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UK Launches National Dashcam Database For Snitching On Bad Drivers (cnet.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNET: Drivers in England and Wales now have a direct line to police for ratting on their fellow motorists, thanks to a new national dash cam database. The National Dash Cam Safety Portal, run by UK dashcam manufacturer Nextbase, lets drivers upload footage from their dashcam to a single database and send it directly to police, the BBC reports. Drivers can choose their region of England or Wales and send footage of accidents or illegal behavior on the road directly to local police, as well as sending a witness statement that can then be used in court.
The fact that it doesn't include Scotland, or Northern Ireland doesn't really make it a 'UK National' service.
Admittedly, Scotland does have its own legal system, which may have subtly different procedures to follow.
Also terms and conditions of the service mean that NextBase is entitled to use your clips in their adverts, or possibly sending them on to those car crash tv shows.
11. Rights you license
11.1 When you upload or post content to our site (including, but without limitation dashcam videos), you grant to us a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, non-exclusive, sub-licensable, royalty-free and transferable licence to use, exploit, copy, store, disclose, reproduce, publish, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, perform and otherwise use that content for any purpose across any media including, but not limited to, promoting the site and its content, promoting our business, and promoting our products and services.
However, earlier on in the terms, it states that "Whilst you retain legal ownership of your rights in your content, you are required to grant us the license described in paragraph 11 (Rights you license)."
What about GDPR? You can't go filming people (aka gathering personal data) all day long in the (unlikely) event that you'll film something illegal...
This is really stupid.
I'm not willing to trade off our rights until this is a real-time in-vehicle tagging system with 4k video upload over cellular and police cars flying by to catch the asshole I've tagged.
I'm not in the UK, but I'm all for ratting out drivers who have no concern for my or my family's safety. If I had access to such a facility, I don't believe I would be bothered to submit footage of everyday misdemeanours that all drivers make, but blatant reckless and life endangering driving should be reported and I'd be happy to assist in that.
...this seems to be really neccessary.
But the Russian videos are still the BEST!
It's not "the UK" and it's not a "national database" seemingly run by the Gov. or the police.
It is a private site, run by a private dashcam company, that just redirects you to the individual police force pace, (England and Wales only, so if it's Scotland or NI you're looking for then you're SOL).
They are nice-enough to state in their T&Cs that "You may be use [sic] the NDSP to upload footage from any dash cam, action camera, mobile phone or any other type of camera from any manufacturer."
I bloody well should think so, since they're just linking through to the cops own sites!
I'm not in the UK, but I'm all for ratting out drivers who have no concern for my or my family's safety.
If I had access to such a facility, I don't believe I would be bothered to submit footage of everyday misdemeanours that all drivers make, but blatant reckless and life endangering driving should be reported and I'd be happy to assist in that.
I have mixed opinions on this.
Yeah, sure, there have been times I wish a cop had been around to witness someone doing something egregiously bad. However, everyone has done something stupid whilst driving at some point. Everyone has done something illegal, either on purpose or by accident.
Never misread a sign? Gone the wrong way down a one way street - or driven at 70mph in a 60mph zone?
I guarantee what is going to happen here is every Spurs fan is going to start trying to catch Arsenal football players making a mistake whilst driving. United fans are going to try to catch and force Liverpool players into making mistakes. People are going to target their rivals, enemies, and people they don't like... and people will get caught making silly mistakes.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Snitch? Yeah, you're obviously the asshole driver. Reporting vehicular assault is not snitching. Don't snitch is ghetto bullshit.
You know, with the stupid shit I see on a daily basis while driving, I've begun thinking about buying a dashcam ... because if any of those idiots causes an accident I want some proof of their stupidity.
If citizens can send in "holy shit, look what this guy just did", then maybe the police can find the idiots responsible and ticket them (or charge them depending on what they've done).
I see an unbelievable amount of scary and dangerous stuff on the roads .. the ability to report that to the police seems natural.
I don't see this as a police state, but as a way for the information to be crowd-sourced because the police can't be everywhere.
Because when you see someone swoop across 4 lanes, cut 3 other drivers off, and then swoop back across two lanes because you have no idea where you're going ... someone is going to get killed if people drive like that.
Hell, open up the ability for me to take a picture of people talking on their cell phones and submit that. I can't tell you how many times I see people texting and driving -- I've even seen people with both thumbs on their fucking phone. I fail to see how a police officer can't stand at an intersection and just pick of dozens of people texting because they're so blatant about it.
Sorry, if you drive badly enough that someone wants to submit their dashcam footage to law enforcement, you deserve it.
The UK continuing in its steady descent toward a police state.
Uh, unlike a true police state, this system is voluntary.
This "police state", is whatever the citizens make it.
Back in the 80s he proposed that drivers get a dart a month. You can shoot that dart at an asshole driver. If a driver collects 3 or more darts they lose driving privileges for a month.
Simply brilliant
/ RIP funny man
Well, we can't have that. You must allow a minority of citizens to engage in any sort of dangerous driving so long as they are wise enough to avoid doing it in front of marked police. You also must ban other citizens from collecting evidence that might be used to punish an offender. Because police state...
Yep. Other citizens = secret police, traffic enforcement = arbitrary exercise of power, traffic court = star chamber acting in place of judicial organs exercising publicly known legal procedures.
It totally matches, by which I mean that you're simply butthurt that other users of the road can collect and now submit objective evidence of your asshattery so that you just might have to drive in a civilized manner.
How will you feel when someone uploads a carefully edited clip that makes it look like you are a bad driver, when in fact you were avoiding an accident with someone else?
As ever, the problem with vigilante justice is the lack of due process and fairness.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Really, what kind of Do-Gooder has the time and energy to upload twenty videos every day? Sure, they're persistent, but there's a limit even with that crowd.
>"Never misread a sign? Gone the wrong way down a one way street - or driven at 70mph in a 60mph zone?"
Yeah, I have mixed feelings too.
It is one thing to report someone with a hit-and-run, weaving in and out of traffic, driving drunk, riding on the wrong side of the road, going 40MPH over the speed limit, or backing up an exit ramp and such.... and quite another when it is an expired tag, not coming to an ABSOLUTE stop at a stop sign, or running a yellow light.
It's got police force logos on it, which implies that they endorse it. If they don't then hopefully they will pay Nextbase a visit to sort that out.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
*Gasp* Complaints might be false and evidence might be incomplete or false? Why, no court system anywhere at anytime has had to deal with such insurmountable problems!
*Double gasp* Traffic court is run by vigilantes, and lack due process and fairness? Damn... and here I thought that they were run by appointed judges that were supposed to at least pay lip service to such concepts.
Time to set up my own traffic court. With a guillotine. Because I can.
Did you even think about what you wrote before you clicked "submit"?
Not sure if anyone actually wants to follow the cnet link in TFA, but it's broken. Here's a working one: https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/u...
Oh arse
The solution to the fact that everyone makes mistakes driving is not to let everyone get away with it. It's to reduce the fines to the point where people who rarely make mistakes can afford it but people who make them constantly can't afford it (this also really requires adjusting fines to the driver's income, but that's a different matter).
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They don't actually have to bother with that. China's doing this now, they've got an automated system where users can upload cell phone video of you breaking a law. So then they'll do things like go out on the highways and drive just above the lower speed limit, block traffic, weave around, and generally incite people to speed around them to "get out of the way of that maniac", who is of course filming you breaking the law.
The reason it's a problem there though is they get PAID for the snitching. There's really no reason for that, people that are truly upset by lawbreakers will be more than happy to upload a video that may get them a hand-slap and reduce future occurrences, they don't need a monetary reward. Paying people to report this sort of thing on the other hand, is just insanely stupid because it just encourages people to incite lawbreaking. So lets hope the UK doesn't Do The Stupid and think about paying people for these reports.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
I think OP means like people who drive 80+ mph on the shoulder in bumper-to-bumper traffic, road ragers, and the like. Even if the police received footage of someone running a red light a half second after it turned red, I doubt they'd do anything. But the guy who blows through the intersection at 60 mph 10 seconds after it's been red, fuck yes. If the footage captured his face it should be a short stint in county jail for those kind of dangerous stunts.
Granted, a system like this could be abused. In my opinion it is up to the authorities to apply it sensibly, for example to send only warnings to people who are caught making silly mistakes, or with expired registrations, and so forth. As for targeting someone specific, as some have suggested might happen - wouldn't you look silly if you, as the complainant, are caught harassing another road user to the point of breaking the law, if it wasn't clear from the footage already? Also bear in mind that the presence of law enforcement, as opposed to its application, is a deterrent in itself. Warning signs that speed camera traps are present on a road are enough to slow motorists down. Would knowing that anyone could be videoing you not be enough to make deliberately reckless drivers think twice? My vote is still in favour of the system, with the potential benefits outweighing the bad.
Just as people snitching on child abusers, robbers, rapists, violent thugs is bad! If people want to risk the life of others and behaving dangerously they should be able to without being being told on by stinking rats!
If this continues drunks can't safely drive home on the wrong side of the road anymore. Incredible.
Video editing and compositing is fantastic these days. All one needs is a database of make/model/year/color vehicles with videos of egregious driving and some Deep Fakes processing. Let's see how well the Sox do in the Series when their pitcher is pinched on a DUI.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
No, it doesn't get rid of bad laws at all because the law enforcers will investigate themselves and find that they did nothing wrong, plus it is very difficult to have a law repealed once it's been passed. In a strict sense, you're correct: if the enforcers got ticketed for breaking laws and couldn't get out of it, you'd see some action, but that ain't happening anywhere. For the photo/video thing, I would hope some forensic analysis went into it (editing of real images is not generally hard to detect unless someone's a freaking wizard at it and can reproduce the exact noise and artifacts and file specs and metadata with great accuracy) but laziness is also a hallmark of nearly every law enforcement organization due to constantly being understaffed and under-funded.
I see an unbelievable amount of scary and dangerous stuff on the roads .. the ability to report that to the police seems natural.
Agreed. If I saw somebody committing an assault or breaking into a building I'd snap something on my camera and call the police. It would feel ludicrous to let the incident go unreported because I'd be snitching on somebody and promoting a police state.
I've got a problem with snitching services in general. Generally, in most countries you simply call 911 or the equivalent service and talk directly to the police in cases of "blatant reckless and life endangering driving" done it many times going down the 401 here in Ontario. You know the guy who nearly pushes another car into the ditch because they're on their cellphone. The guy going down the hammer lane so fast that when you're already 20 over the limit they make you seem like you're standing still. One of two things happen in Ontario when you do this, either the police are sent out or the MTO is sent out. The MTO is the equivalent of DOT and can fine and seize vehicles at the road side, they *hate* doing this because it means people are pulled from truck inspections. Being pulled over by the MTO is about the worst thing that can happen.
Seriously, just use your phone. Unless your vehicle was made prior to 2005 nearly every car has one built into it, or support for BT enabled support. You get much faster responses then uploading a video and waiting a couple of weeks for someone to look at it.
Om, nomnomnom...
AC your not getting the UK and its collection past.
CID Criminal investigation department
DSO Defence security officer
HOW Home Office Warrants
IPI Indian Political Intelligence
LIC Local Intelligence Committee
SLO Security Liaison Officers
Decades of collection, reports and reporting.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
I come to a complete stop at stop signs and people often react badly. It throws the 'roll through' drivers off their rhythm.
There's never a shortage of those self-centered enough to impinge on others.
The police state relies almost entirely on the likes of you.
'I like it because it benefits me. Screw whether or not you like it because it infringes on you.' = My imagined benefit, no interest in you.
'I feel safe knowing that security theater is protecting me. Do you want to support terrorists?' = My imagined benefit, no interest in you.
What's your opinion on self-driving cars? Personally I can't wait, and a good part of the reason is the same concerns you have about reckless driving.
No Not fake Vid that is Political opponent breaking UK driving laws. How they got in UK driving same side even though American not important bust them. After they sort out fake vids, Habitual offenders will be first targets. Example Japan found a guy, To late, but he exhibited dangerous rage on multiple occasions and finally a couple killed as he forced the to stop and truck came up from behind and killed them accidentally. Also an interesting way to fund the policemen department expenses. Over budget this month find some vids and top up ticket revenue. AI software companies will want in to do analysis since takes time to go thru footage.
There is a better solution to 'occasional mistakes' operating in the UK. If you are caught, for instance, a few miles/hour over the limit you are given the option of doing a 1/2 day 'driver awareness' course that costs £70-£110. The benefit is that it is not a conviction so you avoid having points put on your license (get 12 & lose it). There is confusion as to if you need to tell your insurer - but you must if they ask. You are not given the choice if you have taken a course in the last 3 years or your 'mistake' was bad enough.
Do you have any idea how prosecution of driving offences works in the UK?
The police are regulated because they have been found do abuse traffic laws. The equipment they can use is regulated, the places they can operate are regulated, the way they can detect offences is regulated. And still there is abuse.
There is heavy pressure for you to settle the matter out of court. Pay your fine, go on an "awareness" course, don't fight it in court. If you do fight it, you need to pay for your own defence, and if you lose also the court fees.
Defending yourself can be very tricky. The courts are corrupt and tend to side with the police unless you have extremely powerful evidence of your innocence.
Examples of abuse include the misuse of speed guns and CCTV cameras positioned to give a misleading impression, e.g. due to perspective effects making vehicles appear closer than they really are.
And now they want to get the public in on an already very unfair and unbalanced system. No doubt they will produce some very clear cut, extreme examples to gain support. But I have do doubt that there will be a huge number of innocent people accused and railroaded by the system.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
dui needs an test to make it stick not an photo
Was he actually drinking and driving? If so, fine. But you assume that these videos will actually be reviewed by police and acted upon. It might just be a place for people who feel they have no power to blow off steam. I doubt that the police will go out of their way to arrest a bad driver based on some videos uploaded by a random user. It might be used as evidence to PILE ON other charges if the offender gets arrested for something else.
Any of you who lived in communist Poland or Ukraine will agree: A population that informs on itself to the police stops being a civilization and becomes simply a population, living in a culture of suspicion and fear, or passive aggressive seething anger.
Its starts with reporting bad behavior on the road.. it ends with people who express out loud in a pub their empathy for the peaceful majority of Muslims being dragged from their families in the middle of the night, and never seen again.
Who'se actually "safe" in that world? And please don't say the honest law abiding people with nothing to hide. That is naive and not supported by fact.
It gets bad once the vigilantes are deliberately causing people to get pissed off and undertake (which is stupidly easy to do if you sit in the wrong lane deliberately) then upload that snippet to this new database.
Also, could be an easy way to get the database killed off for being stupid and dangerous in the first place. It's basically inciting entrapment a grand scale.
What's he doing driving in the UK?
I'm too lazy to compose a creative sig.
"Report that driver who cut you off. Fabulous prizes to be won!"
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
There's a whole bunch of silver surfers who live on Hayling Island, who currently name and shame motorists who drive in less than thoughtful, considerate ways. They currently just take photos on their smart phones (let's not wonder how they manage to take a picture of someone else's driving legally) and post them to the Hayling group on Facebook ..
This is going to give them a whole new, potentially litigious way of abusing visitors to the island. Wow.
The police have obviously latched on to rate-driver.co.uk as a Good Idea.
There will be unexpected, unhelpful consequences.
>"I come to a complete stop at stop signs and people often react badly. It throws the 'roll through' drivers off their rhythm."
Around here, I would guess that about 80% of Stop signs don't require a "full" stop to assess if it is safe to proceed. Probably HALF of them could be safely replaced with Yield signs. Alas, it seems people don't comprehend what "Yield" means, so seeing a Yield sign is rare, indeed. Instead, we have more and more and more 4-way stops.
As long as it also incentivizes not holding up traffic, blocking the fast/passing lanes I am all for this. I say that as someone who makes the odd asshole maneuver- usually to get around someone blocking traffic.
Spare us your 'vehicular assault' drama Anonymous Coward and quit loafing along at 10 under in the fast lane.
Why stop with dashcams? I would love to have an app where you could just take a photo of a double parked car, or a dog owner not picking up after, and send it with GPS and time info to the police. Even if most were ignored, as they would surely be, the feeling of having done something would help me.
A police state is not created because the police have too many information, but because they are not controlled enough.
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
>"Video editing and compositing is fantastic these days. "
I don't think the point of uploading videos is to actually CAUSE a violation or fine or anything, I am not sure that would even be legal (at least in the USA). But it could cast probable cause that could be used later if they are actually caught by the police doing something wrong that is similar. Or, it could act as evidence if the act was called in first, real-time, and the police were able to catch them doing whatever it was they were doing. For example, call and report a drunk driver, live. You have video. The police respond and catch up to that driver and pull him over. The video could be used as additional evidence when later uploaded. Same thing with a hit-and-run, there should be physical evidence already on the perp's car. Or a stolen car in which someone caught it on video. Or a robbed bank. Etc.
Of course, your point is very valid and any third-party evidence would have to be examined carefully to look for tampering.
Y'all need some roundabouts in your lives.
Ahh yes, the cock suckers on the free way, 3 lanes wide driving next to each other, all doing 10 mph under the speed limit because they're too busy playing on their phone to drive.. How smart phones have ruined the roads... Imagine how few accidents there would be without cell phones. Vehicles have gotten magnitudes safer, yet there are still tons of senseless accidents..
I value the privacy of my family above their safety on the road. I even value YOUR privacy above my own saftety and that of my family on and off the road.
To me privacy is the first and foremost right of the people. Without it, all other rights become meaningless.
Or to say it in other words "First they came after the blatant reckless drivers ..."
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I have an idea that none of what you've described falls within the term "vigilante justice."
[Does not impress a driver in an American-rule jurisdiction in the least]
And a slippery slope fallacy...
None of which support your claim that allowing the general public to provide videos of driving asshattery constitutes "vigilante justice." Nor your apparent claim that the entire populace surrounding you is or will be irrationally targeting your (stellar, I assume) driving.
Being drunk driving over puppies apparently. Just watch the footage.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Please tell me who is the victim in every other case... and why they are only a victim if the police witness it.
The reasonableness of doing so depends in part on what you do with it. If you warn the person against doing it again, you can set up a situation that when the police catch the person driving recklessly the court can set the punishment based on the total history, not just the incident the police caught.
Using it to issue warnings would also give the driver an incentive to correct himself.
So there are socially reasonable ways to use it, if you can get past the whole Big Brother thing.
"However, everyone has done something stupid whilst driving at some point. Everyone has done something illegal, either on purpose or by accident."
So what? Pay the fine and try to do it better next time.
If you don't learn, then perhaps you don't deserve the privilege to drive.
Here is one candidate I would like to nominate for this scheme : https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/...
Around here, we're forbidden from even having them in our cars here, and the footage has no value in a courtroom...
blatant reckless and life endangering driving should be reported and I'd be happy to assist in that.
Sure, it will be used for that. But extensions of government power never stop at the good use case. It will also be used to snitch on people drive 1 MPH over the limit, perhaps to avoid a dangerous situation. It will also be used to claim the ex was driving 15 MPH over the limit through contrived footage (every police reporting system is consistently used for revenge after breakups).
And the best part for the totalitarian state is that the state will accumulate a DB of such evidence on everyone. It will sit on it until you step out of line for any reason, then it will use it. Facial recognition puts you at a protest? Well, turns out we have the evidence to take away your drivers license and fine you 10k pounds. Doesn't matter whether you were actually at the protest, or whether any of the complaints about you were true, because the goal is destroying dissent, not justice.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
There are systems like this where I live, though they are not widely known. I've probably contributed tens of thousands of dollars to government finances through reporting bad drivers. It's a discretion thing - it takes a lot of effort to report another driver, and I have to make sure the evidence is on video and is in breach of the road laws. I also have to fill in a statement, which means attending a police station. Unless someone does something really bad in front of me, I just let it go.
This has two effects on me.
The first is I find myself ignoring minor infractions. If I let it go, I really let it go. It doesn't bother me when other drivers cut me off or pull out in front as long as I can stop in time and there's not much likelihood of an accident. I make space for others in my lane. People going around me doesn't bother me now. Knowing I'm not going to do anything about minor infractions takes away the stress of simply dealing with bad drivers on the road. Also if I don't catch it on camera, I still just let it go no matter what the circumstances.
The other effect is that the changes I see in my own driving has surprised me the most. Once you start openly judging other drivers, you question your own habits more. I'm far less likely to break rules myself now, and even find myself defending drivers whose driving is just bad, but not illegal. But if I'd see someone else fined for it, I'll avoid it entirely myself. Even if I think I can get away with it.
It's easy to have mixed feelings about it, because we deal with traffic cops, who often look for any slight breach to fine us, and really don't work in a fair way. The general public are far better judges on what should and shouldn't be ignored. And it frees up police resources. It doesn't take much of a change in attitude to improve road safety.
But doing something about it is better than getting home and having a whinge about some guy who nearly hit us and ran a red light.
Enjoy science fiction? "Turing Evolved" - AI, Mecha, Androids and rail-gun battles. What more could you want?
Perhaps it's just me, or how the signs are used where I've been, but "yield" generally conveys an image of "prepare to merge with traffic" - pay attention, be ready to stop if necessary, but don't necessarily slow down significantly. Most of the problem stop signs I see are used in places where there's no reason for a full stop, but a significant slow down really is called for.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
They have a point though - you don't need everyone to be out to get you for it to be a problem, just plenty of asshats willing to cause legal-system trouble for people at the touch of a button. (damned kids, foreigners, etc.)
If such a thing is done, it seems to me there should be real penalties for those abusing the system as well. Ideally something that gives the legal system incentive to see justice done and punish abuse. Perhaps something like - if you falsely report a traffic crime, then *you* pay the penalty that would have been imposed on a guilty offender. Hopefully with a gray area for poor judgement by either party, where nobody gets penalized.
We need only look at DMCA take-down notices to see how easily a community-initiated legal process without real penalties for false reports can be abused.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
1. Follow Chinese dashcam scammer with dashcam.
2. Video their illegal antics as they try and get others to break laws.
3. Snitch.
4. Profit.
Obviously wouldn't work for a foreigner, but for a Chink?
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
2 in 15 minutes is a grey area. 1, 'he's the asshole'. Everyone, 'your the asshole'.
If it was 2 every 15 minutes, clearly the GP is the asshole. But 2 once...not enough information.
GP do you drive a Volvo, Pius, leaf or Tesla? That would tip the scale to asshole, for sure.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Generally, misdemeanors are not pursued unless done right in front of the cops. Footage isn't even considered.
But footage of a street race? Some other traffic felony? You'll be testifying about how you got the footage.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Indeed. It seems to me that if you are going to have such a system, and don't actually want to create a surveillance state or other abusive behavior, care should be taken to ensure the incentives are balanced against abuse. Such as - if you send in a false report, or actively incite lawbreaking, then *you* pay the same penalty that would have been levied against a real offender.
And those maniacs - sounds like the sort of behavior that should get reported by responsible drivers, doesn't it? Most of the behaviors you described are probably traffic violations in their own right.
It should be really easy to spot patterns - if a person reports a lot of crimes, and they're usually false claims, then the default assumption should be that they're the guilty party rather than their target. Similarly, if a person gets a lot of reports against them, and they're usually valid, then the new report is probably valid.
In a big, benevolent system you could even use such patterns to easily focus on the worst offenders - don't prosecute each report unless it's clearly serious, just have an officer review it and file it as probably valid, false, or reasonably contested. Reckless drivers will rapidly build up a lot of valid reports against them, as will reckless reporters - prosecute those, and just ignore the occasional reports as the inevitable imperfection of humanity.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Indeed - make it easy for the people who don't actually want to be driving to be chauffeured by competent, predictable robots, and traffic would be far easier to navigate. Unless of course the ease of being chauffeured significantly increased the amount of time people spent traveling, and thus the number of cars on the road.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Watch out! Internet tough guy alert!
For the video evidence to be accepted, it should have to be accompanied by an in person (or personally identifiable) affidavit. Problem solved.
I chose to end my comments, not with a rim shot, but a long decaying F#7sus4
You've already lost the argument as soon as you say "fast lane".
You're not allowed to go any faster in the outside lane then in any other lanes. It's just a lane.
There's laws forbidding people from overtaking other drivers on the inside. If you're going less than the speed limit you should probably move over to an appropriate lane to let past people who are doing the speed limit. That's common courtesy.
Paying attention to the road and other drivers will help you achieve this.
No sig today...
However, everyone has done something stupid whilst driving at some point.
Yes. And every stupid thing does not result in a fine. Have you never been given a warning?
As ever, the problem with vigilante justice is the lack of due process and fairness.
This isn't vigilante justice, this is a database of evidence, nothing more. The normal justice system is still very much involved.
It's legal to pass on the right (inside) in my state. Folks here sometimes draw police attention for going slow in the fast lane.
"Yield" is too complicated a word for the average American. I propose keeping the yield triangle but changing the text to "Maybe Stop".
If youâ€(TM)re getting passed on the right youâ€(TM)re in the wrong lane .
Get up!
It is called the 'fast' lane because you are supposed to be there if you are maintaining a constant speed equivalent to the flow of traffic.
I will leave it up to you to interpret that as the local limit or the local normal speed of traffic, as local customs vary.
What it is NOT for is, as someone else, cruising along as 10 under the limit, at the same speed as another person who also is
quite happy in 'cruise mode' holding up other traffic that is in more of a hurry that you. THAT is why it is called the 'fast' lane, not because
it is has no speed limit.
Most places that have 'no underpassing' laws also have 'keep right (left, depending)' laws. It is rather interesting that a certain subset of
drivers seems to love sitting in the 'center' lane (since you dont like fast it seems) blocking traffic due to low speed, then get all hot and
bothered when they get underpassed....
Its also interesting to watch the common trick of undercover traffic officers sitting in the center lane doing 10 under, intentionally annoying traffic,
and then speeding up to the limit as someone tried to underpass them, to push that person faster, and then give them a double ticket for
both underpassing and speeding. Its quite a common trick around here.
There will be an upswing of people baiting others into doing some stupid by intentionally intimidating them, then posting the result.
Doing a 'brake test' in front of someone in the fast lane, then when they underpass you and flick the bird, film it and post.
Drive at 20 below in the fast lane, and post videos of people underpassing, probably honking at you, and seemingly going 'much faster', even
though they may not be breaking the limit.
It is good to see the UK believes in both vigilante justice and unlimited state surveillance.
I under how quickly videos of police and state cars will get removed....
In the U.S., fatalities, fatalities per mile, and fatalities per capita hit a low 4 to 8 years ago and has risen significantly since then. Two possible causes occur to me: intelligent phone distractions and legalized marijuana.
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You know:
- Top 10 submitters
- Top 5 bad drivers
- Driving catastrophes in your neighbourhood.
And lastly, a special protocol for dashcams. If it spotted someone with a proven history of bad driving, it would sound an alarm.
At least 2 states I know recommend a 3 second gap between cars. Police would not be able to handle the number of complaints about drivers violating this guideline. More than half of all cars on the road at any given time are in violation, about 30% are closer than 1 second, and perhaps 10% closer than 1/2 second. Mile after mile, regardless of speed even 10 mph in excess of the legal limit.
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Well when the inciter is being paid 20RNB and the passer is being fined 750RNB, the state profits 730RNB, why would they want to close the gold mine?
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Hey I freely admit that my leading "if" was quite dubious. And certainly after the money train is rolling in it's going to be hard to convince anyone to change things. All the more reason for a supposedly free and democratic society to avoid setting the stage for such abuse right from the beginning - whether by having real penalties for abuse that keep the institutional incentives balanced, or by avoiding the whole can of worms altogether.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
I'm not in the UK, but I'm all for ratting out drivers who have no concern for my or my family's safety..
So how do you determine what is actually a safety risk? Based on what we already know of 100 years of road laws, wouldn't be a more accurate assumption that these will be used for revenue raising measures that only pay lip service to safety instead? OMG speeding!!! Think of the Children???
Video editing and compositing is fantastic these days. All one needs is a database of make/model/year/color vehicles with videos of egregious driving and some Deep Fakes processing. Let's see how well the Sox do in the Series when their pitcher is pinched on a DUI.
In the UK?
How will you feel when someone uploads a carefully edited clip that makes it look like you are a bad driver, when in fact you were avoiding an accident with someone else?
As ever, the problem with vigilante justice is the lack of due process and fairness.
I got three tickets in the last three months for exactly these types of things. I ride a bike so a quick squirt of the throttle on busy roads can get you into clean air and relative safety quite easily. But they'll never teach you that in the rule book.
Agreed. If I saw somebody committing an assault or breaking into a building I'd snap something on my camera and call the police. It would feel ludicrous to let the incident go unreported because I'd be snitching on somebody and promoting a police state.
The concern is that assaulting someone actually has a victim. Most road rules punish you for merely being in the same loose statistical group as someone else who did something wrong years ago. And the crazy part is that the penalties for this are now actually getting worse than the actual offending.
eg you can run someone over and kill them and if it's an accident you get off with a suspended sentence while others who merely speed (and don't crash) receive heavy fines and loss of license which can result in loss of job, insurance and other life affecting punishments.
I'd feel better about reporting it if the results was better drivers, rather than just more heavy fines.
There is confusion as to if you need to tell your insurer - but you must if they ask.
There is no confusion. You don't have to tell them.
Some insurers insurers usually operate a “catch all” clause in their policies about keeping them informed about factors which may affect your driving, and failing to declare a course could lead them to cancel cover in the event of an accident
I wasn't there so I'm no one to judge, but there was also third option: honk to let the lorry driver know you're there.
What is best in life? Hot water, good dentishtry and shoft lavatory paper.
Better yet:
1. Make obviously fake video
2. Upload it under name of a person you want to swat
3. Have that person't life destroyed
What is best in life? Hot water, good dentishtry and shoft lavatory paper.
It is called the 'fast' lane because you are supposed to be there if you are maintaining a constant speed equivalent to the flow of traffic.
No it is not called that. It is called a lane. In free, fast moving, traffic it is for overtaking. In still or slow moving traffic, that rule seems to be ignored. What does the Highway Code say?
Its also interesting to watch the common trick of undercover traffic officers sitting in the center lane doing 10 under, intentionally annoying traffic, and then speeding up to the limit as someone tried to underpass them, to push that person faster, and then give them a double ticket for both underpassing and speeding. Its quite a common trick around here.
That sounds like inciting someone to break the law. That is a criminal offence in most places. From what I hear though, this is a fairly standard mode of operation for the FBI in the USA, so guiding people into breaking the law may be legal there.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
Interesting. You have a car that can accelerate from 55 to 100 quickly enough to leave 'a few seconds' to do something faster than the alternative, which would have taken 3 seconds?
P.S. Try Germany one day.
I once made an entire car of Germans scream in terror because I did a slow, careful, U-turn in an empty road where it was perfectly permitted.
Apparently that's not "how it should be done".
The legalization of weed I doubt made a big difference, maybe a small percent but not as much as cell phones would. most people that cant handle driving stoned wouldn't attempt it. And those that smoke and drive daily were doing it before legalization. The cell phones however, I cant drive more than 1 minute on the freeway of all places here in Las Vegas without noticing somebody on their cell phone. Not all are impeding traffic, but most are. And as far as surface streets.. HAH! i would say at least 50% of drivers are on their phones while driving, and it seems like about 85% at red lights. I wait 5 seconds at a green light before I honk... I end up having to honk at somebody daily, and I drive very little anymore because of it, I used to love driving.. I cant say I'm 100% innocent I do answer my phone and put it on speaker if I wasn't already using it to listen to music, I also keep it on my lap to make it easy to skip through the shit I dont want to hear on pandora. I however do not drone into it at red lights, and impede moving traffic because "this message is important".
I agree. There are far too many stop signs in the world and not nearly enough go signs. 4 way stops are the lazy "traffic calming" or "I don't want to design this intersection".
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
Hell the people around Atlanta can't even figure out the "Keep Moving" signs telling them not to stop.
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
Seriously, BeauHD ?
Nice to know you think reporting dangerous driving and crimes is a bad thing. Why do asshats like you think like that?
Reminds me of watching people in a high crime neighborhood crying on the news about how cops don't solve their crimes while watching the same people post on line about "don't snitch". In fact. I literally saw someone one year protesting the police chanting "don't snitch" then a few months later begging people to tell the police what they know, AKA snitching, about the death of his cousin. I bet if you were the victim of a crime you would report it, thus making you a snitch. If you saw someone attack one of your friends, you would snitch.
You people need to grow the fuck up and stop acting like you don't have to follow the law and complaining when people turn you in for violating the law
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
You've already lost the argument as soon as you say "fast lane".
No, because it is at least a suggestion everywhere that "slower traffic keep to the outside" implying that the inside lane is for faster traffic, thus the fast lane.You seem to be under the impression that everyone drives at exactly the speed limit or over all the time. However, some people drive slower than the limit and are supposed to be in the outside lane as to not hold up people driving faster than themselves.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
I do live in the UK.
This is a private run thing by dashcam brand "Nextbase" to try to sell more dashcams. The various police forces in the UK have nothing to do with this what so ever and are not likely to prosecute anyone over it as it's easy to call video evidence not taken by a an authorised officer into doubt.
I'm as concerned about this as I am about being shot.... which in the UK means I'm more concerned about Eastenders... which I never watch.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
The solution to the fact that everyone makes mistakes driving is not to let everyone get away with it. It's to reduce the fines to the point where people who rarely make mistakes can afford it but people who make them constantly can't afford it (this also really requires adjusting fines to the driver's income, but that's a different matter).
The UK system is high fines, but low prosecution numbers. I've passed police cars doing 10MPH or more over the limit, as long as you're being polite and safe you're fine. Cops will only pull you over for doing things that are stupid and/or dangerous.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Yes. And every stupid thing does not result in a fine. Have you never been given a warning?
By a police officer? No. I'm a foreigner and a man. If I get pulled over I get a ticket.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Do you have any idea how prosecution of driving offences works in the UK?
The police are regulated because they have been found do abuse traffic laws. The equipment they can use is regulated, the places they can operate are regulated, the way they can detect offences is regulated. And still there is abuse.
There is heavy pressure for you to settle the matter out of court. Pay your fine, go on an "awareness" course, don't fight it in court. If you do fight it, you need to pay for your own defence, and if you lose also the court fees.
Defending yourself can be very tricky. The courts are corrupt and tend to side with the police unless you have extremely powerful evidence of your innocence.
I was with you up until here.
The courts in the UK are far from corrupt, it's just that the police do not prosecute until they have significant evidence. Otherwise they'd get in trouble for wasting court time.
People most often lose traffic ticket defences because they're most often guilty (also, have no idea how to defend themselves). If you can demonstrate your innocence it wont even get to court as you can take the matter up with the police and CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) directly and if you're evidence is even remotely plausible, they'll drop the charge.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
The fact that it doesn't include Scotland, or Northern Ireland doesn't really make it a 'UK National' service.
Given the fact that this is being run by a private company (dashcam brand Nextbase) who are simply submitting the footage to the police on your bahalf, it's not even an English and Welsh service... Its a private service that will likely be ignored by the Police.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
It's got police force logos on it, which implies that they endorse it. If they don't then hopefully they will pay Nextbase a visit to sort that out.
Do you live in the UK?
Have you not seen the thousands of Walts on bycyles with yellow POLITE jackets trying to look like they're cops? That matters not.
For the Johnny Foreigners amongst us, in the UK we've got legions of cyclists wearing vests like this so that you might get them confused with one of these.
Use of police logos is not a crime, hell... we dont even prosecute people who pretend to be police. Also, the logo's are buried down at the bottom of the page next to big writing saying "We support the police". They could have put Royal Mail logos on there for all it matters.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Da! Comrade!
ve shud all be at de mercy of de state. Everyone should all be guilty of something because that way we can be locked up when it is politically convenient.
Making EVERYONE a criminal so that ANYONE can be "legitimately" charaged at anytime is what the communist dictatorships do (did). If rules/regulation make 100% of the population in violation of the law then those laws are not for public safety but to protect the government. That's not a road I want to drive down.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Video editing and compositing is fantastic these days. All one needs is a database of make/model/year/color vehicles with videos of egregious driving and some Deep Fakes processing. Let's see how well the Sox do in the Series when their pitcher is pinched on a DUI.
In the UK?
Finally, the term "world series" finally makes sense.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
The court's default position is to give a lot of weight to the word of police officers. Worse still, that weight seems to be given to police staff who are not officers, such as the people who operate the speed cameras.
More than that, the judiciary as a whole is supportive of this. It not only makes it very difficult for individuals to prove their innocence when confronted with the word of a police employee (which is taken to meet the standard of "beyond a reasonable doubt"), but it also makes it extremely difficult to prosecute the police. They can literally get away with murder.
We see the same resistance to fairness from the judiciary over and over again when evidence is found exonerating convicted criminals.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
that most drivers considered themselves above average.
However I can't help noticing when watching dashcam videos on youtube from Russia and America, that they are by far the best drivers in the developed world when it comes to performing spectacular feats of epic failure in the shit driving caught on cam videos.
We are pretty boring by comparison.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
If you're not going faster than the people in the right (inside) lane, you need to move your ass over ASAP to let past people who want to pass. That's common courtesy, and ought to be the law in places it isn't.
Fixed it for you.
It is called the 'fast' lane because you are supposed to be there if you are maintaining a constant speed equivalent to the flow of traffic.
It may be called the 'fast' lane, but it is not. It is the passing lane. You should only be using it if you are passing another vehicle. Obviously, there are exceptions, such as heavy traffic or an upcoming (ie, less than a mile ahead) left exit. But as long as traffic is flowing normally, it should be used for passing and NOT cruising.
By a police officer? No. I'm a foreigner and a man. If I get pulled over I get a ticket.
I'm a foreigner and a man too, I guess I just live in a country without a military police. I remember doing 130 in a 90 zone (the zone had changed about a km back). A police officer cruised up beside me, waved at me to slow down and then kept on going.
Not every stupid thing results in tickets in much of the world.
It's becoming hell in England. Cameras everywhere. Big nanny there to catch you.
Nothing we could do to stop it though.
"If you're going less than the speed limit you should probably move over to an appropriate lane to let past people who are doing the speed limit. "
Actually, it's:
"You MUST keep right unless passing" (for right side driving countries, Keep left unless passing for left side driving countries)
Depending on the jurisdiction, lane hogging can get you anything from a "lanehogging" ticket, "failure to keep left/right", careless driving, all the way up to dangerous driving, depending on how much of a mobile hazard you are. Speed spread is the most dangerous phenomenon on the road and slow drivers travelling 10-15mph below the limit are _far_ more dangerous than ones travelling 10-15mph above the limit when on single carriageway roads or failing to stay in the rightmost(leftmost) lane.
" Folks here sometimes draw police attention for going slow in the fast lane."
"sometimes" should be "ALWAYS" - it's one of the most dangerous things that anyone can do on a multilane road because it forces every other driver to go around them.
"the common trick of undercover traffic officers sitting in the center lane doing 10 under, intentionally annoying traffic,
and then speeding up to the limit as someone tried to underpass them, to push that person faster, and then give them a double ticket for
both underpassing and speeding. Its quite a common trick around here."
That kind of stunt is police corruption at its finest and _should_ be something that the ACLU would be happy to drop a ton of shit on from a great height if someone had dashcam evidence of it.
"You know, with the stupid shit I see on a daily basis while driving, I've begun thinking about buying a dashcam ... because if any of those idiots causes an accident I want some proof of their stupidity."
I have a dashcam because if any of those twats crash into ME, without one it's their word against mine and the insurance companies aren't going to give mine any more weight than his.
It can accelerate from 55 to 100 faster than a container lorry can merge into a lane. The deceleration happened after I was in front of the lorry (there was plenty of space ahead of it)
The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.
Once self-driving cars become a proven technology it won't be very long before you're not allowed to drive your own car. Without human drivers there's little need for traffic signals, stop signs, etc, as it will all be negotiated between the cars.
Maybe not so much in the city, but rural settings offer much different driving consideration. Heck, even in the city a self-driving car if probably going to balk at driving off the end of the driveway and into the back yard to drop off a load of landscaping supplies.
It's also going to be a slow process. Give it at least 20 years between competent self-driving cars being available, and for the feature to be included in the lowest-priced economy cars. Then another 15-25 years for the bulk of the pre-self-driving cars to be retired from the road. Might be 50 years after the first competent self-driving car before such a bill would even have a chance of being passed. And it's not looking great for anyone developing one in the next 5-10 years.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Maybe so. It's very difficult to really see how long it will take. Insurance will be a driving (heh) force. I think it will happen slowly for years, then seemingly all at once.