Georgia Teens Develop App to Document Police Abuse | Hacker News Reader

Georgia Teens Develop App to Document Police Abuse

forharriet.com

229 pointslogn50 comments

How come there is not a single link to the actual app in the article?

Here is a link to their app on their website: http://pinetartinc.com/?p=44

This is what I hate most about online journalism. Even tech-centric web sites will do it intentionally. Just the other day there was a TechCrunch article about some .io company getting bought out and they made it a link, but instead it takes you to the TC page about that company.

I'm pretty sure people working at these companies are just so certain that any link leading people away from their web site will cost them money. As if people will just wander onto their site, and as long as they can't find the exit they'll be stuck there forever.

@Zikes: I HATE this! I've complained on TC about them not linking to Kickstarter projects and instead linking to other stories about Kickstarter on TechCrunch. I feel like they've gotten better at linking to Kickstarter/Indiegogo for projects lately but they still are guilty of this tactic consistently.

> As if people will just wander onto their site, and as long as they can't find the exit they'll be stuck there forever.

The digital equivalent of casinos' lack of windows.

That and losing money doesn't look entertaining through a window

Not linking to a company described in a news article can be annoying but it's not always some casino mentality code they have against outlinking to maximize internal pageviews -- in many cases it's also journalism trying to hold onto some standards of not just being a shill for the interview subject.

On Wikipedia they call it citing sources. Journalism would certainly do very well to practice that.

The BBC somehow survives now that it's actually linking to papers referenced, entities discussed in the article, etc.

Well being state funded probably helps in that regard

I'd think that would work against the claim being asserted - that external links affect neutrality - given how closely people watch the BBC for any possible bias and berate it for assumed bias (with or without cause).

Not linking to a company described requires a very conscious effort. It's obvious that when you want to tell people "hey, look at X", you want to point people towards X somehow. If you don't do this, then it means you have some ulterior motive for not doing that.

Their website is a little basic, but man, when I was 14, my websites used rainbow gradient backgrounds and were written in Microsoft Word. I love seeing this!

"A little basic"? It's straight up a website template. They didn't have to actually make the website, they just added their content.

Of course it will look better than something made before popular web publishing tools and templates, they didn't have to write their HTML from (close to) scratch

Because the article clearly states that the app is not available yet?

From the article: Five-O is currently in Alpha testing and will roll out to the public on August 18th, 2014, available to both Apple and Android.

That link you posted is to some screenshots.

The closet thing you could link to, in terms of 'how come there is not a single link to the actual app' would be this Google+ 'Community' (don't use G+ unless absolutely necessary so not sure what a G+ community even is) where you can join beta testing: https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/11815254284529799664...

It's the equivalent of a spam site. Don't bother.

Think about it. A 14-year old made the app (purportedly). Not that it's impossible but you can't find it. Think about it.

"Hey Everyone, our 1st mobile Five-O will be published on Monday August 18th, 2014. Get Ready to download!"

On similar lines 'I paid a bribe' from India.. http://www.ipaidabribe.com/reports/paid#gsc.tab=0

Very similar to NYCLU's stop and frisk app: http://www.nyclu.org/app

The execution could need some polish and the UI isn't doesn't seem very friendly (lots of fields to fill in) but such an app fills a real need.

This certainly doesn't replace official complaints but having independent data collected on Police interactions can probably increase political pressure to tackle abuses.

More power to them, but it's not like we need more documentation of police abuse.

We need some way to force a consequence with said documentation. The police in Missouri simply don't care because the penalties are so small that they can be written off.

But with more data, publicly visible, it is easier to put pressure on politicians and get things changed. There is no other way I know of.

Frankly, I think what it'll take is more riots.

Completely disagree. More data is needed about police abuse. If every single person in US starts believing strongly that police abuse has gone out of control, and if politicians can't pretend it doesn't exist anymore, then something will be done about it.

Otherwise, everyone will keep pretending there are just "some bad apples" here and there, and it's not actually a systemic problem.

I follow stories through http://www.policemisconduct.net/ which is from the CATO Institute. There are people out there trying to stop this abuse but its an uphill battle against an establishment whose strength might even exceed the Teachers groups

Part of the point of an app could be to help people to know how to properly document their interactions with police.

It's great to see kids doing great work for the public good.

Though, I do wonder how the app compares/will compare with the ACLU app for the same purpose.

There is a much easier answer.

Take the billions of dollars the pentagon and homeland security is giving to these departments and instead of buying useless armored tanks and other nonsense, buy a wearable camera for every cop in the country.

There are 700,000 cops in the usa. Bulk purchase at $100 each is $70 Million. Throw in $30 million for tech support, downloading, etc. and you are at a "mere" $100 million. Since it is a government program, budget it at five times the cost and you are still "only" at half a billion, which is a fraction of the pentagon's program.

Fund it now, make it a law they have to wear it at all times while on duty or instant termination.

"suspects" will behave better, cops will behave better, it is already proven.

Not that I disagree with your proposal at all, but you're probably significantly under-estimating the cost.

The cameras need to be "designed for LEO!", so double their price. You also need very expensive retention technology and obscene amounts of backup space (even though the video always disappears whenever someone asks for it anyways)

Well, there's that nice new data center in Provo...

The 1033 program that gives them all these war machines costs taxpayers $5 Billion.

So I think my half billion estimate would work.

They are not buying the equipment; it is being gifted to them by the DoD.

It's like someone walked up to you and said: would you like a free hammer? And you think to yourself, I don't need one but hey! free hammer! So you take it. Then suddenly every problem starts looking like a nail...

You should correct that it is being gifted by every taxpayer in the USA.

DoD doesn't grow that equipment on magical trees in their backyard.

So ironically some peaceful protesters, innocent bystanders and suburban homeowners are paying to have themselves teargased and worse.

Wooh, that's my high school! Very cool.

Somebody call Marissa Mayer....I smell a $30 million payday for these kids. Seriously though, they saw a problem in their daily lives and tried to use technology to solve it. If they repeat that process enough times, eventually they will succeed with something. Based upon the screenshots, this specific app looks like it could use some polish, but then that could be said about Yo and Snapchat.

Can they do it for Symbian s40? Record n send by sms?

Let's fund em.

Now if they just join YC, then I can say I called it 6 months ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7235346

| YC (S14): "Yelp for Police Officers"

Please connect this to a blockchain.

Why the hell is it a smartphone exclusive app? Isn't the target audience largely underprivileged populations who might not have access to a smartphone?

Why do people want everything to be an app, when a website would do the job better?

These kids that made this grew up with apps, not websites. Apps are their first choice.

But, isn't accessibility excruciatingly important here?

This post (http://modelviewculture.com/pieces/it-s-not-you-it-s-the-sys...) mentions many ways well-intentioned projects can miss the mark, because of these kinds of issues.

Actually, an app is more likely to be on a user's phone for this kind of use... Although you can bookmark a website to your homescreen, most users don't know how to do that and even less actually do that.

A mobile app is more likely to be on hand and easy to open in case of a run-in. (Although it's not likely someone would remember to do so if something were happening)

You can make a website and then an app which is just a wrapper around the website.

If you want to target lower income people, then I think smartphones are the better choice. They can afford a cheap Android smartphone rather than a small laptop. Smartphones provide the same services cheaper and they're handy to use

I don't disagree with you, but I think the parent's point was that a responsive website covers all three bases, where an app only covers 2 (1 in most cases). Why exclude the laptop when you have an easy alternative that doesn't.

So if you're in the subway and have no bars a website is better how exactly?

Web apps do not necessarily require a network connection.

While many people don't have smartphones, I've noticed that a lot of them have iPods.

I agree that a smartphone app that contains a responsive website rendered in a web view is the best option.

However smartphones are surprisingly common among low income teens (http://www.businessinsider.com.au/low-income-teens-own-more-...). Eventually there probably won't really even be a smartphone/dumbphone distinction, just more or less expensive smartphones.

And of course in the United States, even middle and upper class Black teens are often targets of police harassment.

I just made an app too, but probably not as important...

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