Comment by Manuel_D | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Manuel_D | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

You're calling me daft yet you couldn't be bothered to answer the question. What is going the be legalized, as the above commenter wrote? What law is Flock breaking presently?

Like it or not recording and photographing people in public, then selling that information is not illegal. Paparazzi do it all the time. You can point a webcam out your window, run ALPR software on the video feed, and sell access to query that information. Nothing about that is illegal. If it is, then please reference the laws that prohibit this.

People talk about privacy laws being violated, but in general privacy laws do not cover public activity. Privacy laws mostly focus on protecting communications and activities carried out in private.

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

Pointing out the incorrect assumption that Flock is doing something illegal is not sealioning. There's a reason why none of the replies actually point to the law that Flock is supposedly breaking: because there isn't one.

Sealioning is a style of trolling, not a logical fallacy.

And what about pointing out the fact that Flock's activities are legal, contrary to what people claim, is trolling?

That will notion of an individual’s right to photograph a person in public held against the rights of the person being photographed, to conduct their business and affairs undisturbed, is likely to be challenged successfully before the Supreme Court when it can be shown a majority of people are under perpetual persistent technical surveillance.

You assume that some future Supreme Court case will rule that governments' use of Flock violated the Fifth Amendment, but at present Flock is violating now laws. Like I said in the my original reply: nothing is good to be legalized because nothing Flock is doing violates the law.

There's a big difference between "X is illegal" and "X is presently legal, but my prediction is that the Supreme Court will, in the future, rule that X is illegal."

Reply on news.ycombinator.com