years ago, when I was a MP in Germany, I used to chuckle over the red light cameras and camera speed traps used by the Polizei. Neat idea, never work in the states, we have a 4th amendment after all. Then the technology started moving over here. I was suprised at first, but then, I though about how many bank cameras had been used to build cases against bank robbers, and no one ever fussed about it. I wasn't very happy about this, but again, no one ever fussed about cameras in banks, or convience stores et al. I still don't like it, years ago, when these things started showing up in Alexandria Va, someone posted to the list about it, and no one even commented. So I figgured it was a non issue. Now, for some reason, folks are getting their panties in a knot over this. What's the big deal? Yeah, big brother has a new surveillence tool, so what?
On Thu, 2 Aug 2001, cubic-dog wrote:
years ago, when I was a MP in Germany, I used to chuckle over the red light cameras and camera speed traps used by the Polizei. Neat idea, never work in the states, we have a 4th amendment after all.
You must have grown up in a different country, the U.S. of the 70s, last century.
Then the technology started moving over here. I was suprised at first, but then, I though about how many bank cameras had been used to build cases against bank robbers, and no one ever fussed about it.
Of course it's unsurprising, most people are ignorant, and like to stay that way.
Now, for some reason, folks are getting their panties in a knot over this.
It's a bit too late, but it's a good thing it's happening at all.
What's the big deal?
Yeah, big brother has a new surveillence tool, so what?
Some people have put two and two together, and finally understood what you can do with with realtime machine vision biometrics, wireless WAN and data warehouses, and what that means in the context of Moore's law and the current political system. It's not just a new surveillance tool, that thing turns quantity into quality. And, of course, there's much more interesting stuff in the pipeline, so what we have is just a dot on the plot. -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://www.lrz.de/~ui22204/">leitl</a> ______________________________________________________________ ICBMTO : N48 10'07'' E011 33'53'' http://www.lrz.de/~ui22204 57F9CFD3: ED90 0433 EB74 E4A9 537F CFF5 86E7 629B 57F9 CFD3
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cubic-dog -
Eugene Leitl