71–80 of 292 posts
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Cameras can be at every intersection all the time and can adapt in real-time to emerging traffic patterns (ie a ballgame ending and a stadium of people hitting the road at once) as well as traffic changes over time from environmental changes
Why can't pneumatic tubes do this?
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It also gives tech workers unprecedented abilities to fight it. Software engineers need to take social responsibility for what they create.
I don't think new feats in society are accomplished by holding groups of individuals to task and making each one play by the rules. We need new ideas and new government structures to fight the tide or get ahead of it and inspire people with smart and informed leadership. Shaming ambiguous highly paid developers doesn't do anything, because you are criticizing a job role , a "slot" in society, when you think you are c…
I also dislike the "someone else will take their place" logic. While a large number of jobs are, indeed, trivially replaceable, many are not, and many developers have significantly above average skill. Some believe they act ethically, and some do not care. If we can remove those who wish to act ethically from working at unethical companies, we significantly shrink the job pool for them. They'll have less options, and likely have to fight harder and pay more to get them. This means that unethical companies may be paying more (i.e. lower profit margins) and be getting worse talent.
If we can get more of the most talented developers working at more ethical companies, the more ethical solutions will be better, and they will win in the market.
[1] I am a big proponent of GDPR and a desire for a US version of it. Though ultimately, particularly in terms of government surveillance, I feel we need a Constitutional Amendment defining a right to privacy. Something far more lasting and enshrined into our future legal framework that recognizes that privacy is a fundamental human right.
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Under control from what? Committing crimes, breaking into homes, shooting people dead, raping women going out for a jog, planning terrorist activity? I welcome it.
If you create a massive surveillance system for "good" purposes that doesn't mean someone can't later use it for nefarious purposes. One (rather primitive by modern standards) example is that Poland required people to list if they were Jewish for their national census, and then the Nazis used that list to round up and account for Jews in the holocaust. Since the US routinely violates the constitution in the name of f…
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"Access to the video is very limited and subject to strict protocols for use in investigations." That's what they all say. It's an empty platitude at best. "the audio recording capability isn't live" Yet . It is still present, though, and could become live should San Diego decide it to be useful.
Yes exactly this. The "trust us, we are very careful with this ability to spy on you" should be taken with a grain of salt.
America, land of the free and home of the obedient and fearful. Seeing this, I can't help but feel like we have gone too far to have any return to what privacy we did have.
This is what so sad about tech, it gives those in power unprecedented abilities to control the population. Essentially heading back to slavery through technology with no way out for the slaves anymore.
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It also gives tech workers unprecedented abilities to fight it. Software engineers need to take social responsibility for what they create.
Tell that to the Google. Their employees scoffed about working with the Pentagon and dropped the contract, but happily helped China build an authoritarian social-punishment system. Then denied it ... and then more details kept coming out showing Google continued working on it, just more quietly.
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It also gives tech workers unprecedented abilities to fight it. Software engineers need to take social responsibility for what they create.
Tell that to the Google. Their employees scoffed about working with the Pentagon and dropped the contract, but happily helped China build an authoritarian social-punishment system. Then denied it ... and then more details kept coming out showing Google continued working on it, just more quietly.
Google is already an extremely large company, and I think that many are only just now realizing the problems that they were contributing to. It may take a while for employee actions (both protests and resignations) to have a visible impact due to it's size, but I think they're making progress.
As per my thoughts I expounded here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19548485 I think that Google's available talent pool is shrinking. Many very talented engineers have left, and many new potential engineers would not want to work there. Sure, there are still plenty who do, but I would say their options are narrowing over time.
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Tell that to the Google. Their employees scoffed about working with the Pentagon and dropped the contract, but happily helped China build an authoritarian social-punishment system. Then denied it ... and then more details kept coming out showing Google continued working on it, just more quietly.
Pretty sure Google wasn't working on a social punishment system (ie the Chinese "credit score" that's based on social factors), but a censored search engine, which is still pretty shitty but not nearly as bad as what you claim, unless I missed some big piece of news and am myself mistaken
https://theintercept.com/2018/09/14/google-china-prototype-l...
It's just a matter of time until we have country-wide full surveillance. It will be the perfect tool for anyone who wants to create a dictatorship. The thought police and the telescreens in 1984 will look primitive and weak in comparison. I think there is no way around it. Add to that drones to keep the population under control and there is huge danger we'll have a pretty bleak future.
It'll probably end in a war of some sort, as power struggles usually do, but a chaotic don't-know-who-your-enemies-are war like Syria rather than the Great Power contests of WW2. Then after the war we'll likely see the survival of technologies that don't require large-scale maintenance (like solar, batteries or mechanical/thermal storage, electric motors, market economies, flexible micro-manufacturing, computers, and drones) over those that do (like the electric grid, large corporations, state-wide surveillance, broadcast networks, large standing armies, etc.).
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This sort of defeatism isn't helpful. Surveillance technology doesn't sprout up from nothingness; it's built on a culture and a political/economic environment which can be changed.
> which can be changed. But won't be. GWB expanded the state's powers with the Patriot Act, Obama signed an extension and then a new version of the act when parts expired. When both sides are pro-surveillance and Americans refuse to change the system or support 3rd parties, what change can there be?