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People Staring at Computers

kylemcdonald.net

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Re: People Staring at Computers

#201

Post by [deleted] »

dale_glass wrote: post #136
TeMPOraL wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's magical thinking. People don't understand how technology works. More than that - because it's not really about computers . Most people don't understand how reality works. What is information. How reasoning works. What can you infer from observations. They feel (and sometimes, in some places, really think) that a picture is like a piece of their soul. But it isn't. It's just a hash of their phenotype, useful most…

And you get this stuff from? I'd say people understand very well the implications of a photo. If all there was to a photo is showing "the shell that you won in the genetic lottery" there would hardly be a point in photography. I disagree with your assessment. It's part acceptance, part different priorities, and part ignorance. Some people understand what is being gathered and simply accept that as a worthwhile exchan…

[deleted]

Re: People Staring at Computers

#202

Post by gizmo »

SamoyedFurFluff wrote: post #195
gizmo wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are cameras on every street corner. At ATMs. In every store. On public transportation. I never consented to any of this. Art projects that confront people with the reality that they're being recorded and watched are vital to remind people that privacy still matters, and that we should struggle to regain some of the privacy expectations we've lost.

Art projects still have ethics to them. He could’ve put a singular art installation somewhere for people to use and have their photo taken while they browse a specific art installation. Violating people’s privacy in order to remind them their privacy is important sounds like the sort of “I’m harming you for your own good” that abusers use.

Everybody who enters an Apple store is already being recorded by hidden video cameras without their consent. Loss prevention. Unless you think being photographed in addition to being unknowingly video recorded is a grave privacy violation, I don't get your point.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#204

Post by dale_glass »

jl2718 wrote: post #197

>>> "What is your day job, Kyle?" "This is my day job. I'm a media artist, I just write a lot of code. I spend most of my time making open source tools with other people." "But how do you make money?" "I get commissions, grants, and live off artist fees from exhibiting work. I fly to conferences and festivals and do workshops and presentations. Sometimes I'll do residencies." This agent and I are both having a ‘Deuce…

My brother lives in a well known capital city, and does it like this. He does a bit of everything: illustration, graphics for games, teaching, work for hire, etc.

As I understand it, it doesn't pay amazingly well, but he manages. Pretty sure it's a more stressful way of making a living than just working a normal job.

Living in a "big city" doesn't mean you're rich. There's cheaper parts of the city, studio apartments, flatmates, and saving up what you can.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#205

Post by dale_glass »

globular-toast wrote: post #174
yarcob wrote: post #89

The most curious thing about this project is how people seem to have a visceral reaction to having photos of them made without their permission; but having their activity tracked online hardly evokes the same reaction. It's weird. What harm is a random picture of my face in public going to do? But still some people worry so much about that. Whereas only very few people show the same reaction to the fact that Google s…

People in cities are captured on CCTV hundreds of times per day but nobody seems to mind. I remember some fifteen years ago sitting in pub with a group of people and being the only one who cared that there was a CCTV camera right above our table (it was one of those creepy omni-directional domes). Surveillance Camera Man showed that people have often violent reactions to being overtly filmed by individuals in public.…

The context is a very different one. CCTV is everywhere, but you know Apple is really only interested in security, and maybe keeping track of their own employees. They're not going to randomly make some sort of art project from their footage without lots of discussions with lawyers. I'm pretty sure they'd also make sure to get written consent from everyone involved.

We can also expect a company like Apple would be very risk averse in this regard, and keep far away from anything too weird.

Some random guy doing their own project going by just whatever seems reasonable to them and installing surveillance software on somebody else's computers isn't really the same sort of thing.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#206

Post by pessimizer »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #185
emptyparadise wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's be careful and not blame people for all of it because the Facebooks of the world go a very long way to make sure actually understanding what's going on with your data is extremely difficult.

Not my intent. My position is that: - Most people have little clue about how reality works; - Companies thriving on people's data do their best to perpetuate that state of things; - I don't blame people from being ignorant about practical implications of complex topics at the intersection of mathematics and philosophy; I blame companies for exploiting that lack of understanding.

> I blame companies for exploiting that lack of understanding.

I blame governments for not protecting the weak.

Businesses always exploit their up front investments in knowledge (and equipment) to get money from customers. The problem is when they're allowed to conceal and actively mislead the public about that knowledge in order to maintain their monopoly on that knowledge. Even worse, since there's absolutely no competitive advantage in defecting, it becomes a natural cartel.

A functional government would carefully classify and explain all the elements of the problem, then determine how to regulate it through democratic processes.

The problem starts with the fact there's never been a clear right to privacy in the US. Instead it's just a phrase and a weird set of principles stitched together from ancient court decisions about celebrities. The US benefits from its freedom of speech baseline being enshrined in the constitution rather than being a patchwork (like in the UK for example.) The right to privacy should be that clear as well.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#207

Post by vidarh »

globular-toast wrote: post #174
yarcob wrote: post #89

The most curious thing about this project is how people seem to have a visceral reaction to having photos of them made without their permission; but having their activity tracked online hardly evokes the same reaction. It's weird. What harm is a random picture of my face in public going to do? But still some people worry so much about that. Whereas only very few people show the same reaction to the fact that Google s…

People in cities are captured on CCTV hundreds of times per day but nobody seems to mind. I remember some fifteen years ago sitting in pub with a group of people and being the only one who cared that there was a CCTV camera right above our table (it was one of those creepy omni-directional domes). Surveillance Camera Man showed that people have often violent reactions to being overtly filmed by individuals in public.…

CCTV is impersonal, and rarely watched.

Impersonal collection and personal collection evokes very different concerns in people. Impersonal bulk collection is easier to dismiss as "they're not looking for me", whereas the latter raises all kinds of questions about motivation.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#208

Post by atombender »

gizmo wrote: post #181
NotEvil wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, he never asks people for there consent. Even apple does that (although in a never read privacy policy) but they do

There are cameras on every street corner. At ATMs. In every store. On public transportation. I never consented to any of this. Art projects that confront people with the reality that they're being recorded and watched are vital to remind people that privacy still matters, and that we should struggle to regain some of the privacy expectations we've lost.

Those cameras don't publish their recordings to the Internet, so your analogy is flawed. You can argue that such cameras are also violations of privacy, of course, but there's a big difference between recording and broadcasting — no matter if the intent of the broadcasting is good.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#209

Post by jrochkind1 »

CaptArmchair wrote: post #166
i_dont_know_ wrote: post #138

This reminds me of a random, but chilling, scene in "Minority Report". The protagonist confronts a man he thinks is responsible for killing his child. The man decides to reassure the protagonist by explaining how kind he was to the child, and made sure the child didn't suffer when he killed him. He's presenting it as though this is a legitimate defense for such an obvious violation. The part that sticks with me is th…

I agree with that assessment. To my mind, the act of capturing faces in and off itself isn't even the reason why he was investigated. Consent from members of the public is an entirely separate discussion. This boils entirely down to him not having formal consent from Apple. He simply walked into the store and quite literally installed a small application on each Macbook without Apple's consent. > I remember being a b…

> He simply walked into the store and quite literally installed a small application on each Macbook without Apple's consent.

People install free software on computers in Apple Stores all the time though, don't they? It's part of testing out the computers, and expected by Apple. As mentioned in the story, Apple resets the computers each night.

My guess would be this is part of why they decided they didn't have a legal case against him. But it's just a guess.

Re: People Staring at Computers

#210

Post by gizmo »

atombender wrote: post #208
gizmo wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are cameras on every street corner. At ATMs. In every store. On public transportation. I never consented to any of this. Art projects that confront people with the reality that they're being recorded and watched are vital to remind people that privacy still matters, and that we should struggle to regain some of the privacy expectations we've lost.

Those cameras don't publish their recordings to the Internet, so your analogy is flawed. You can argue that such cameras are also violations of privacy, of course, but there's a big difference between recording and broadcasting — no matter if the intent of the broadcasting is good.

Yes, there's a big difference. In one case it's an art stunt to draw people's attention to a social question, and in the other case maybe security employees are leering at customers through cameras for their own perverse enjoyment, but who knows because there is zero transparency or accountability.
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