Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

bits.blogs.nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 188 posts

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#171

Post by betterunix »

obviouslygreen wrote: post #170
betterunix wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I'd be really uncomfortable if I was standing at a urinal and someone was next to me still wearing Google Glass." What if that person is deaf, and Glass is doing speech-to-text for them, helping them get through their day? What if they are a foreigner, and Glass is translating signs, instructions, and spoken language for them? There are a lot of good uses for Google Glass that should not be ignored just because it h…

And none of those things prevents them from taking it off and hanging it on a pocket or in their collar while using a urinal. The only excuse for this that I can come up with is if, like someone I recall being posted about around here, it was actually mounted to their head in a way that makes it impossible or impractical to remove.

Maybe they just forgot to take them off? Why should a person using an assistive device constantly think about where it is appropriate to use?

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#172

Post by georgemcbay »

betterunix wrote: post #166
georgemcbay wrote: post #143

I'm a lot more worried about the privacy implications on a macro scale than I am about some random person getting a photo of my private bits. The scary part of Glass-like devices taken to their logical conclusion for me isn't the little individual invasions of privacy (though those are also unfortunate), but the massive amount of real-time, real-world information collected in the aggregate. If Glass-like devices are…

"The scary part of Glass-like devices taken to their logical conclusion for me isn't the little individual invasions of privacy (though those are also unfortunate), but the massive amount of real-time, real-world information collected in the aggregate." As opposed to the world without Google Glass, where people are constantly taking pictures in public and then uploading those pictures to Facebook? Honestly, singling…

There's a huge difference in terms of scale (assuming Glass becomes as mainstream as Google hopes it will be) and real-time accessibility of the information.

I am not a Google competitor. I use lots of Google products daily: gmail, nexus 4, ARM Chromebook, Go, I even have a Google TV box. And yet I still feel Glass has massive potential for privacy abuse on a scale never seen outside of maybe the NSA.

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#173

Post by coldcode »

marknutter wrote: post #79
DanBC wrote: post #42

Creepers have been creeping for years and years and years. They peer through curtains; they make spyholes in cubicle walls, and with digital cameras they hide cameras in ceilings and books and showers and shoes. Voyeuristic porn is a category. Upskirt is word popular enough to have an understood meaning. I'm a bloke. I'm not worried by those creepers. But I am uneasy about some users of Google Glass. I'd be really un…

I have a feeling that when/if Glass becomes popular enough it will become a social faux pas to be wearing Glass while looking at a woman. Can you imagine some guy wearing Glass staring at a pretty girl across the way? It's creepy enough without Glass; it's super creepy with. As such, I'm betting it will be considered polite to prop Glass up on your head when interacting with people.

Or a pedophile.

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#175

Post by betterunix »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #6
mtgx wrote: post #3

I assume people think this is a problem because they are afraid someone will film them "down there". But you have to actually look down there to do that with Glass, and last I checked that was already frowned upon, and it's something people know they shouldn't do. So why would Glass make this situation much worse?

> So why would Glass make this situation much worse? Because prior to Google Glass, I could just be mad that the guy next to me is getting a free show. After Google Glass, everyone potentially gets tickets.

Then punch him? What would you do if he pulled out a cell phone at the urinal?

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#176

Post by Nrsolis »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #153
freehunter wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I'm not comfortable with is saying "no, women shouldn't feel as frightened as I would" because the two situations are completely different. I'm not talking about how common these situations are, or how commonly violence is the outcome. I'm talking about how I would react in the very specific situation that is being outlined in this specific story. I would urge everyone to reserve violence until it is absolutely…

I can understand using force to prevent someone from touching you inappropriately. But that has the huge caveat that you must have reasonable evidence they are going to touch you inappropriately. Them standing and staring is not good enough. Punching someone on the train for standing in your way is not reasonable either.

The problem with this discussion is trying to come up with a one-size-fits-all response to every possible situation. Life doesn't work that way.

It's all well and good for us to think about what we might do in a situation like that. In almost every case, that's not what happens when faced with that situation. Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.

So let me be clear: it's extraordinarily hard to compare "what you would do" in a scenario when you have the luxury of thinking about it, considering the alternatives, and thinking about possible consequences. In the heat of the moment, when you've got seconds to react, you're likely to make a decision is widely different than the one you THINK you'd make.

Those of us who have faced violence in the past know this intimately. If you've never been held at the point of a gun (I have), then it's hard to comprehend the variety of emotions, positive and negative, that come to the surface when you're suddenly faced with that reality.

Even people who have trained their whole lives for violent encounters deal with this. I wouldn't get too worked up about not having all the answers at your fingertips.

That said, if I catch you taking a picture of my junk in the bathroom, it's not going to go well for you.

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#177

Post by zemanel »

megablast wrote: post #139
yardie wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can quickly see Glass becoming this generations, "Are they crazy or bluetooth?"

Maybe it is a sign of us all getting old, when everybody else adopts google glasses. They say old age is when you stop wanting to learn new things. (Well, somebody said that)

i do not believe it's a sign of anyone getting old or stopping new things, just that i think general social responsibility hasn't been catching up with emerging technologies and Googlers / early adopters could do well in publicly setting civil conduct examples, like taking the Glasses off when going to a public restroom, because people on the other end of recording devices have rights too in public spaces, if not legal, moral, ethical or merely civil common sense.

Case in point is that, for the first time i remember in the short 32 years of my life, a few weeks back i angrily got up from my metro seat and went sat dow as far as possible of a women sitted right in front of me, which was having a loud and unnecessary family discussion with her mother over the phone. She was:

* very notably by the look on peoples faces, not only causing distress to me but to the surrounding people (later afternoon rush hour)

* i could still hear her clearly 2 carriages away

* she publicly admitted during the conversation that having those kind of public conversations was uncivil but would not turn off the call, by her own will

Same goes for the latest tendency (around here at least) of people playing music loud on their phones, again, on public transportation.

There is civil freedom in public space of course, but there are different types of public spaces; closed quarters public transportation is very different from a town square and can only imagine how discomforting it will feel when i'm sat across someone wearing Google classes, wondering if i'm being recorded or not and most importantly, if i as a citizen complain about my privacy, will be recorded and shown up on Youtube in the next minute.

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#178

Post by Nrsolis »

Filligree wrote: post #149
Nrsolis wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the worry is that once the cameras become commonplace, it'll make the barrier that much lower. Once the barrier is lowered, more people will feel like there is little harm in crossing it.

Would there, in fact, be as much harm in crossing it? What I mean is.. if societal norms change such that, say, nude photos are no longer considered important - because everyone has nude photos online, after all - is it still as much of a problem? Most of the psychological issues here are highly cultural.

Maybe for you. But I don't think that someone else should have that power over me. Once you start allowing that barrier to be crossed, you're inviting all sorts of other incursions on what we consider to be personal liberties.

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#179

Post by betterunix »

georgemcbay wrote: post #172
betterunix wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The scary part of Glass-like devices taken to their logical conclusion for me isn't the little individual invasions of privacy (though those are also unfortunate), but the massive amount of real-time, real-world information collected in the aggregate." As opposed to the world without Google Glass, where people are constantly taking pictures in public and then uploading those pictures to Facebook? Honestly, singling…

There's a huge difference in terms of scale (assuming Glass becomes as mainstream as Google hopes it will be) and real-time accessibility of the information. I am not a Google competitor. I use lots of Google products daily: gmail, nexus 4, ARM Chromebook, Go, I even have a Google TV box. And yet I still feel Glass has massive potential for privacy abuse on a scale never seen outside of maybe the NSA.

I am really not seeing how that is the case. There are so many photos being uploaded without Google Glass that it is possible to reconstruct a model of an entire town using those photographs. We already crossed the point of having large numbers of photographs taken without our permission uploaded corporations that do not care about any of us. The most dramatic change with Glass will not be the number of photos, but the applications that will be possible.

A while ago, a friend of mine sent me a picture he found on Facebook. It is me and my best friends from college at a party on the first night of our freshman year. We were all in the background of the picture -- it was completely inadvertent that we were photographed. That was nearly a decade ago, long before Google Glass was even a concept.

You are not going to see more privacy abuse resulting from Glass than you already see resulting from the combination of smartphones and online social networks. I do not want Facebook to build a profile about me, but guess what? My friends and family upload pictures of me to Facebook without asking permission, complete with metadata, which is added to a database that has my browsing habits (surreptitiously collected) and tidbits gathered from any mention of me by those same friends. What do you think Glass is going to add to this situation?

Furthermore, what solution would you propose? We as a society already managed to dig ourselves into a hole, where we have become dependent on large corporations to satisfy our computing needs; if you want a technical solution, you are going to have to trust Google to implement it. Legal solutions would likely further restrict our freedoms and worsen an already overly complicated legal code, restricting our ability to take pictures or used head-mounted displays and other wearable computers.

Re: At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom

#180

Post by potatolicious »

ignostic wrote: post #169
potatolicious wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not as irrational a fear as you're making it out to be. Check out any number of tumblr blogs. People of Wal-Mart. Look at That Fucking Hipster, etc. Or a very, very large section of /r/pics or /r/funny on Reddit. Even ignoring the extreme cases like /r/creepshots, the Internet has already proven that it greatly enjoys taking pictures of strangers in everyday life and mocking them mercilessly. People would like t…

I probably didn't clarify the core point well enough. Even if you're right - if the fear is rational - what is your alternative? Banning filming in public? Some of the more corrupt police forces would love nothing more than to have evidence of police brutality tossed out on those grounds. To answer the tangent, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representativeness_heuristic

Vigilance and self-policing, because you're right, regulation on this front has a highly chilling effect on expression.

This particular topic is near and dear to me - I do a lot of street photography which is, at least partially, defined as taking pictures of strangers in a documentary manner, and almost always takes place in public.

Countries with strong privacy laws, such as France and Japan, do suffer from this. The photographic community in the UK has been hit hard in the past few years as even innocuous picture-taking of popular landmarks has been hit with intense police scrutiny if your gear is too "good".

We do not want the heavy hand of government in here, because inevitably this will mean throwing the baby out with the bath water. Expression and art is usually at the boundaries of what society currently finds palatable, and activities along this border needs to be regulated by people, not immutable and slow-changing laws.

The only solution I can think of (and it's not a particularly good one) is to slam the door shut on people who would abuse their freedom of expression and whose actions will lead to the loss of freedom by inviting regulation. I'd rather oppose people rather than technology, though.

Post reply on HN