[extropy-chat] The end of crime as we used to know it?

[Technotranscendence]

On Friday, March 19, 2004 2:26 PM BillK bill at wkidston.freeserve.co.uk
wrote:
>
<http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20040319/ap_on_sc/cr
ime_fighting_camphones&e=1>
>
> Quote:
>
> Fri Mar 19, 7:53 AM ET
> By MARK NIESSE, Associated Press Writer
>
> ATLANTA - When Lisa Johnson saw
> a man exposing himself to her in a
> parking lot, she reached for her cell
> phone — not to call 911, but to snap
> a picture.
>
> The images captured on her camera
> phone led police to the capture of the
> former principal of a nearby high
> school. After his arrest on public
> indecency charges last month, he
> resigned from a lower school job
>
> Cell phones that can take pictures are
> becoming a more common way for
> victims and other witnesses to help
> police capture criminals. Because
> the phones are so portable and
> always on, it takes only a moment to
> photograph the face or license plate
> of someone in the act of a crime.
>
> Highlight Quote:
> * Their real impact will be in the future,
> when millions of phone users will be
> able to document any event at any time. *
>
> So the idea of the open society is breaking
> through to your average man-in-the-street
> newsreader. That's quick. I expected it to
> take years for it to become common
> knowledge.

I'm not so sure I follow you hear.  Some guy shows his willy to a woman
who takes a photo of it and he gets arrested?  Now, don't get me wrong
here.  I'm saying that in the open society, public nudity will be the
norm, but this example cuts both ways.  I mean I immediately thought it
might make agents of the state less brutal because of fear of being
caught in the act.  But imagine the democratic despotism which is now
coalsecing around the world.  Good little citizens are able to enforce
any law that they please.  Someone photographs you in the deepest wood
smoking a joint.  You're busted.  Etc.

In fact, I'd say this falls into the category of "enforcement
technology" -- technology that enhances centralized power at the expense
of individual freedom.

Regards,

Dan
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/MyWorksBySubject.html