Uhh, they pretty much buried the lede here:

> The specific incident in question was a grand larceny case where two men tried (and failed) to steal a robot owned and operated by Serve Robotics, which ultimately wants to deploy “up to 2,000 robots” to deliver food for UberEats in Los Angeles. The suspects were arrested and convicted.

So two guys try to steal a machine that has a video camera attached to it, and then the company that owns that machine turns over the video to police to help catch the guys who tried to steal their property in the first place.

And why did someone think this was worthy of an article? If a homeowner suffers a breakin and their Ring video is turned over to police, am I supposed to be shocked or surprised or something?

When media sites try to make "big conspiracy vibes" to something that is imminently reasonable they just end up looking like total ass clowns, and it obscures valid concerns people can have about mass surveillance.

That headline seems wildly misleading, and creates discrediting noise around real valid concerns about mass camera feeds.

> The specific incident in question was a grand larceny case where two men tried (and failed) to steal a robot owned and operated by Serve Robotics, which ultimately wants to deploy “up to 2,000 robots” to deliver food for UberEats in Los Angeles.

So is 404 Media regressing to the mean now? It feels like they came out of the gate with some real stories. But this is such a bad faith article it seems like they’re reaching for a “hard-hitting” angle on a totally uncontroversial incident.

Can’t wait to see “7-Elevens are feeding camera footage to the LAPD”

Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37692721

Request to change the headline: While this is the headline in the article it does not accurately reflect the contents of the article.

The camera footage provided to the LAPD was about the robot being stolen. This detail completely changes the context.

tl;dr:

1. the robots are always filming video

2. mostly for the reason that they are frequently directed by humans from the central HQ, they don't operate absolutely autonomously

3. the company has expressed willingness to share this "surveillance video" with the police

4. but in the case in question, the surveillance video shared with police concerned a crime against the robot.

"The specific incident in question was a grand larceny case where two men tried (and failed) to steal a robot owned and operated by Serve Robotics, which ultimately wants to deploy “up to 2,000 robots” to deliver food for UberEats in Los Angeles. The suspects were arrested and convicted."