I understand the privacy argument. There are a few questions though:

1) Suppose there will be another shooting. Don't you want to know what exactly has happened before you go to the protest? Suppose your child will be hurt. Wouldn't you do anything to capture the culprit? How exactly would you feel if the police would tell you that they couldn't get the video with culprits face, because watching it would be a violation of someone's privacy?

2) Everyone has a camera in their pocket. Someone is filming all the time. Police can seize this video. Isn't that a privacy risk? Should we ban cameras in smartphones?

3) Should we even be private in the public? Doesn't privacy in public spaces encourage crime? I will die on a battle to keep the privacy in my home, but in public? I personally prefer to be safe, than private, in public.

4) What about private cameras near homes filming 24/7? Are those risks for privacy?

5) People in power will always be corrupt, have bad intentions, will use public goods for personal gain. Should we disregard broader benefits because there will be isolated cases where those benefits will be exploited?

Happy downvoting.

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hmry 2 days ago | parent [-]

1) If someone killed my child, I would probably want to kill them back. And yet we don't consider that sufficient reason to make revenge killing legal. The wishes of the victims need to be weighed against the cost it imposes on everyone else, including those who are innocent. The cost of violating everyone's right to privacy, the social impacts of mass surveillance, and the risk of that data being abused.

2) > Isn't that a privacy risk?

Yes, it is!

> Should we ban cameras in smartphones?

No? How about making it difficult for the police to seize everyone's videos without a good reason? We already do that for phone videos, it's called warrants. But Flock doesn't. They just ask cops to enter any arbitrary "reason" text into a HTML textbox and instantly get access to everyone's videos. And if the people explicitly said they don't want those specific cops to have access, like many people decided about ICE? Well, just ask the next county over and use their system, it's not checked in any way.

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Manuel_D 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

People don't have a right to privacy in public (at least in the US). Do people not realize anyone can photograph or film them in public at any time. Heck, photographers can even then around and sell the without the subject's consent. Case in point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nussenzweig_v._DiCorcia

I'm really struggling to see the parallel between being filmed in public and committing revenge murder.

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hmry 2 days ago | parent [-]

Sorry if I was unclear. My point was just that "if you were a victim, wouldn't you want this?" is not a very strong argument. What victims want does matter. But when it affects other people, their needs matter too.

Especially with mass-surveillance, which affects everyone. It's not possible to mass-surveil only people who would commit crimes, you need to surveil all innocent people too.

	▲	Manuel_D 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		> My point was just that "if you were a victim, wouldn't you want this?" is not a very strong argument. What victims want does matter. But when it affects other people, their needs matter too. Right and you used murder as an example. Do you think murder is even remotely comparable to putting up a security camera in a public space? Yes, a victim might want some sort of response that is socially unacceptable, sure. But if you want to make a convincing argument you have to explain why the proposed response is unacceptable. Not some different, extreme, response of your own invention. I'm really not sure how "committing vigilante murder is wrong" is supposed to be a good argument against putting up security cameras in a public space.

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self_awareness 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

[flagged]

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hmry 2 days ago | parent [-]

Which points do you disagree with?

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self_awareness 2 days ago | parent [-]

The part that you prioritise your convenience over life-long tragedy of someone else.

	▲	hmry 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Privacy is not "convenience", I'm not sure how you arrive at that. And it's also not mine, it's everyone's. I don't want children to die (obviously). I also don't want governments to track the movement of protestors and dissidents, police to stalk their ex-girlfriends, etc. I don't think the effectiveness of mass AI surveillance in preventing crime is high enough to justify the drawbacks.