The creepy cameraman of Seattle wears Google Glasses | Hacker News Reader

The creepy cameraman of Seattle wears Google Glasses

brianshall.com

Brian sounds like an angry google hater. If you read some of his other blog posts, you will see that he sensationalizes his headlines. He says that the cameraman wears google glasses, but then provides no evidence. He also has a post where he somehow twists a commercial [1] for google glass showing a mother, child, father, and friends all using glass to do a hangout into "Google Glasses commercial encourages taking video of womens[sic] tits and uploading it to Youtube", a title concerning a video that includes no nudity and no youtube uploading.

Privacy is a major concern with things like this, and I am worried that it will be violated with the glass product, but I'm really more worried that I'll be the one violating my own privacy on accident rather than some perv spying on me with it. If you think about it, the guy with the hidden camera on the train is far less conspicuous than a guy wearing "GOOGLE GLASSES (TM)" and staring at you.

1: http://www.brianshall.com/content/google-glasses-commercial-...

I just fear for Google Glasses. I am hopeful for them, primarily since I'd like to try them, but in recent news there have been a few cases of people against the idea of being recorded. People being recorded tend to find it a privacy risk. I myself might, but I think it'd depend on the person wearing the glasses/camera far more than the camera itself. There are of course inherit risks with concepts of hidden cameras and recording people without their permission. Poses risk to projects like Google Glasses.

I think it's about as concerning as cell phones. There are plenty of places where you are not allowed to bring a cell phone, especially if you're going to be looking at or talking about something confidential. I think the same rules would apply to glasses. Both devices have a camera and can upload a recording to youtube or qwik or any other number of video services, and both devices can be used to secretly record videos.

I hope that Google will take measures to reduce the risk of unwanted recording, perhaps by having an LED or a shutter/record sound which can not be muted.

I remember at one point that my dad was having a hard time getting a new cellphone, because he wasn't allowed to bring cellphones with cameras into work. This was maybe 8 years ago or so at this point, but I imagine that a lot of places have had to redact those policies.

The only evidence that these are done using Google Glass exists in the author's mind. He perceives Google Glass (and somewhat misunderstands the technology) to be this all-seeing eye of Google that will constantly record and stream everything. Mostly he sounds like a wacko.

Since there's no public units of Google Glass running around, the author is either lying or is asserting that some member of the Google Glass team is running around with a prototype unit and harassing security guards and walking into people's homes.

Really, it looks like a GoPro or some other small handheld unit. But this is a guy who calls himself "Grand Poobah of The Smartphone Wars" and talks about how great Apple is in an unrelated post or topic. So we can take that with about as much seriousness as it deserves and move on.

Legality of this aside...

I assume the best in people. So I assume this is a person trying to call into focus the blurry spectrum between experiencing an event, documenting an event on paper, drawing, pictures, and video. And he's probably doing it because with the technology coming down the pipeline, these lines are going to get even more blurred. Perhaps he's even an advocate of legislation to prevent things like this and just figures you have to poke someone (the public; the legislature) in the eye to get them to respond.

But even so, this is a pretty jerk-ish way to do that for animalistic reasons. He's not just recording people, he's staring at strangers.

Several times he made the plea of "I'm not being threatening." That's patently false. We're mammals. Staring at a stranger for prolonged periods of time is a direct, unambiguous threat. If a stranger stared at me like that, blank faced and unmoving, I would call the police with or without a video camera. And if I saw you doing it to someone I cared about, I'd probably consider attacking you, or at least putting on a good show of it.

So he's missing the whole point, and the headline reads "creepy cameraman.." instead of "Man draws focus on ubiquitous surveillance." His creepiness is confounded with the recording such that it's impossible to ply apart what part of the reaction is because of him and what part is because of his camera.

Hopefully it'll draw out the public discussion I assume he wants drawn out.

That blog is quoting from a Seattle newspaper article without linking to it, here's the link to the article:

http://blog.seattlepi.com/thebigblog/2012/10/31/who-is-seatt...

The newspaper article is quoting from the photography is not a crime blog:

http://www.photographyisnotacrime.com/2012/10/10/creepy-man-...

http://www.photographyisnotacrime.com/2012/10/30/creepy-came...

According to photographyisnotacrime, the original youtube Creepy Cameraman uploader was itsrighttherenow which has been deleted for copyright infringement.

Here's a google cache of his youtube page:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:6OBvqhK...

That's as far down the rabbit hole as I could go to find the original source of this story.

There is no mention of Google Glass in any of those articles. This post is just anti-Google blogspam.

The links are poorly styled and don't look like links. The "creepy cameraman" text links to the article. I actually followed it there before coming to the comments here.

[ Unless of course it was added in response to your comment, I guess. ]

Hi all I posted the blog link (by Brian Hall) as I thought his take on it was interesting (if inflammatory). I read the original Seattle PI article it links to. I note that the cameraman does not in fact use Google Glasses and apologies for passing on false info. Thanks to the other posters for their detective work.

I don't see how Google Glasses is any more of a threat than the average smart phone. Here's a video I saw just a few days ago that's just as invasive: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTcvQSqE21g

And another one I saw a few years ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbaDw7A6anA

I basically live my life assuming I'm being recorded unless I'm in my own home. Just wait another 15 years and I'm sure the military will have developed bug-size (or smaller) cameras that can fly and will be nearly undetectable.

"The age of privacy is over."

where does it say he is wearing google glasses?

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