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Comment by siculars | Hacker News Reader

“…erasure of undesired objects”

This is not going to turn out well. Do we really want to edit reality in this way? This is like the printer that automatically watermarks your prints - for your security and protection! Coming to a child protection law near you real soon.

Want to take a picture of that Ferrari? That’ll be an extra $5.

No, you really can’t take photos in airports.

Thats a police officer(s). (Literally) Nothing to see here, move along.

Vampires/Ghosts. A class of people who’s faces are in a master redact database. You know, like some real CIA Jason Borne stuff.

Military installation? What military installation? Replace with slave labor camp or, a more economically favorable rendition - “sweatshop.”

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I was just told by Amazon that I can't sell a used book there because the publisher, Morgan Kaufmann, is currently not accepting applications to sell and denied my request to sell.

I was pretty stupefied. Amazon and the publisher have colluded, for whatever reason, to police how used books are sold.

Perhaps Amazon is FINALLY starting to do something about their rampant book piracy problem?

[0]https://mobile.twitter.com/martinkl/status/15511491594026680...

[1]https://nypost.com/2022/07/31/pirated-books-thrive-on-amazon...

Who knows? Although, I actually bought this particular book off of Amazon.

In this case, after some research, I actually think this is related to the book sometimes being used as a textbook. I wouldn't really call it a textbook, as in the normal 30 editions type of textbooks, as it's just a really good book on its topic (and only the second edition, which is the latest). Apparently publishers want to funnel the used sale of such books through certain approved sellers? I imagine it's to keep the price artificially high and for the publisher to recover some of the money back themselves. Seems ridiculous, and it would be surprising if it's legal. It's basically a racket.

What do you mean, it's your book. Why would even ask Amazon if you can sell it?

You have to to sell in their platform. When I tried to add it to my Amazon Seller inventory, it required approval. Selling on Abebooks (owned by Amazon) requires a subscription now.

> This is like the printer that automatically watermarks your prints - for your security and protection! Coming to a child protection law near you real soon.

You mean like most (or maybe all) color laser printers sold in the last couple decades?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_Identification_Code

https://www.eff.org/pages/list-printers-which-do-or-do-not-d...

It's already happening with AR; there was a demo on Twitter showing how using Apple's new AR SDK you can just plaster over things you don't want to see. This for me puts AR right up there with AI as a huge risk to society, for precisely the reasons you point out. "Pay $9.99 a month not to see homeless people" "Pay $2.99 a month to see enhanced street signs so only you can find your way quickly" etc

>Pay $9.99 a month not to see homeless people

Better hope that's context-sensitive. Street meth addicts commit enough random assaults and smash enough car windows now, just imagine what they would do if they were literally invisible.

But you’re not forced to use AR. No one is going around slapping VR headsets on people to “hide the homeless”.

You're naive if you think this way. You're not forced to use AR, yet. That's different to never will be forced to.

Smartphones are already all but mandatory for certain locations/demographies. Not owning one carries an immense penalty when it comes to access to government services, banking, and general daily functioning.

....3 hours with my bank and €20 for a token-generator (pass-number generator ) says different.

Even the pass-generator is diffiicult to fiind on the login page....keeps telling me 'not authorised' without the phone ok.

*don't drop your phone!!* Especially when you'll suddenly need it to buy a new phone.

This is the crucial point.

You're not forced to use your cellphone. But society might hypothetically get to a point where it's extremely inconvenient not to.

You are absolutely forced to use a smartphone. To have just about any kind of job, you require one.

Would a dumb mobile phone suffice? Or do they need you answering email while you commute?

Hypothetically? We’re already there.

It'd be impossible to live in Sweden without a mobile.

Just like you’re not forced to use a smartphone, or a car?

Such technology could also represent a huge improvement in quality of life. Imagine augmented reality glasses with built-in ad blockers.

It all depends on who's in control of the device. It'll be great if we're in control and the technology is used to empower us. It'll suck if the corporations and governments are in control and the technology is used to manipulate public perception and extract revenue.

What exactly is this problem with this?

We have enough of people acting like their own experiences are indicative of the norm or are evidence of something happening or not happening, and using that to spread that message, that making this even easier seems like it would be a real problem.

Are news bubbles a problem? Imagine if people actually block out reality on an even more direct level and what that means to their perception of the world. What if people can opt into trusty AR programs to "show" them the stuff in the world they're missing (the conservative conspiracy or liberal agenda), and those also selectively omit some other things?

News bubbles in no way suggest we shouldn’t have the internet. People living in their own AR worlds isn’t an excuse to enact an intellectual dystopia

I'm not sure who you're arguing against. Where did I say we shouldn't allow AR or this technology? I stated why it might be a problem (which is what you asked for), and why we should possibly pay attention to the negative consequences that might follow.

I mean, maybe some people are homeless by choice, but some are due to misfortune and poverty. Using technology to turn a blind eye to poverty in our communities seems bad. Also you may trip over a homeless person.

It would defeat the entire point of having them: As an example why to obey. It is not like you cant scale a tax with housing requirements. Could give them jobs too. It would take a bit of getting used to but if the only thing a person wants is drugs their potential productivity could be 10x that of ours combined.

You don't have to have a point, to have a point.

Appeals to emotion are dumb. Try again

You may trip over a homeless person if you can't see them.

Also papering over social problems means those social problems will bite you in the ass eventually. Never underestimate the power of a bunch of desperate people.

> Do we really want to edit reality in this way?

Do you have a solution to stop this hypothetical future you've envisioned that isn't also just as bad?

"Hey you can't code that feature!"

Not to mention that there is nothing wrong with allowing people to see different things lmao. What even is this conversation ?

If you don't want a camera that can't take photos of undesired objects, don't buy one.

If you don't want a TV that doesn't track your viewing habits, force automatic software updates, show ads, and do other objectionable things while claiming it's "smart", don't buy one.

Yeah, I don't.

Good luck finding one easily.

I only need one, and there are display monitors that companies use for offices etc.

Monitors still exist and they don't suffer from the terrible input lag that most smart TVs have.

Monitors cost 2 to 3 times the price of TVs. And dont come with speakers either.

Well yeah, those TVs are cheap because they use crappy panels and get subsidized by ads. If you just want a cheap panel and driver, you can message a wholesaler on panelook and buy them for like $200 plus some change for a sound bar.

A fast 4K monitor costs ~$700 because it’s a much better product.

Every modern TV has a gaming mode that disables post-processing.

I meant to say pixel response time.

What when there are laws preventing the manufacturing of such desired cameras?

I am all for great ideas and tools and implementations. I am just very leery of humans. ;)

Regimes don't generally bother to mandate the use of a specific technology, they just mandate the act illegal.

The example of yellow tracking dots in printers has already been mentioned. Our governments had zero problems mandating the use of that specific technology. Same with kill switches in cars so that police can remotely disable your vehicle.

Wait till some new laws show up. Wait till it is economically incentivized to buy redactocams.

Maybe we could have laws that protect us from these kind of cameras instead of enforcing them. I'm against saying "No you can't do this" but I'm all for "You must show us how you do this" or "This thing must be optional".

You can already make cameras do this in software, why aren't we buying redactocams now?

If it's already in software, then your phone is just one irreversible update away from getting that feature for free! People love free stuff!

> Vampires/Ghosts. A class of people who’s faces are in a master redact database. You know, like some real CIA Jason Borne stuff.

Doesn't make much sense. If a person is a risk, you would want to surveil them more, and not erase them from every camera feed.

I think it's more like the CCP would load their secret police database in.

A government could do both.

Think "Scanner Darkly"

It's bad, but it's just moving reality editing a few levels down the stack.

It's moving it away from your control. Right now we have the option to edit the images and videos we capture. This kind of technology allows those same choices to be made by someone else without any regard for your wishes. Your options can be limited to editing only what they allow to be captured in the first place.

It changes nothing about images you consume, but yes, it changes things for images you produce.

Would a government even want that? Not even from the moral stance, just the strategic point of view. We know from the social media experiment how bad things can go if you hook an entire population to some "product".

Sure, you can make (even though incentives) everyone wear AR glasses (because they're so cool), and they'll censor out undesired things. That's as much a form of control as it is a form of being controlled. Hooking your entire population's vision to the internet means it could possibly be maliciously used by bad actors.

> This is like the printer that automatically watermarks your prints

That ship has sailed. Most (all?) printers already do that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_Identification_Code

It’s not that sophisticated and is a physical artifact that had to be forged for some purpose. Effectively it’s like having a zero power neural network. You could make something like a motion sensor that only spots human faces, but very low power.

I've got news for you. "Reality" is already edited. Actually is a model made up by the brain.

"artisanal mining" for cobalt.

We should really consider conserving analog versions of taking pictures.

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