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Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

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Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#71
While this incident is terrible, there's one thing Dr. Mann doesn't make entirely clear in the article.

The contact information for McDonald's France is quite easily found at http://www.mcdonalds.fr/contacts. It's not an e-mail address, but rather a phone number, but the way the article is written it's not at all clear if he's tried to contact them by their publicly available phone number?

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#73
post #26

No one at an ordinary McDonald's would even notice such a device. Ergo this was not an ordinary McDonald's, but one with security people looking for cameras. Why would a McDonald's have security people looking for cameras? Possibly because it was a mafia front. If you wanted to launder money, a fast food restaurant in a popular location would be a good place to do it. The way the employees behaved is consistent with…

A much more plausible explanation of a story posted by a newly created account to a popular tech aggregator about a technology which competes with (and possibly pre-dates) Google Glass, with a picture of Google Glass on the same page, is that a patent [1] suit is about to break out.

A cynic might think they were trying to harvest accesses from internal to Google IP addresses so that as of today they could show 'knowable infringement' aka treble damages.

[1] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sec...

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#74
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you enacting Poe's law? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poes_law I seriously cannot tell, and you didn't wink at the end? Since McDonald's are easily franchise-able, I suppose they could legitimately be used as a Mafia Front... But really, Poe's Law? wink ;)

This is what came to my mind as well. I can't decide whether or not the comment is supposed to be serious. On one hand, I can't think of many above-board reasons that a restaurant employee would tackle you for having a tiny camera, or rip up medical documentation. On the other hand, the jump straight to a mafia seems a leap too far. Yet if we are going to speculate, I don't see a criminal explanation as significantly…

Page is down, but doesn't Occam's Razor handle this situation adequately? He ran into a random violent asshole. It can happen anywhere at any time to anyone.

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#75
post #26

No one at an ordinary McDonald's would even notice such a device. Ergo this was not an ordinary McDonald's, but one with security people looking for cameras. Why would a McDonald's have security people looking for cameras? Possibly because it was a mafia front. If you wanted to launder money, a fast food restaurant in a popular location would be a good place to do it. The way the employees behaved is consistent with…

Without further information I find this very hard to believe. Laundering money through a fast food restaurant with a supply chain outside your control is a terrible idea. Franchises are required to purchase food centrally. Q How much cash are you banking this week? A 1,000,000 EUR Q So you have sold 500,000 Big Macs. A Yes Q Can I see your invoices for 500,000 buns please? The profit margin is not high enough for it…

I think you just showed us a glimpse of the future...

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, he is well within reason to get a lawyer and sue the pants off of McDonald's in civil court if his case is accurate as he describes it. He's not asking for that though. What he basically wants is a public apology and for McDonald's to FIX his glasses. This is laughable. Notice how all aspects of this story point to how awesome his glasses are: "they help with a medical condition", "having them fixed is more…

Agreed. This should be handled by lawyers and law enforcement. Not by panhandling to the internet about how awesome your technology is. For the record, I totally love his research. When Google Glass debuted I said aloud "Wow! It's Steve Mann's EyeTap!".

We should all be thankful that it wasn't Steve Mann's EyeTrap design.

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#77
post #28

Upsetting but I don't think there's much that can be done about it. The local police or gendarmes are unlikely to have the time to pursue it and I doubt any witnesses will come forward (from the staff at least). Just a case of three "beuf" (as the French would say) taking a dislike to a geek. Sadly, there's a sub-section of young(ish) male French society that is extremely macho and very closed minded when it comes to…

In Russian, this kind of person is called "gopnik". Feel free to use.

Not directly related to one of two USA main parties.

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#78
post #26

No one at an ordinary McDonald's would even notice such a device. Ergo this was not an ordinary McDonald's, but one with security people looking for cameras. Why would a McDonald's have security people looking for cameras? Possibly because it was a mafia front. If you wanted to launder money, a fast food restaurant in a popular location would be a good place to do it. The way the employees behaved is consistent with…

Seems rather tin-hatty. Is it not more likely that, being next to L'Arc de Triomphe, they simply have extra security for anti-terrorism purposes, and that's why they attacked the guy who was recording everything? I recall a similar incident at Disneyland after 9/11.

These guys even look like private security contractors, and their actions are more easily explained by the mindset endemic in that field than by criminal conspiracy.

Re: Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass

#79
Surely the only take-away from this is that McDonald's is a terrible place. Didn't we all know that already?

It's still helpful to try and do as much damage as possible with this story (ideally getting some money or at least an apology for the victim), but make no mistake that the company structure will make this vanish into the æther in no time.

The long-term solution: just don't go there.

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