Slashdot Mirror
Should We Be Afraid of Google Glass?
An anonymous reader writes "An article at TechCrunch bemoans the naysayers of ubiquitous video camera headsets, which seems like a near-term certainty whether it comes in the form of Google Glass or a similar product. The author points out, rightly, that surveillance cameras are already everywhere, and increasingly sophisticated government drones and satellites mean you're probably on camera more than you think already. 'But there's something about being caught on video, not by some impersonal machine but by another human being, that sticks in people's craws and makes them go irrationally berserk.' However, he also seems happy to trade privacy for security, which may not be palatable to others. He references a time he was mugged in Mexico as well as a desire to keep an eye on abuses of authority from police and others. 'If pervasive, ubiquitous networked cameras ultimately make public privacy impossible, which seems likely, then at least we can balance the scales by ensuring that we have two-way transparency between the powerful and the powerless.'"
I always wear my infrared LED cap when mugging Google Glass owners.
Then my face is unrecognizable.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8UjcqCx1Bvg
ubiquitous cameras everywhere recording everything at all times are necessary.
After all, according Google's CEO, if you have something that you don't want anyone to know, you shouldn't be doing it in the first place.
" 'If pervasive, ubiquitous networked cameras ultimately make public privacy impossible, which seems likely, then at least we can balance the scales by ensuring that we have two-way transparency between the powerful and the powerless."
Well, may be so, however, I still won't tolerate you coming to my home, to my gym, to my office, to my restaurant, to my pub, etc. wearing a camera. You can choose to loose your privacy somewhere else.
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
Well no, we should not be afraid. We should be thoughtful. We should consider the ramifications. We should act accordingly. I'm not having anyone come into my house wearing those things, but then I'm not having anyone come in with camcorders either. If I were running a business open to the public, I'd love to have people come in while wearing them, as it would provide me an opportunity to demonstrate it.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
then at least we can balance the scales by ensuring that we have two-way transparency between the powerful and the powerless.
That will never happen. The powerful will always have more ability and opportunity to meddle with the data than the powerless. Just look at how Dick Cheney was able to get his house blurred out of google earth. The occasional powerful dumbass will get busted to "prove" the system is fair, but the really competent criminals will skate just like they do today.
HIV is "already everywhere". So too was slavery. "Already everywhere" is the pragmatism of the damned.
it will just be a transition.
soon enough waving your dick around on a video that's on the internet will not matter one bit.
basically, when there's embarrassing shit about everyone on the net it will not matter one bit. however, it might be bad for your business if you're caught bullshitting every day. but uh, I can't see that as too bad to be honest. cops, robbers, mcdonalds employees, teachers and public servants would at least be expecting to get fucked over if they try to fuck over their clientele.
point I'm trying to get at.. is that there's still a lot of behavioral tabus in the west - which leads to hypocrisy.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
>"The author points out, rightly, that surveillance cameras are already everywhere"
Typical "justification". So because there are already cameras in many places, there is nothing wrong with having them everywhere, all the time, possibly recording and sharing everything, including audio.... even at your restaurant table.
>"that sticks in people's craws and makes them go irrationally berserk."
Typical again. So anyone that could possibly have a problem could only react by being "irrational" about it?
>"However, he also seems happy to trade privacy for security,"
Could it get even more typical? Seems all the rage for a long time now to not give a damn about privacy or freedom. The vast majority of people are quick to trade privacy and freedom for convenience and the illusion of safety.
Difficult times are coming. Technology is never bad/evil, but what people DO with it can be. I hope people who are eager to strap on something like Google Glass think about how it might affect others around them. There are a lot of unanswered questions about moving into a world where everyone (and every company/government) knows everything about everyone at all times.
I am surprised to see the push against this, especially in the types of communties like here on slashdot
in the USA to me, this seems just a continuation of the freedom to make photographs in public that people have enjoyed for a long while now. While there have been some challenges.. its been upheld a few times that freedom of speech can include making videos or photographs
not related to photography/video/recording in public in any way at all,.. the supreme court said this in Texas v. Johnson 1989.. a case about whether one should be able to desecrate an american flag.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_v._Johnson
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0491_0397_ZS.html
The First Amendment literally forbids the abridgment only of "speech," but we have long recognized that its protection does not end at the spoken or written word.
While we have rejected the view that an apparently limitless variety of conduct can be labeled "speech" whenever the person engaging in the conduct intends thereby to express an idea ... we have acknowledged that conduct may be "sufficiently imbued with elements of communication to fall within the scope of the First and Fourteenth Amendments,"
In deciding whether particular conduct possesses sufficient communicative elements to bring the First Amendment into play, we have asked whether:
[a]n intent to convey a particularized message was present, and [whether] the likelihood was great that the message would be understood by those who viewed it.
at least, for americans like me.. it seems to me to be 'freedom' issue.. it might be unpleasant to know that someone else can annoy you with their Nazi uniform, or video camera but if its in public.. its likely that they are free to do that.
in a somewhat related issue there was the case of a photographer who was in conflict with people who felt he shouldnt have been allowed to sell images of them
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nussenzweig_v._DiCorcia
Nussenzweig v. diCorcia is a decision by the New York Supreme Court in New York County, holding that a photographer could display, publish, and sell street photography without the consent of the subjects of those photographs
it might be annoying, it might creep people out ..but really i just see it as a thing that one might have to deal with in a free and open society
(can one imagine people crying about government crackdowns if we saw China/North Korea banning the use of things like google glass? or am i just being a bit cynical today?)
GeekWire: 'Creepy Cameraman' pushes limits of public surveillance - a glimpse of the future? (includes interesting video)
Just don't commit any crimes...
Just don't be associated with those who commit crimes.
Don't be associated with those who are associated with people who commit crimes.
Certainly don't walk/run/drive/bicycle through any place that has recently had a crime committed.
Don't appear to be doing something worthy of being noticed, even if it is benign.
Don't get in the way of people who would rather have what you have.
Don't make people upset with you.
Don't let people get upset with you even though they don't know you.
Don't have the wrong skin color.
Don't have the wrong gender.
People may argue slippery slope, but most of those are already being used EVERY SINGLE DAY to target people. Collection = abuse. You can't get around having it, if you're not gonna have people use it. Occasional news reports about people at the DMV grabbing celebrities police reports and that is stuff people think is necessary to collect! What about everything else? Also, the security of databases stinks. More so via people than technology.
Tonights forecast: Dark. Continued dark throughout most of the evening, with some widely-scattered light towards morning
That's not a bad idea.
But what could possibly be bad about random strangers walking around with cameras attached to their heads which take pictures and instantly upload them to google? Google is building a security camera network made of meat.
They're using their grammar skills there.
Exactly!
The problem is not "people" recording as much as images sent to Google'a servers. We already know it automatically tries to identify people, so that information is STORED somewhere along with the whole camera frame, whatever might be in it. Like rob here says, the ENTIRE PURPOSE is for Google to gather those ancillary images and sounds and sell ads to the highest bidder. You walk into a bar, what beer is advertized? What song is playing while you're dancing? You can quickly see that turning into ad data sold to beer companies based on who saw their ads, and forwarding a list of bars that didn't pay ASCAP for the DJ last night.
People miss that this ALL PRIVACY being targeted... We already have complaints from PRIVATE PROPERTY OWNERS that wish people not to use Google Glass there. YOUR HOME is next... I mean all your friends have Googke Glass, they aren't going to look in your medicine cabinet, or see your brand of foot-fungus cream. Remember these are the AUTOMATED images, so Google isn't invading THEIR PRIVACY because their photos, videos, audio tracks are password protected. Google is just racking up EVERYBODY AROUND them!!
THAT is the change here. When I go to a place, I expect them to have cameras in case of robbery or breakin. But MAINTAINING cameras is HARD. Most have a tape or DVR of limited space and keep reusing the space. Generally something from six months ago is "forgotten". Google Glass is you running around taking pictures of everybody else's stuff. And storing it in a vast server farm wher Google is going to use it for their own private purposes.
You are not arguing against tech like google glass, you are arguing against a fascist police state. If the government, law, and courts are not set up to be abused by the rich then taking pictures in public cannot be used as a weapon.
Improve society; don't try to suppress technology.
Anarchists never rule
To me that is the sad thing, Orwell didn't need "big brother" as all that was needed to get the people to go to 24/7 surveillance is social networking crap like FB. Now you have people tweeting every second of the day what they are doing, taking video and pictures everywhere, hell the only thing that keeps it from being big brother heaven is there is so much info overload the feds would need 30 Blue Gene supercomputers just to process all the info!
To me the only interesting thing to come of this will be to see how the courts react, after all you have cops being more jackbooted than ever and busting people for filming them while you have this explosion of video equipment so it will be interesting to see which will trump in the courts. One thing is for sure the days of authority (or anybody for that matter) being able to pull shit in public without anybody filming is well and truly over, I've seen everything from cops beating the helpless in FLA to tank battles in Libya and the one thing they ALL have in common is dozens of people holding up camera phones to get the shot. In fact I would argue that will probably be the defining image of this decade, the image of dozens of people holding up smartphones recording events.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
The article's premise was that pervasive surveillance can be viewed as acceptable under the aegis of "trading" privacy for government transparency, which, in the surveillance context, means that we are watching them.
I'm suggesting that's very likely a bad idea. You're saying the tech is unavoidable. I'm saying that the use of that tech is governed by law, particularly privacy laws of various stripes (you can't record audio in many cases, you have to have a warrant to record a telephone conversation, you can't convey what you hear on certain radio frequencies, etc.) The idea that we accept pervasive surveillance as a trade for the ability to watch the government, couched as an argument for "transparency", is going to be mediated by law, which in turn we might have a chance to stick an opinion in the mix before pervasive tech turns into pervasive exposure.
Sorry I was unclear, I didn't mean to be. It's a big issue for people concerned with privacy. It's a non-issue for those who don't understand what privacy was and can be. In between, there are a lot of levels of understanding.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The problem is not "people" recording as much as images sent to Google'a servers.
Well, no - both are problems. I don't want random individuals recording my interactions with them.
Google IS the bigger problem, admittedly. For one thing I'm pretty sure they never truly delete anything even if you delete it from your account. I've come to believe that because of an experience I recently had. One of our users had uploaded an ical file containing her calendar from another system. She then changed her mind and cleared the calendar of everything, following Google's instructions (I verified this) - so the calendar was completely empty. a couple months later, for collaboration's sake she went to her old system and again exported an ical file. Google would not allow her to upload the events, though, stating "these items have already been uploaded" even though they were not on her Google calendar anymore.
FYI the solution to the upload problem was changing the sequence number for each event in the ical file, as others around the web have found.
#DeleteChrome