

Google Glass: An Etiquette Guide - onosendai
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323982704578453031054200120.html

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babarock
I can't help but shake my head in disagreement when I hear things like "we
need a red LED or a shutter sound on this camera". It's not that I encourage
people to be sneaky about spying with their pictures. It's that it will be
_inevitable_.

As mentioned, any hacker could turn off whatever restriction you're going to
put. Pretending that we're preventing something is stupid and wrong. It's a
hypocrisy that is so typical it makes me angry.

To a large extent, secret photographing/recording is a technological
revolution, and it will, predictably, meet some resistance. We can either:

* pretend to do something about it.

* help people resisting transition into it.

There are really no other options. Preventing it from happening is _not_ an
option. What would you do?

It's very similar to the whole "illegal downloading of music" business.
Millions of dollars are spent, laws, national (global!) debates are held, all
sorts of technological hurdles are put into play, and ... nothing prevents any
kid from downloading whatever they want from the Internet.

All this "pretending to do something about it" has a cost. Some scapegoats are
going to suffer greatly along the way. Aaron Schwartz's example is famous
around here, but it's absolutely not the only one. Do we need more innocent
victims?

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jamesaguilar
Right? Doesn't HN react negatively to security theater in most contexts? It is
interesting that the collective approach is different with this device.

~~~
kevingadd
A red 'recording' light or shutter noise are not security theater. They're a
feedback mechanism to notify subjects that they are being recorded. Even if 1
or even 10% of google glass users hack their device to remove the light, the
other 90% will have the light and that will improve others' awareness of when
they're being recorded and enable them to take action.

Incremental improvement is better than nothing, and this is an example of an
incredibly cheap, obvious incremental improvement with no downside.

~~~
jamesaguilar
The feedback mechanism can be disabled, via a rooted device or physical
disconection, just like tsa scans can be circumvented. It's exactly analogous.

~~~
integraton
> The feedback mechanism can be disabled

And you can insult random people on the street, or repeatedly fart loudly on a
crowded bus.

The article is about etiquette.

~~~
BoyWizard
The people who have reservations about insulting random people on the street,
or farting loudly on a crowded bus, are likely going to have reservations
about recording people whether there's a light on or not!

~~~
kevingadd
That is absolutely true, which is why the original article was about
etiquette, not somehow creating supertechnology that can restrict a Glass user
from doing bad things. That is, the LED is about feedback, not restraint.

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jamesaguilar
I don't get why everyone is freaking out about trying to predefine the social
rules for this thing. Rather, to be more literal, I should say I do get it but
don't agree with it.

Wearable computing and ubiquitous photography _are going to be things_ as the
cost of hardware falls. This is already true compared even to the world of the
late nineties. Google glass is just the first attempt, but there will be
others. WSJ opinion pieces are not going to define how people use it.

The actual social drawbacks combined with the benefits will be the determining
factor in how people use it. I imagine (from actually watching people's
reaction to the device in person) that in real scenarios most people will not
care that you are wearing a Glass/iSee/Windows Goggle 8. And likewise, the
relative infrequency of surreptitious recording being useful will limit how
often the devices will be used that way.

~~~
hatcravat
Actually, Steve Mann was doing this fifteen years ago. There are web pages
describing his wearables that literally haven't been updated for a decade.
Think about that for a second. Bill Clinton was president when this was
cutting edge stuff. And the Glass hardware looks just as stupid and dorky as
the hardware Mann built himself.

~~~
jamesaguilar
You are nuts if you think Glass looks as dorky as Mann's stuff. Be serious,
please. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wearcompevolution2.jpg>

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stevenleeg
I wonder what the rationale behind not including an LED for the camera was. I
can't imagine it was cost or anything. Such a simple addition would have
definitely done a long ways in reducing the fear people seem to (rightfully)
have with its camera.

~~~
greggman
Are you going to require blind people with prosthetic eyes to have LEDs in
their eyes?

As Kurzweil would say first the tech will be made for people with
disabilities. Then it will at some point be better than real eyes and some
people will start getting them on purpose. Finally most of the rest will at
least augment themselves. People thought cellphones were stupid on the 80s.
They thought computers were stupid in the 60-70s or at least that no normal
person would want one. Now most 1st world people have both in the their
pocket. Glass is only the first step.

~~~
kevingadd
I don't see how it would be unreasonable for the prosthetic eye setup to come
with a LED that lights up when the video stream is being recorded to storage
or streamed to the internet, no.

Nobody's suggesting that you should be required to have an indicator that
tells people you're looking at them. That's stupid.

~~~
greggman
How is this different then human memory? Why can't recordering something in my
augmented brain be my choice and have nothing to do with you? You don't get to
choose what I remember. Why should you get to choose how I remember it or why
should I have to inform you that I'm remembering it in a certain way?

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libria
> You know how that guy with the Bluetooth headset became Bluetooth Headset
> Guy, the most grating tech villain in existence today? It's because he never
> took his headset off.

There's a strange social phenomenon where some people feel obliged to not only
pass judgment on the way other people enjoy their life (the same contingent of
people who seem to dislike those family stickers on cars and people who take
pictures of food), they must evangelize/enforce the style of life they're more
comfortable with.

What's wrong with bluetooth guy (and his predecessor of 10 years before, cell-
phone guy) using his technology? Deal with it like you deal with everything
else: endure it, go somewhere else, or explain _politely_ how their behavior
is demonstrably harmful (not merely annoying, harmful).

> Be courteous and take the device off in locker rooms, public bathrooms,
> business meetings, movie theaters and anywhere else where wielding a camera
> would be improper or offensive.

Agreed. Those are legal issues and should absolutely be observed (the law, not
the events).

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rasur
Memory-impaired users of EyeTap/Glass-like devices - using them as a memory-
prosthetic (a not unreasonable use of this kind of technology to aid their day
to day lives) - might find themselves subject to abuse from able-bodied (in
the metal sense) non-users, mistaking the disabled for geeks.

Just a thinking-out-loud exercise. Move along.

~~~
kevingadd
That's a real concern, yeah. With a technology like this, abuses can have a
huge negative impact on people who otherwise have need of it to go about their
daily lives.

I think if cochlear implants were mass-market for people who weren't born
deaf, we'd probably already be facing some of the same social problems there -
if it was widespread and common that people just carried around recording
devices in their skulls, and anything you said anywhere could be recorded and
replayed without your knowledge or permission, and it was _common_ , that'd
probably make people pretty paranoid. The introduction of smartphones and
other commodity recording devices has already caused a problem here - with
stories of police officers/military confiscating or damaging phones that are
being used to record their acts, etc.

To a degree this isn't something unique to Glass, it's just the first time
we've had a theoretically mass-market device come out that aims to make
recording truly ubiquitous _and_ non-obvious.

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zw123456
I get it, I don't like being photographed without my consent. OK, I admit that
may come from a place of self conscienceness or whatever. But, I would like
that respected. How about an opt out or opt in type of icon that people could
wear, maybe the polite Google glass wearer would use the opt in feature that
would only photograph other Google glass wearers? That seems like an easy
feature to add. Just a thought.

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RRRA
How about this : <http://imgur.com/UdJGSJj>

