Transparency, was My blind spot

From: Michael M. Butler (mmb@spies.com)
Date: Sat Mar 15 2003 - 05:18:50 MST

  • Next message: Dehede011@aol.com: "Re: My Blind Spot"

    On Fri, 14 Mar 2003 17:12:19 -0800, spike66 <spike66@attbi.com> wrote:

    > Such a thing already exists, or can be easily modified
    > from cheap commercially available wireless cameras, such
    > as those x10 things you can find for less than 100 bucks
    > at Fry's.

    I'm going to chip in my Eliezer Yudkowsky moddy.

    No. I reiterate, Spike: The missing piece is rapid robust distant backup.
    Such a thing does not exist off the shelf at a good (mass consumer) price
    yet. I'd love to help bring it to market.

    > The picture isn't great, but good enough for the purpose
    > of protecting oneself from false accusations at a rally,
    > and good enough for identifying abusive cops, etc. The
    > range isn't great, but good enough for these purposes as
    > well. Your buddy with the recording device (any ordinary
    > portable battery VCR will do) stands a few meters away,
    > perhaps with her own camera, for which you carry the
    > recording device.

    I disagree. This is not robust, it is not distant, and it has no backup.
    It's a baby step in the direction of what I am talking about.

    DISTANT: Need effective range measurable in many hundreds of meters, with
    signal quality feedback to the operator.

    BACKUP: Need multiple records.

    ROBUST: Need records stored in different hard-to-corral places (say a p2p
    network), need signal hard-to-jam/detect.

    Typical problem with your proposed approach:

    A few meters away, your friend gets swept up in a dragnet, or detained and
    frisked, and the only copy goes into the hands of the cops. This happens
    even with small stuff. *Frisk* "What's this, sir?" If the henchman gets
    booked, the only record winds up in the property room as a matter of police
    procedure, possibly edited or deleted or lost.



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