

JustSpotted (YC S08): Celebrity Geo-Stalking In Real-Time - ajmalasver
http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/12/justspotted/

======
gfodor
These guys must sleep really soundly at night, knowing that they're using
their various talents trying to make a quick buck off of invading the privacy
of and in some cases likely endangering the safety of their fellow human
beings.

I realize that that sentence could arguably describe a number of mainstream
startups. However, there's something more sinister and downright evil about
this one in it's blatant disregard of common decency in the name of profits.

This type of reckless employment of modern data processing and search
algorithms reminds me that as software engineers we have great power and thus
great responsibility. Just because you can do something doesn't mean that you
should. If we don't use our power ethically, then surely some politician some
day with an axe to grind will ensure that we do. And a sad day that will be.

~~~
chegra
If it is legal and you can do it to make money, someone will. Why not these
guys?

You are hoping the millions of software engineer out there don't produce
something like this?

That is not going to happen. What you should be thinking of is ways to
counteract such things. You can't just write code without sanitizing the input
and don't expect somebody not test that you did. The same reasoning apply
here, you should start thinking of profitable counter measures to render these
guys useless.

[Side note: Just couple days ago someone reports a meeting between Microsoft
and Adobe and Adobe stocks shot up 13%. This is one benefit of knowing where
celebrity are located. But if you don't like it draw up your defense
strategy.]

~~~
gfodor
You realize your argument can be extrapolated to most every field that relies
upon the public trust. Those fields have gone on to create codes of ethics,
licensing or accreditation processes, or even legal penalties for those who do
not abide by the decided upon boundaries for ethical behavior.

Just because our field is too immature to have such things doesn't make it any
less important to call a spade a spade. Not all wars can be fought nor won
through competition in the marketplace, as you suggest.

~~~
chegra
Well go and create such legal counter measures. For now these guys are making
money and I'm happy for them.

~~~
gfodor
Are you making an actual argument here? If so, what is it? It seems your
argument is that one shouldn't be criticized on ethical grounds for legal
activity, or that if something is legal and can be done to make money it
should be praised regardless of the negative impact it can have on people's
lives.

It's probably clear that I don't respect either of these opinions, so I hope
that you're arguing some finer point here that I'm missing.

------
AlexMuir
I've seen quite a bit of this - and even put considered developing a similar
service (justseen.at - domain for sale).

The first problem is one of being perceived as invading privacy. This creates
all sorts of follow-on problems - Apple won't allow you in the Appstore,
Google Maps will likely withdraw your permission to use that (as I think
happened to Gawker). There are ways around these, but it makes it a murky
business and complicates bringing in revenue.

In the UK (where celebrity magazines are huge), Papture have been doing all
they can on this. There's not much hope of an exit - mainstream celebrity
magazines would probably worry about stepping over the line in acquiring
something so intrusive.

Potential revenue sources that I saw were paid-for SMS alerts whenever a
particular celebrity is spotted (imagine the number of teenies following
Justin Bieber). And perhaps paid for accounts allowing real-time access, while
everything else is delayed by 2 hours (for safety reasons).

In the end I decided it wasn't something I wanted to be involved with from a
reputational standpoint.

------
revorad
Is a new Upoc upon us?

<http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_39/b3700106.htm>

------
flashingpumpkin
Sounds a lot like what we're doing on <http://pappd.com> _plug_

------
pclark
Gawker Stalker, then.

