Read the DMN article more closely and ask yourself why the violations went down. From the article:
"City records indicate Dallas has lengthened yellow-light intervals on 12 of its 62 monitored traffic signal."
and
"Dallas City Hall has idled more than one-fourth of the 62 cameras that monitor busy intersections"
Your presumption, and that of the DMN, which never prints a negative word about cameras, is that the ~15 cameras were idled because they were working too well. The alternative theory is that tickets went down when the yellow went up. *Side note: violations also go down when a camera goes out of service, there's construction at or near a camera intersection or the city/vendor just turn the thing off to goose the "success" numbers -- it's a worthless measurement.)
Did the yellow go up because Dallas City Hall was concerned about safety? Nope. Because they got busted using yellows shorter than allowed under a 2007 Texas law: http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/20/2068.asp
A story, by the way, on which the DMN never reported.
It has already been used abused in Arlington, Virginia and in several Connecticut cities. Sure finding stolen cars sounds great, and that's just what it takes to get the lemmings to give the thumbs up to this technology. But let's be real about the true purpose: to make money.
Arlington will tow away your car for overdue library books. In Connecticut, the off-duty marshals -- who get paid a bounty for each car towed away -- trawled the WalMart parking lots to find people with a few overdue parking tickets. A woman in Bridgeport had her car towed out of her driveway while she was home over $85 in parking tickets. Is that the kind of world you want to live in?
References:
ConnecticutArlington
If you liked "Bill 602P" and the Patriot Act, you'll love this 9th Circuit ruling, too. Why?
It screws you on two fronts: taxes and privacy.
Anything declared a telecom service becomes subject to CALEA. That's the law that makes phone companies open up their network so that the FBI can easily plug in and tap phones at will (with a court order).
And just unlike the bogus 602P email, this one will tax the Internet. All the universal service fees and other taxes that jack up your phone bill will appear on your cable bill, too.
What's the upside? You still have the same cable company providing the wire into your home, providing the same routers and connection. But another company gets to resell the same lines, give you a rebranded web browser, and gets to call it "competition." YEAH! Sign me up for that.
The vote wasn't about media consolidation. The vote was to spend $38 billion to fund the Department of Commerce, the Department of Justice, the FCC and other agencies. The media provision was just a few sentences in a hefty-sized piece of legislation. I would think most people on/. would vote no if they actually took the time to read the bill, here.
The true vote was in committee where the amendment on the TV ownership cap and nothing else. The vote was 40-25, which my trusty calculator says is less than 2/3rds.
It's easy to say, "big media is bad" and oppose consolidation. But how many people here actually know what they're talking about? Here are the facts:
The amendment that passed as part of the appropriations bill would roll back the proposed 45% cap back to the current 35%. It's not allowing a company to own 35% of televisions in the US, it's ownership of enough stations to reach 35% of the U.S. audience. (It's not market by market)
There are 1,331 commercial stations in the US. Fox and CBS (Viacom) are already over the cap at about 38% (because the court ruled the 35% cap was "arbitrary".)
Viacom (CBS) has 39 stations. That's 2.9% of stations nationwide.
Fox has 37 stations. That's 2.8% of stations nationwide.
NBC has 29 stations. That's 2.2% of stations nationwide, including Telemundo.
Disney (ABC) has 10 stations. That's.8% of stations nationwide.
So what we're talking about is allowing CBS and Fox to buy a handful of stations to go from ~3% of the market to 4%.
So the question is, why does this mark the end of democracy? What difference does it make in anyone's life? Do you even know if News Corporation owns your local Fox affiliate? You don't like big corporations, but how would you like the networks to pull out of your market? (There was a big outrage when a New York cable company pulled ABC because of some silly dispute.)
Those are the real questions, if you actually want to talk about what the appropriations amendment does. (posted in a previous thread, but too late for anyone to notice)
Slashdot Mirror
Read the DMN article more closely and ask yourself why the violations went down. From the article:
"City records indicate Dallas has lengthened yellow-light intervals on 12 of its 62 monitored traffic signal."
and
"Dallas City Hall has idled more than one-fourth of the 62 cameras that monitor busy intersections"
Your presumption, and that of the DMN, which never prints a negative word about cameras, is that the ~15 cameras were idled because they were working too well. The alternative theory is that tickets went down when the yellow went up. *Side note: violations also go down when a camera goes out of service, there's construction at or near a camera intersection or the city/vendor just turn the thing off to goose the "success" numbers -- it's a worthless measurement.)
Did the yellow go up because Dallas City Hall was concerned about safety? Nope. Because they got busted using yellows shorter than allowed under a 2007 Texas law:
http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/20/2068.asp
A story, by the way, on which the DMN never reported.
It has already been used abused in Arlington, Virginia and in several Connecticut cities. Sure finding stolen cars sounds great, and that's just what it takes to get the lemmings to give the thumbs up to this technology. But let's be real about the true purpose: to make money. Arlington will tow away your car for overdue library books. In Connecticut, the off-duty marshals -- who get paid a bounty for each car towed away -- trawled the WalMart parking lots to find people with a few overdue parking tickets. A woman in Bridgeport had her car towed out of her driveway while she was home over $85 in parking tickets. Is that the kind of world you want to live in? References: Connecticut Arlington
It screws you on two fronts: taxes and privacy.
Anything declared a telecom service becomes subject to CALEA. That's the law that makes phone companies open up their network so that the FBI can easily plug in and tap phones at will (with a court order).
And just unlike the bogus 602P email, this one will tax the Internet. All the universal service fees and other taxes that jack up your phone bill will appear on your cable bill, too.
What's the upside? You still have the same cable company providing the wire into your home, providing the same routers and connection. But another company gets to resell the same lines, give you a rebranded web browser, and gets to call it "competition." YEAH! Sign me up for that.
You've obviously never been to Washington, D.C. The Internet access is free, the parking is not.
You're talking about the 1996 deregulation. I'm talking about the June 2003 rule which tightens the radio rules.
The true vote was in committee where the amendment on the TV ownership cap and nothing else. The vote was 40-25, which my trusty calculator says is less than 2/3rds.
(a) The FCC rules don't help Clear Channel. They redefine media markets in a way that slightly reduces the number of stations CC can own.
(b) The amendment has nothing to do with the radio rules, just the TV ownership cap. It only affects CBS and Fox, the only networks over the cap.
The amendment that passed as part of the appropriations bill would roll back the proposed 45% cap back to the current 35%. It's not allowing a company to own 35% of televisions in the US, it's ownership of enough stations to reach 35% of the U.S. audience. (It's not market by market)
There are 1,331 commercial stations in the US. Fox and CBS (Viacom) are already over the cap at about 38% (because the court ruled the 35% cap was "arbitrary".)
Viacom (CBS) has 39 stations. That's 2.9% of stations nationwide. .8% of stations nationwide.
Fox has 37 stations. That's 2.8% of stations nationwide.
NBC has 29 stations. That's 2.2% of stations nationwide, including Telemundo.
Disney (ABC) has 10 stations. That's
So what we're talking about is allowing CBS and Fox to buy a handful of stations to go from ~3% of the market to 4%.
So the question is, why does this mark the end of democracy? What difference does it make in anyone's life? Do you even know if News Corporation owns your local Fox affiliate? You don't like big corporations, but how would you like the networks to pull out of your market? (There was a big outrage when a New York cable company pulled ABC because of some silly dispute.)
Those are the real questions, if you actually want to talk about what the appropriations amendment does. (posted in a previous thread, but too late for anyone to notice)