based on a report I saw posted the other day on slashdot. What if the person assaulted was blind and the camera was used to generate a visual image that was sent directly to the optic nerve? What would it look like? Who's to say it wouldn't look just like this? So a blind guy goes into McDonald's using his augmented visual device where the employees destroy his device and throw him out of the resteraunt. No being this guy is from a foreign country and doesn't have a cell phone hooked into the local grid he's blind and on the side of the road asking for someone to locate some help for him. Next, since his glasses are now broken and are expensive 60K I believe to replace he no will spend months without vision while he files insurance paperwork to have the glasses replaced.
So your opinion is/would be, well he shouldn't have gone on private property knowing that someone might attack him? Maybe he shouldn't leave his house? Obviously this guy traveling to a foreign country is just a big loser, he should have stayed at home in order to protect himself. Yep, if that rape victim wasn't at the bar she wouldn't have been raped, it's all her fault.
Thanks for playing.
/* TODO: Spawn child process, interest child in technology, have child write a new sig */
They do not have the right to physically assault him(forcibly trying to take off his glasses) or to damage his personal property(tearing off documentation). If you have problems grasping that, it seems to me that you are the jerk here.
That is also the case in the US. Private security, AKA "rent-a-cops" have no rights beyond any other private citizen.
Your knowledge of the US appears to be about as good as your knowledge of deodorant.
In regards to their policies against video recording, I suspect they don't want a recurrence of the movie "Supersize Me" which did great damage to their image around the world. It was about a film-maker who spend an entire month (or more?) eating only McDonalds food. Whenever they asked him if he wanted supersize, he had to agree. The health results were predictably grim for the film-maker.
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when first he appears as a protector - Plato (423 to 327 BC)
The most common wording I've heard is "[Calls] may be recorded [for quality and training purposes]". Which then unintentionally gives you consent to record them.
None of the Colombians (or Mexicans for that matter) I asked said "gringo" would refer to a Canadian - that's reserved strictly for Yanquis from my experience.
I'm going to take a wild stab and guess that Yanquis are New Yorkers who move to Quebec?
A couple of years ago, I tried photographing the menu board in a McDonald's in Beijing, because so many items on the menu were so incredibly bizarre. A store manager came over and was very unfriendly to me about it, asked me to delete pictures from my camera, and basically told me he would throw me out of the restaurant if I kept trying to take pictures. I wonder if there is some corporate policy that inspires this sort of behavior?
Tell them you're recording the call at the same point their pre-recorded voice tells you "calls may be recorded...". Just say it back to the recorded voice.
Excuse me? I would hope everyone would be just as outraged if a person tried to grab their regular glasses, assuming they wear them. It would be an assault.
It sucks, but that's just the world today. In a related way. notice how employment contracts mention that you're liable for any damage you cause to company property, but they're not liable if they damage your property? Or how they expect you to consistently work unpaid overtime; expect you to be available on call when you're at home/on leave; and generally expect it to be no big deal to impose on your own time outside work. But if you have to spend some work time to deal with even an minor personal issue then suddenly there's a huge stink made about the impact it's having on business continuity; costing the company time etc. I'm talking about small things like phoning the doctor to make an appointment (using your own mobile!), personal conversations with other staff (they want team bonding, but you can only talk about things immediately relating to work?), being ten minutes late become of unexpected roadworks, etc.
It seems we're just here to be used by companies (either as customers or employers), we exist only to make other people wealthy.
And their normal (at least in the UK) notification to you that "calls may be recorded..." is giving you permission to record. If they did not want you to record then they should announce "WE may record calls..."
My experience in Germany is that the announcement is along the lines of "We listen in to or record selected calls for quality control and training purposes. If you do not wish this, please say so at the beginning."
Now, this could be because German companies care more about your privacy (or about the PR effects), so they make this explicitly opt-out. Or it could be legislation.
Perhaps you could try influencing legislation where you live to demand an opt-out approach to call recording?
Esli epei etot cumprenan, shris soa Sfaha.
In some states you can go ahead and record all of the calls that you want and you do not have to tell anyone.
That's what I heard, too -- that in those places, there has to be the consent of at least one party for the call to be recorded.
So you can't just wiretap random strangers speaking to each other... but if you're calling a company, and you (as one of the participants to the call) give consent to recording the call, then record away!
Esli epei etot cumprenan, shris soa Sfaha.
Hehe, EXACT thing happened to me in the 1985 San Diego County spelling bee. I got up there and (I have rather good hearing - though poor eyesight) the guy said clear as day "suet" and I thought to myself - "no way, that's a baby word" so I asked him to repeat it and he said it exactly the same way so I simply spelled "SUET, S-U-E-T, SUET" and he said "That is incorrect" and then spelled the word SUINT and then the son of a bitch (lol) even pronounced it properly by saying "Soo-int" insted of "Soo-it." A friend on the El Cajon all-star baseball team with me who was also in the bee told me everyone off stage freaked out thinking this guy was trying to trick people.
(I would have gotten my a** handed to me by later words anyhow, but that was embarrassing for me - the press picture they take of each kid on their first word shows me looking at him after being told what the actual word was and I have this "what you talkin' 'bout Willis?" look on my face.)
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Which allows you to call the police and get him arrested for trespassing. It still does not however allow you to assault someone.
Like I said, I don't know the specifics, but as far as glasses go, you take my glasses you are coming in contact with me. Even if I don't start spouting blood out of numerous wounds, it's assault, perhaps even theft. Since the glasses he was/is wearing are probably worth over a grand, I believe that is also a felony.
Seriously, I've worn glasses since I was 9 years old and I can't remember one incident where it's ever been acceptable for someone to take the glasses off my face without my authorization. Perhaps they just didn't do it when I was overseas because I was in the military and they didn't want me shooting a cruise missile at them? Or perhaps, it's not acceptable anywhere to grab someone's glasses from off there face, except of course in McDonald's at a certain location in Paris.
As posted in another message here, this isn't the first incident at this particular McDonald's either.
/* TODO: Spawn child process, interest child in technology, have child write a new sig */
Or perhaps he just wrote that comment because he was trolling since his original message wasn't moded down as far as I can tell. He appears to be just trying to stir up controversy.
/* TODO: Spawn child process, interest child in technology, have child write a new sig */
Dude did piss his pants apparently.
http://blog.laptopmag.com/exclusive-cyborg-steve-mann-on-alleged-mcdonalds-assault
Admit nothing. Deny Everything. Make Counter-accusations.
Am I the only one that read the statement? It seems to me that they are collecting information. In fact McDonald's doesn't deny they attacked him, they only state that their employees denied it. It's an important distinction. Their employees are quite naturally saying, "We're innocent!" while Mann's saying "They're guilty." Mann provided proof that one of their statements - namely that they didn't damage any of his property - is incorrect. But it doesn't seem McDonalds, as a whole, is calling Mann a liar. Here's the statement:
It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.
- Jerome Klapka Jerome