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In Less Than Five Years, 45 Billion Cameras Will Be Watching Us (fastcompany.com)
An anonymous reader writes: It was a big deal for many when Apple added a second camera to the back of the iPhone 7 Plus last year. In five years, that will be considered quaint. By then, smartphones could sport 13 cameras, allowing them to capture 360-degree, 3D video; create complex augmented reality images onscreen; and mimic with digital processing the optical zoom and aperture effects of an SLR. That's one of the far-out, but near-term, predictions in a new study by LDV Capital, a VC firm that invests in visual technologies such as computer vision. It polled experts at its own portfolio companies and beyond to predict that by 2022, the total number of cameras in the world will reach about 45 billion. Jaw-dropping as that figure is, it doesn't seem so crazy when you realize that today there are already about 14 trillion cameras in the world, according to data from research firms such as Gartner. Next to phones, other camera-hungry products will include robots (including autonomous cars), security cameras, and smart home products like the new Amazon Echo Show, according to LDV. UPDATE: Story has been updated to reflect the updates made to The Fast Company article. The outreach figures are 45 billion cameras by 2022, not trillion.
Soon there will be trillions of cameras all around us.
https://xkcd.com/605/
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
It's already been proven that software today can manipulate audio and create words you've never said based on samples.
Next-gen video manipulation will be able to put you at the scene of any crime, and we all know how valuable video evidence is in a courtroom today.
Our legal system needs to adjust for this abuse of technology. It will not be able to in time, which will make video evidence the next weapon against innocent victims. Watch and see.
44 trillions camera over 5 years is 25 millions a day. I do believe that our dear Governments want to see each one of us piss, but that would still require quite an efficiency that I highly doubt public agencies are capable of.
Surely they meant "billions", right? I can't imagine how it's possible that there's 2000 cameras per each person already, including babies and third-world countries.
14 trillion cameras for 7 billion people? That's 2000 cameras per man, woman, and child on the planet. That just doesn't seem to make any sense. Between current and old phones, the old web cam for the PC, and some older unused HD video recorders, I personally have about 20. Most are packed up in a box of old tech junk. Someone who had a lot may have 100 as a total guess. So where would the other 1900 come from? Most cameras set up for surveillance do so to record the activities of many.
If we assumed there are currently 2000 cameras per person, and even that every person in the United States had 100 cameras in their possession, that would leave 613,700,000,000 cameras unaccounted for in the US. That's one camera for every 170 square feet of the nation. I don't think we're quite at that level of surveillance yet.
I'm sorry, but your opinion seems to be wrong.
How can there be 14 trillion cameras in the world today, as the summary claims? With around 7 billion people in the world, that's 2000 cameras for every living person on earth. I think someone's math is off somewhere.
TFA claims that there are already 14 trillion cameras. That is 2000 cameras for every person on earth. That is wildly implausible. I think someone has "trillion" and "billion" confused. I can believe an average of 2.
I think I have 10: 2 on my primary cellphone. One on my burner phone. One on my laptop. On on my external monitor. 2 in my car (dashcam + back-up camera), and 4 security cameras around my house.
My thoughts exactly. They say 72% of them are handheld, but that is 700 cameras per hand to hold them. If they meant 14 billion, that might be about right.
Traffic cameras, security cameras... Hell London alone probably already has a 5.9 million of them just watching the streets, and that was in 2013.
WTB [sig], PST!!!
Some may think I am only joking...
What if I were to tell you that an event so devastating is going to occur over the next 150 years that it will kill everyone presently living upon on the earth?
I'd say "already got it covered thanks".
There are an estimated 6,000,000,000 people living upon the earth today... EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM WILL BE DEAD IN 150 YEARS!!!
*YodaVoice* And that... is why you fail */YodaVoice*
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
When you say "44 trillion cameras", what comes first to mind is each of them being part of a botnet...
Better beef up those firewalls everyone!
As for people worrying about being seen, I see an upcoming trend where people who are bothered by that will choose to live such disgusting lives that no-one would choose to watch them.
In a preverse twist, they will become popular celebrities, and the future foretold by Sesame Street where Oscar the Grouch was wildly liked will come to pass on a scale unheard of.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The article says there will be 44 trillion cameras, not that they will be "watching us".
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
There are 2.5 billion smartphones in use. If each of those had two CCD sensors, that's 5 billion.
https://www.statista.com/stati...
245 million CCTV systems were installed in 2014. If that is a yearly estimate, then you could extrapolate over a decade.
https://technology.ihs.com/532...
That's another 2.5 billion.
If you look at a sales figures of digital SLR cameras vs smartphones, digital cameras are in decline:
https://www.dpreview.com/news/...
That puts smartphones at 1.5 billion/year. That could be extrapolated as well.
Possibly 14 billion, but not trillion.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
There's no way this is true. If there were 14 trillion cameras today, that's ~2,000 per every man woman and child.
Maybe he is using other scale. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... Both scales use same words with different meanings.
Well, the summary did mention the number came from Gartner, so that explains quite a lot.
For every post, there is an equal and opposite re-post.
It was on the internet so it HAS to be true. Amirite?
That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
Ignorance assumes those cameras are assigned to people.
No, the article itself says that 72% of the 14 trillion cameras we supposedly now have are "handheld cameras" while only 3% are "security". That's 1,300 handheld cameras per person, and is clearly nonsense.
A venture capital company that gets its numbers so wrong is not where I would invest my money.
Maybe he is using other scale.
Then there are 2 million cameras per person. So... no.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
That's an entire busload of Japanese tourists.
That's just shy of THE ENTIRE GDP FOR THE US.
So. Not. Buying.
Unless, of course, "cameras" is code for "leaves," a la HHGTTG.
I got my brain thinking 14 trillion. At 44 trillion, it's roughly 2.5 times the entire US GDP.
Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.
You pretty much can't miss.
Gotta count the NSA gene-spliced video transmissions from all of the insects in the world (other than eyeless insects).
It probably has something to do with somebody translating from British English to American English. Incorrectly. https://en.oxforddictionaries....
People should not fear their government. Governments should fear their people.
Remember to add TV sets, tablets, laptops, RC toys, and cars to that, given that home spyware and reversing cameras are now standard.
Still nowhere near 14 trillion I'm sure, but could conceivably approach... 100 billion (cue Dr Evil music).
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Brush your teeth, comb your hair and try to look presentable.
It was a big deal for many when Apple added a second camera to the back of the iPhone 7 Plus last year.
No. Idiot.
Apple did not add a second camera to the back of the iPhone 7 Plus. Apple added a second lens to the one camera on the back of the iPhone 7 Plus.
The iPhone 7 Plus has two cameras, not three. The camera on the front has one lens and the camera on the back has two lenses.
Still nowhere near 14 trillion I'm sure, but could conceivably approach... 100 billion (cue Dr Evil music).
No - it could not. That would still be 20+ cameras for every inhabitant of the planet - and while you can have 2.5 billion camera-equiped mobile phones around, that is the only piece of electronics 60% to 70% percent of these people will get. 100 billion is still way off - laptops are counted maybe in the tens of millions, cars with cameras are still non standard in low end models in most of the World, and RC toys are a luxury item for most people - even on the developed World. 14 billion seens pretty high already, but is conceivable.
-><- no
Ok, but what about Regular London?
The population is widely claimed to be about 9 million so 5.9 million in London is approx 1/2 per person, though of course, it does depend on how you define London and whether you include commuters - it might be significantly less.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
20+ cameras per person isn't unreasonable for 1st world countries, but yeah averaged out among the population is ridiculous. Let me count the number of cameras I can think of that just my wife and I own or have access to (leaving out public cameras):
3 phones (6 cameras)
4 laptops (4 cameras)
2 webcams
Front and rear dashcam (2)
Go pro
Sony camera
Old Olympus camera
Endoscope
So that's 18 for 2 people for 9 each. And I'm probably forgetting plenty...
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
It completely bipasses common sense. People that don't know what a trillion is shouldn't be writing about it. And people who do know shouldn't post this drivel on Slashdot.
Your username, one of my favorite songs.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
http://www.ldv.co/insights
LDV have updated their website with billions instead of trillions.