Via Notes from a Teacher, this little development in the War On Photography, as reported by CNET:
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have come up with an inexpensive way to prevent digital cameras and digital video cameras from capturing that secret shot.
The technology they’ve devised detects the presence of a digital camera up to 33 feet away and can then shoot a targeted beam of light at the lens, according to Shwetak Patel, a grad student at the university and one of the lead researchers on the project.
That means that someone trying for a surreptitious snapshot of, say, a product prototype or an amorous couple gets something altogether less useful–a blurry picture (or a video) of what looks like a flashlight beam, seen head on.
While suggesting this represents a victory for personal privacy, the article goes on to note that some of the most virulent anti-camera sentiment can be found in big chains like WalMart, where they just plain Really Don’t Like You Taking Pictures.
Will Pate discovered this when he had coffee, a camera and a side order of absurdly stern warning at a McDonald’s McCafe. And Alex and I discovered it a few years back when we took our dog Sisko with us to a local Petcetera.
He being an excited puppy, he was also cute and irresistable, and we naturally took pictures… until an employee gently but firmly whacked us on the nose with a (figurative) rolled-up newspaper and informed us that photography in the store was forbidden.
Since then, I’ve seen more and more signs in stores – especially large chains – banning photography. The goal, apparently, is to prevent the theft of “retail concepts” and the unauthorized reproduction of their branding.
Which might not be such a big issue… except that public space is a shrinking commodity these days. More and more of our time is spent, less by choice than necessity, on the kind of private (read corporate-owned) property where camera-zapping technology might be deployed.
Wouldn’t it be a nasty little irony if — just as one branch of digital technology is opening a whole new arena of personal expression to consumers — another one is slamming the door shut?
