this is a phenomenal use of technology
New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
471–480 of 483 posts
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#472Fantastic! I live in south Queens next to the Brooklyn border and good lord the idiots here with their loud cars. Every night it's a cacophony of revving engines, tires screeching and exhaust bangs. You hear the same bullshit sound repeatedly every god damn day. Usually a slammed mustang, infinity or BMW with a two step or whatever that noise making exhaust mod is and either an instagram tag or car club name. And its…
Speaking of NYC, we've enjoyed some amazingly effective soundproof windows in many spaces, it seems like a thing there, but when we ask window salesmen in the Bay Area about soundproof windows like that, they kind of shrug and say " double pane is pretty much all you can do". Why can NYC do this but not SF? Or have we just not called the right store?
Because it probably won't make much difference unless your building is made of brick (like many NY buildings), which it can't be, because earthquakes.
The window sales guy doesn't want you to shell out megabucks on his recommendation and then get no benefit. That makes him look bad.
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#473Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#474Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's single-handedly the best perk of being white in the US. I hate it, it's straight up dystopian, but you can't argue with the benefits of being above the law for anything less than like murder. Being white means I do things like speed, do drugs at parties and concerts, jaywalk, be drunk in public, trespass -- err sorry urban explore, set of fireworks on the 4th without so much as a second glance.
Go on a ridealong. You'll be arresting white people all day.
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Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#475Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be clear, their constitutionality status is a matter of opinion. In my opinion, they should be deemed unconstitutional via a violation of rights against search and seizure, and rights for a proper trial. It's impossible to face your accuser in court, it's impossible to actually check the software used to identify whether you were speeding, and asymmetrically automating enforcement of something where it's in the en…
Right to trial, I could see the issue there. Right to inspect the evidence used against you, sure. But where on earth do you get an expectation of privacy in deafening sounds you blast in public, which people can't ignore even if they want to? And audible inside others' private areas?
> But where on earth do you get an expectation of privacy in deafening sounds you blast in public, which people can't ignore even if they want to? And audible inside others' private areas?
Nowhere, because I never said anything about that.
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#476Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be clear, their constitutionality status is a matter of opinion. In my opinion, they should be deemed unconstitutional via a violation of rights against search and seizure, and rights for a proper trial. It's impossible to face your accuser in court, it's impossible to actually check the software used to identify whether you were speeding, and asymmetrically automating enforcement of something where it's in the en…
You can face your accuser in court. The camera isn't accusing you. The city is. It's using the camera as evidence.
It's easy to use a camera as evidence in, say, a robbery. The camera will show you actually committing the crime.
If you're speeding, something's measuring your speed based on camera images. The method used to determine speed is not described in detail, just "trust us, they were going the speed we say". It's not generally the city who is doing this, but a third-party private company which sometimes is paid per ticket issued.
You can face the city in court, and the city will just say "Our contractor says you did this." The contractor will say "we totally think you did this. No, we will not show you our proprietary software that says you did it." In my opinion, that last statement violates the rights of the accused.
There have been numerous cases in the last decade of red light and speed camera companies issuing hundreds of illegitimate tickets. The system is ripe for abuse, and gets abused all the times. Happy to pull up some examples of this if you're curious.
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#477Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right to trial, I could see the issue there. Right to inspect the evidence used against you, sure. But where on earth do you get an expectation of privacy in deafening sounds you blast in public, which people can't ignore even if they want to? And audible inside others' private areas?
> But where on earth do you get an expectation of privacy in deafening sounds you blast in public, which people can't ignore even if they want to? And audible inside others' private areas? Nowhere, because I never said anything about that.
You said:
>>In my opinion, they should be deemed unconstitutional via a violation of rights against search and seizure
The only things searched are that very same deafening noises that everyone has to hear without any effort on their part. If you're saying that's a violation of search and seizure, you're saying there's some expectation of privacy around the violation being prosecuted.
If not, what are you saying was being searched/seized that violated privacy?
You could have said so the first time you posted, or in your last reply, but elected instead to have plausible deniability of any specific argument.
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#478Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps a couple strangers would hear a few words but don't know who you are. If police or other state agency are pervasively watching, listening, and recording, I think you would agree that is quite a different situation.
A cop can still legally follow me around and overhear my conversation with a recorder
Not without a warrant
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#479Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can face your accuser in court. The camera isn't accusing you. The city is. It's using the camera as evidence.
It's easy to use a camera as evidence in, say, a robbery. The camera will show you actually committing the crime. If you're speeding, something's measuring your speed based on camera images. The method used to determine speed is not described in detail, just "trust us, they were going the speed we say". It's not generally the city who is doing this, but a third-party private company which sometimes is paid per ticket…
I can definitely see these systems being used illegitimately, but this has nothing to do with whether you can face your accuser. A software company telling you that you cannot validate the methodology of their measurement instrument is definitely troubling, but it is not fundamentally dissimilar to the police using speed guns whose internals you cannot inspect to convict you of speeding. Even more problematic than either of these technologies is the fact that the cops jail motorists for DUI on the basis of their own subjective interpretation of those motorists' performances on sobriety field tests.
The use of opaque technology by law enforcement raises significant issues in a free society. But so does the use of opaque non-technological judgement by police officers. Since there are significant benefits to automated enforcement, we should be pushing to improve transparency, rather than pursuing a chimera where we can only be prosecuted on the basis of transparent and reproduceable forensic analysis.
Re: New York is using cameras with microphones to ticket loud cars
#480Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But where on earth do you get an expectation of privacy in deafening sounds you blast in public, which people can't ignore even if they want to? And audible inside others' private areas? Nowhere, because I never said anything about that.
You said: >>In my opinion, they should be deemed unconstitutional via a violation of rights against search and seizure The only things searched are that very same deafening noises that everyone has to hear without any effort on their part. If you're saying that's a violation of search and seizure, you're saying there's some expectation of privacy around the violation being prosecuted. If not, what are you saying was…
I feel like you're trying to force a very specific wording, "expectation of privacy", that doesn't fit very well with what I'm trying to describe, because in different contexts there can be different definitions/interpretations/kinds of "privacy".
For example, if one is driving down a public street, obviously one does not have an expectation of "privacy" in the traditional sense.
If everyone driving down a public street is checked, without probable cause, to make sure they aren't violating any laws, I think that should be an unconstitutional search.
Obviously that isn't an unconstitutional search under current interpretations of laws, but I think it ought to be.