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The significance of the proliferation of such technology is that there will actually be people and processes 'watching' the screen. To my mind this is fundamentally different than the knowledge that a few state actors had the capability but not the manpower (or desire) to do so.

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Sort of and sort of not. I keep typing up long comments all over this post and then deleting them and I better just stay away. I'm not at all comfortable pushing the limits of what I can actually say without getting in trouble, even if it isn't technically classified. If you mean data like this isn't already being collected on every vessel on earth and accessible from a terminal somewhere, that is incorrect. Creating the system that does that was exactly my job five years ago. If you mean the Navy largely doesn't care what you're doing and isn't really paying attention if you're not a drug runner, pirate, or state actor, then yes, that is true.

Exactly. Focusing on capability gives you a very myopic view of the situation. Capabilities are a moving target, with very few truly revolutionary leaps between the first film-based spy satellites and whatever we've got today.

Proliferation is huge. I can buy a high-resolution satellite photo of my neighbor's property every day if I feel like spending the money. That's something that wouldn't have been available at any cost a decade or two ago.

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