Physical assault by McDonald's for wearing Digital Eye Glass • Hacker News Board

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

#361

Post by Knotwilg » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 11:56 AM UTC

dante_dev wrote: post #320

sxp wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this mean those places also ban people from using smartphones or normal cameras on the premises? There is no indications that Mann was actively taking pictures of strangers. And it would makes sense for a tourist to take pictures of his family at a restaurant. How are tourists normally treated when they try to take pictures of their vacation?

yes, basically if you use your smartphone to take a photo of a dish, they'll complain about it.

That's an exaggeration. I'm Belgian and recently went to France and took pictures of us enjoying our dishes. I didn't notice the personnel having an issue with that. So it is not a general rule.

But the spirit of bambax' and others' messages is true: in Europe, customer is not king and should behave in a way that pleases the shopkeepers or restaurant owners. This is more true the closer you are to the capital or the city's hot spot.

And more generally, one has to develop a sense of what is right in a particular place, not assuming that the same customs apply as in your home country. Americans don't have a good record at that, I'm afraid. As someone pointed out, you're bound to inadvertently offend people, but rushing into a place with a camera is a good way to start learning from your mistakes.

That being said, the violence displayed by this particular personnel is completely over the top and should not be tolerated, not by customers and not by law.

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

#362

Post by lloeki » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:03 PM UTC

bambax wrote: post #273

pg wrote: 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…

Is this the real PG throwing around conspiracy theories? Wow. I'm French and have been living in Paris my whole life. In France you're not allowed to take pictures or movies of people without their consent. If you try to take pictures of strangers in the subway you will be heckled and possibly assaulted, and the police will do nothing to stop it. I'm not defending my country here -- I'm a photographer and resent this…

> In France you're not allowed to take pictures or movies of people without their consent.

"Droit à l'image" covers use, duplication and distribution of pictures of people, and only if said people can be identified on the picture. I don't know about any french law that forbids actually taking pictures of people in a public place. In a private area, there's Code Pénal, Art. 226-1, and even then, the law says that unless they explicitly disagree, their consent is assumed. Once the shot is taken, you don't have the right to publish the image without their explicit consent, and if no consent of publication is given, you can publish the image as long as people cannot be identified.

(FWIW one can take and publish pictures of goods to one's heart's content, provided it causes no harm)

> If you try to take pictures of strangers in the subway you will be heckled and possibly assaulted, and the police will do nothing to stop it.

There is no legitimate reason for a nearby police member not to try to stop someone physically assaulting someone else, whatever the reason of the assault may be. Their duty is to at least inquire into the situation.

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

#363

Post by hexagonc » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:06 PM UTC

ktizo wrote: post #152

hexagonc wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it wasn't a random violent asshole. It was three violent assholes which doesn't seem random to me.

That's because, like the majority of people, you are probably quite bad at understanding both randomness, and the normal behaviour of violent assholes.

Um, sir, I have more than a layman's understanding of randomness, thank you very much. This is Hacker News; all kinds of people post here.

I'm not even sure what you mean by "random" in this case; we're talking about one event. I didn't say anything about the distribution of violent assholes in McDonalds or France in general. It certainly wasn't "random" when the first violent guy brings over other employees who happened to also be violent. I don't know about France, but in the US, there are strict laws on what a commercial establishment can do to get someone off the premises. Now, mafia-run operations aside, most places would just ask you to leave and threaten to call the cops if you remain.

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

#364

Post by theorique » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:07 PM UTC

jonmrodriguez wrote: post #350

Fuzzwah wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no indications that Mann was actively taking pictures of strangers. Except for all the photos in the blog post.

If you actually read the post, you would see that the device would normally purge its buffer after it finished augmenting / vision processing those frames. Only because it was forcefully shut off was the data retained.

An angry rent-a-cop in the face of the person wielding the camera would not know this.

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

#365

Post by bambax » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:12 PM UTC

drostie wrote: post #349

sylvinus wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a fellow Frenchman I can confirm everything bambax said! Maybe one other explanation for this incident is the amount of hidden camera documentaries airing on national TV recently. I can imagine these security agent being briefed to avoid at all costs having another Super Size Me shot at their location.

Can either of you explain why the French police does not get involved? It seems like vigilante justice would be something they'd want to stamp out.

In France, taking a picture of a stranger can be compared to entering his home, unannounced, and helping yourself with the content of his fridge.

The reaction can be mild "Hey, WTF??" to aggressive (being punched in the face).

In the US, if you go to the police saying "I entered this guy's home and took a Coke from his fridge, and next thing you know he punched me!! For a can of Coke!?! Can you believe that! Please arrest him!" the police will likely tell you "you're lucky you didn't get shot".

In France the photographer is considered the perpetrator. The police will not help him (and maybe worse if he insists...)

Also, "assault" is very different here than in the US; grabbing someone by the arm or pushing him around isn't considered assault (more like a disagreement).

That said, you can get very far with asking first: many people, if asked, won't mind being photographed (but you have to ask every person, and respect every decision, which would make the whole process pretty complex).

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

#366

Post by charliepark » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:34 PM UTC

pascal_cuoq wrote: post #347

pg wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make a convincing case. I didn't realize attitudes toward photography (and security in shops) were so different in France. I've taken quite a lot of pictures there, including inside shops and restaurants IIRC, but somehow I must never have tripped this rule. How embarrassing to have produced an instance of the indignant and uninformed speculation that I so often groan to find at the top of HN comment threads.

> were so different in France Different as compared to what? Google “right to bear camera” and you will find many documented cases of policepersons, people in charge, and passersby harassing photographers, in cases photographers that were not using their equipment. These take place in countries that are otherwise considered civilized, all over the world. Do you mean “different” as in “elsewhere, terrorism would have…

Clearly, he means "different as compared with the United States," where it's legal to photograph anything in a public space. But I get the sense you're itching for a fight about photographers' rights.

Although McDonald's isn't a public space, there would be several rungs in the ladder between "sir, you can't take photos in here" and a physical altercation.

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

#367

Post by ajanuary » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:35 PM UTC

scoot wrote: post #132

"when the computer is damaged, e.g. by falling and hitting the ground (or by a physical assault), buffered pictures for processing remain in its memory, and are not overwritten with new ones" This sounds bogus. The stills presented in the post suggests they were taken by design rather than some random stills "remaining in memory" after the alleged assault. There are frames from earlier in his McDonald's visit that it…

The earlier frames can be explained by having a larger buffer than is strictly necessary for typical use and rather than removing them as soon as they're processed, just leave it to get overridden.

Why you would have a buffer that large for realtime processing, I'm not too sure, but there probably is a reason.

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

#368

Post by bambax » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:41 PM UTC

lloeki wrote: post #362

bambax wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this the real PG throwing around conspiracy theories? Wow. I'm French and have been living in Paris my whole life. In France you're not allowed to take pictures or movies of people without their consent. If you try to take pictures of strangers in the subway you will be heckled and possibly assaulted, and the police will do nothing to stop it. I'm not defending my country here -- I'm a photographer and resent this…

> In France you're not allowed to take pictures or movies of people without their consent. "Droit à l'image" covers use, duplication and distribution of pictures of people, and only if said people can be identified on the picture. I don't know about any french law that forbids actually taking pictures of people in a public place. In a private area, there's Code Pénal, Art. 226-1, and even then, the law says that unle…

> There is no legitimate reason for a nearby police member not to try to stop someone physically assaulting someone else

In France the photographer is considered the perpetrator. The police are more likely to help the people being photographed to not be photographed (if necessary, by taking the camera by force), than to protect the photographer. ("More likely" is an overstatement; the most likely behavior is that the police won't do anything either way).

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

#369

Post by nikcub » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:41 PM UTC

pg wrote: 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…

Franchise restaurants are terrible avenues for money laundering because of all the internal controls put in place by the parent company. Cash registers are linked directly back to central servers under control of the parent company, so that the franchisee does not gain an opportunity to skim on the revenue share that is passed back up.

The same tight controls put in place by the parent org to assure they receive their full revenue share, and so that they can monitor store sales, inventory demand, and all the other good things that come with instant centralized sales info etc. etc. also prevent money laundering as a side effect.

Further, both McDonalds stores on the Champs-Elysees are corporate owned and operated. McDonalds in France has a high rate of corporate store ownership and operation compared to other countries (20% in France compared to 15% globally) because of a previous bad experience with the national franchisee (it was fought out in a court battle[1]) and that store being a marquee store for the brand in Europe.

My only theory as to why this happen is that the staff were confronted with a situation that they were not accustomed to dealing with and that caused them to react poorly. McDonalds is a highly controversial company and because of their profile they are constantly being targeted by individuals, groups and the media (see 'supersize me', 'fast food nation', 'mclibel' etc.). The security at this store may have mistaken this visitor, who had a camera attached to his glasses which could be considered 'hidden', with somebody who was looking to expose the restaurant in some way.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/1988/06/12/business/mcdonald-s-tries-...

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

#370

Post by yaix » Tue, Jul 17, 2012, 12:46 PM UTC

bambax wrote: post #273

pg wrote: 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…

Is this the real PG throwing around conspiracy theories? Wow. I'm French and have been living in Paris my whole life. In France you're not allowed to take pictures or movies of people without their consent. If you try to take pictures of strangers in the subway you will be heckled and possibly assaulted, and the police will do nothing to stop it. I'm not defending my country here -- I'm a photographer and resent this…

The camera was not taking pictures because they were not stored.

Its is not the police's job to judge if anybody acted in self-defense or not, the job of the police is to show up(!) and restore order. Judges do the rest. Also in France.