

Camera Hack: How to find a lost camera - wakeless
http://www.andrewmcdonald.net.au/a-pictorial-guide-to-avoiding-camera-loss/

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PanMan
Nicely done. The only comment is that everything seems readable on a small
camera screen, exept for the most important part: Your email adress...

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RiderOfGiraffes
Storage space is cheap, and it's pretty cool that this guy has realised that
and has taken the time and effort to make an entertaining (at least the first
time) plea.

In the days of chemical film cameras I always made sure the first shot was of
a card with my name and a contact address. I recovered three films that way
which had been delivered or given to the wrong people by the people developing
the film. For the cost of one photo per film, it was definitely worth it.

I need to go do this again, although if I lost the camera, I doubt I'd get it
back. If a reward is offered, returning someone's photos is clearly a win for
the person who has them, whereas the camera might be of greater value than the
(reward plus warm fuzzies minus effort).

Then again, maybe not. I'm off to take a photo ...

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Raphael
Just have a text file on any drive you're worried about losing.

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jamesbkel
For something like a camera the average person wouldn't notice a text file,
but may notice photos.

For phones, I generally include my email in the greeting/home screen message.

For my iPod, I select the engraving option and use '$100 Reward. Contact:
my_email'

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buro9
For my bicycle, since it's more likely to be stolen than lost, I have little
bits of paper inserted into lots of places that bike mechanics are likely to
find.

"If this bike has not been brought into your shop by [insert your name] then
it is stolen, please call me immediately on [insert your number]".

These little pieces of paper are in places like the stem, the bars, under the
bar tape, in the bottom bracket, under the inner tubes, under the rim tape, in
the hubs. Literally anywhere I can put them where they are likely to survive
undetected by a casual user of the bike but that is likely to be discovered
the first time the bike is taken into a shop for servicing. Obviously I use
little bits of plastic and a permanent CD marker for the places likely to get
wet (the ones under the innertubes).

I don't expect to get the bike back days after a theft, but weeks or months
later I think it would work well.

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sga
I like this idea alot. I do have my doubts that someone who has stolen a bike
is going to take it in for servicing. Though they may sell it to an
unsuspecting person who subsequently takes the bike to a shop so maybe it does
have a shot of working. Good concept either way.

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andrew1
I'm always amazed by news stories about people being prosecuted for possession
of child pornography, found when they took their laptop in for
servicing/fixing. So in light of that someone taking a stolen bike for
servicing doesn't seem that far-fetched..

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sga
Truth. Just thinking that they might be more likely to steal another bike
rather than bothering to get the first stolen one fixed.

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buro9
In London a sizeable quantity of bike thefts appear to be pre-meditated and
part of organised crime. The bikes we've recovered (I run
<http://www.londonfgss.com/> ) have turned up as far afield as the coast and
as close as Brick Lane.

Down Brick Lane market on a Sunday morning there is literally a fence... a
chicken wire one from which stolen bikes are sold. Lord knows what the buyers
are thinking, and the police are well aware of what is happening too (but are
doing very little about it).

We are now tracking (within the community) where bikes are stolen from, the
measures used to protect them and evidence of how they were circumvented as
well as where and when the bikes are turning up. With a large enough community
(over 12,000 users in the same city) we're able to recover a fair amount of
our own property after the event... not to say we're lax about protecting it
but that by taking as many precautions and steps that you can you stand some
chance of being re-united should the worst happen.

Opportunist crime wherein someone just steals something because it's easy to
and then they keep the item now seems rare.

Oh, and if you're interested in bike security these guides on my site are good
places to start:

Guide to which locks to use (which are primary security, which should be
considered secondary): <http://www.londonfgss.com/thread17938.html>

Review of a motion alarm: <http://www.londonfgss.com/thread24813.html>

We also have private areas of the site for tracking stolen bikes, and have
worked with companies like Kryptonite to help make their locks better, local
police to try and get them to do stuff about the 'fence' and the local cycling
associations to try and raise awareness. We're collectively writing guides on
bike security too which we hope will be released under creative commons on a
wiki and then from there we can encourage bike shops to distribute copies with
every new bike sold.

Anyhow... I am more than wandering off the point, which is that most stolen
bikes in London are stolen to be sold and that the buyers tend to be regular
people who do take them into bike shops after a while, from where some bikes
have been recovered. More successfully though, we've recovered bikes from
Gumtree and eBay classifieds.

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nradov
If the search engines could do an image search based on camera serial number
then you could locate some stolen cameras that way. Just search for any images
uploaded from that camera since it was stolen, and then you could have some
evidence to use in tracking it down. EXIF data can include serial number but
apparently it's not very standardized right now.

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Maciek416
Some picture noise removal programs allow you to supply a "noise profile
picture". This involves leaving your lens cap on and taking a long exposure so
that the only thing in your picture is the noise inherent in the camera's
sensor. The noise pattern on any given sensor is fairly unique, unique enough
that these programs can then use that profile to "subtract" noise from
pictures you take.

Perhaps people could register their noise profiles with a service like Flickr
and, if their camera is stolen, this noise profile could be detected in
pictures found on the web.

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rogupta
Or use an eye-fi card so it wirelessly uploads all photos (hopefully, i.e. if
there's a standard/open network nearby).

Disclaimer- portfolio company

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pmorici
I bet you could sell more Eye-Fi's if there were an easy way to upload new
firmware to the card. It's a fundamentally interesting product but I think you
could get a lot more creative uses for it from opening it up more to your
customers.

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MartinCron
You could also sell more Eye-Fis if they supported CompactFlash in addition to
SD. I thought I could use an SD to CF converter, but they are apparently
pretty dodgy.

I'm shocked that there isn't a way to wirelessly send pictures to a tablet PC
for instant studio proofing with a DSLR that saves to CompactFlash, but there
doesn't seem to be.

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dotBen
Yes, rogupta - to Martin's point here... if EyeFi is in your portfolio then I
would urge you to push for CF version... I only use pro camera gear which
doesn't take SD.

I've talked to the EyeFi guys about this but it seems to fall onto deaf ears.

I also agree that there should be an open platform option for these -- you
could sell a ton of these if people could use them for their own uses that go
beyond the original concept of uploading to the internet.

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rogupta
thanks for the feedback.

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gokhan
Actually "Camera Hack: How to find a lost memory card"

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ars
Not a hack, but a good idea anyway.

Except that I can't read the email address.

Maybe just put a sticker on the outside of the camera?

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MartinCron
While I couldn't stand a sticker on the outside of a camera, I always print
labels with my email + phone number and stick them on the memory cards and
removable batteries.

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eam
That's a good idea too. However, I think the photos add a little emotion and
increase the chance of the person who finds it to return. Just a thought.

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neda
it was great idea. i wanted to know who have this beautiful camera. and i know
it. i promiss to keep ur camera very well and take pretty photo. dont worry
buddy

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kk0009
wow ..I liked it... what a nice way of representing things?

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ZombieKush
LOl That was actually pretty funny=-)

