Live data from Hacker News

Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

bloodinthemachine.com

281–290 of 321 posts

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#281
post #117
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would I fly an expensive drone close to a camera, fumble about for a minute trying to get it painted like a renaissance artist, when I can get a paintball gun for much less?

Or use a powerful enough laser pointer. Bonus points if you use infrared since other humans can't see the beam and won't know what you're up to. Though you either need a laser powerful enough to harm human eyes or lots of patience. Hong Kong protesters innovated a lot of these sort of resistance using lasers

> Bonus points if you use infrared since other humans can't see the beam

But how would you see it? IR goggles?

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Iceland is one of the most peaceful countries in the world (murder rate 0.54), 36 incarcerations per 100k, police don't carry guns, and it's not known for its widespread mass surveillance system. Portugal is one of the most peaceful in the world (murder rate 0.7), 118 incarcerations per 100k, and doesn't have license plate readers or mass surveillance. USA murder rate is 6.3, 541 incarcerations per 100k, extremely hi…

Sorry, I mean high black population, not low. For low, examples like you gave are easy to find.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#283
post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not what I’m disputing, of course. I’m disputing that the grandparent’s assertion that if we (by your stats) simply lock up 1% of the population that violent crime would drop by 60%. I mean, trivially, using our brains for a nanosecond, what if that 1% of the population is almost always 16-18 year olds when they commit those violent crimes. The 16-18 demographic is roughly 4% of the US population (Google). Tha…

Don't jail criminals because maybe they're young, that's your argument? Sounds like a something that's already part of the sentencing policy, leniency of first time offenders.

I was tipsy when I typed that out, tbh. But yeah, there’s a strong case to be made that jailing youth while simultaneously divesting in their communities causes a pretty significant hollowing out and sense of hopelessness.

The reason I brought up youth is because, unsurprisingly, most violent crime is performed by people who don’t have a fully-formed prefrontal cortex. Feelings of invincibility and a sense of not having much to lose.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He meant to say high black population

Ghana has a murder rate of 1.84 and incarceration rate of 133 per 100k. It didn't get this stable by buying Flock cameras. They have nowhere near the surveillance of the U.S. And they have far fewer murders, far less violent crime, and far fewer incarcerations. If only the prosecutors had more evidence then it could be more like the U.S.!? Woodmore, Maryland is 82% black. Chance of being a victim of a violent crime i…

OK to Ghana.

Woodmore is a gated community so obviously it has an unrepresentative population.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what was the paperwork about you disingenuous asshole?

What was it about? By the time the Democrats were crowing that he was a felon, no one eve remembered. Did Trump see or sign this paperwork? Didn't much matter to anyone. If he saw it or signed it, would he have known what it was? Did he read it first? Probably not. With a tiny little wall of text, you might even manage to tell me why you think the paperwork was so horrible that he should be in prison for it, I suppos…

To answer the question you avoided. The "paperwork" was classified materials that make the Hillary's emails outrage of magats look like nothing at all in comparison.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of crimes are committed by a small percentage of people. The real issue is prosecutors who refuse to incarcerate repeat offenders. But having video evidence is a powerful tool for a motivated prosecutor to actually take criminals off the streets

We spend $80 billion a year on incarceration in the US, and have the highest incarceration rate in the world. Your plan increases both. Do you honestly think that if we spend $160 billion or $240 billion a year and double or triple our incarcerated population that we'd solve crime? Look at places and countries with low crime. They don't have the most Flock cameras, the most prisoners, or the most powerful surveillanc…

I was at work the other day and we were talking about my mouse problem in my basement. My coworker asked how many mouse traps I had.

I said 74.

74?! That's way to many mouse traps. No one would ever need that many mouse traps.

But sir, I haven't told you how many mice I have.

The number of incarcerated individuals is not a relevant statistic if you're also not including the number of criminals there are.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there is no real penalty for being a career criminal, people will continue to be career criminals. If someone knows they can rob people and get away with it, why would they do honest work for a living? What is your solution to prevent crime without incarceration as a possible outcome for people breaking the law… especially those who do it repeatedly? It’s easy to talk down to solutions being used today, but withou…

> If there is no real penalty for being a career criminal, people will continue to be career criminals. I know this is a wild idea, but what if they had better options than career criminal for a living? Americans are so invested in the penalties they can’t imagine the incentives approach.

The average drug dealer makes less than minimum wage. People commit crimes because they enjoy doing it, not because they need to. We know this because we have survey data on convicted criminals.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you want someone who commits a violent crime to avoid prison?

Why is your focus so narrow on ensuring people get punished for crimes rather than ensuring there is no crime? We have the highest incarceration rate in the world. Increasing that isn't going to turn us into Iceland.

Incarceration isn't for punishment. It's not for justice. It's not for rehabilitation. It's too protect society from the evil doer.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#289
post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's wild that you think the problem with the US is too low of an incarceration rate. 25% of all prisoners in the world are in the US

It can be true (and likely is) that both: a) much more time and effort should be focused on catching and stopping the most persistent repeat offenders (sometimes by locking them up); and b) orders of magnitude too many Americans are currently in prison.

If the only crime--at all--in America was rape and murder, America would still have a higher incarceration rate than Germany.

America has a lot of criminals and therefore America needs a lot of incarceration.

Re: Across the US, people are dismantling and destroying Flock surveillance cameras

#290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ghana has a murder rate of 1.84 and incarceration rate of 133 per 100k. It didn't get this stable by buying Flock cameras. They have nowhere near the surveillance of the U.S. And they have far fewer murders, far less violent crime, and far fewer incarcerations. If only the prosecutors had more evidence then it could be more like the U.S.!? Woodmore, Maryland is 82% black. Chance of being a victim of a violent crime i…

OK to Ghana. Woodmore is a gated community so obviously it has an unrepresentative population.

I would think hard on Ghana. It has no shortage of black people living in poverty. Yet it's extremely safe compared to the US as a whole. You're far less likely to be the victim of a violent crime walking down a street in Ghana surrounded by impoverished black people than you are in many streets in the U.S. Not all of Africa is like that. Many countries are more dangerous than the U.S. But Ghana shows pretty clearly that it's not a racial or even strictly a poverty issue. And that increasing our incarceration rate is quite possibly the opposite of what needs to be done. We need to consider other solutions.

It feels good and easy to say lock the bad people up. But the numbers don't show that as a solution if the real issue you're trying to solve is decrease violent crime.

Post reply on HN