Posted on 07/21/2010 6:50:12 PM PDT by Argentine-Firecracker
Advice regarding the war against photography:
So what should you do if you’re taking photos and a security guard or police officer approaches you and tells you to stop?
(Excerpt) Read more at dillonhillas.com ...
I’m seldom taking photos where those things are likely to happen but I wouldn’t be happy about it.
Tell them you are from the New York Times. :)
>>So what should you do if you’re taking photos and a security guard or police officer approaches you and tells you to stop?
You better stop because the cop will beat you or even kill you and the propoganda media will portray you as either a terrorist (for taking photos of things) or a pedophile (for taking photos of people). Freedom is what people had last century. Now you have (the illusion of) SECURITY.
... security guard or police officer ...
Big difference ya know.
A security guard can’t violate your 1st ammendment rights as well as a cop can.
I find this whole episode weird. On the one hand, terrorism issues trump. On the other hand, it is creepy to have the authorities in the US try to suppress regular citizens.
From that piece:
Police and prosecutors in Maryland have been taking a particularly hard line. In one case, motorcycle rider Anthony Graber left his helmet cam on while he was pulled over by a state trooper. A grand jury indicted him on several violations of the state's wiretapping laws. If convicted on all charges, Graber could face up to 16 years in prison. In alleging that the GoPro video camera on Graber's helmet constituted a "surreptitious" wiretapping device, prosecutors are making the claim that a person recording his own arrest is violating the police officer's right to privacy.
Sounds just like Maryland.
Many cell phones can take still photos, video clips and can even record sound. If you are careful no one should know that you are taking a picture.
None. Don't diminish it.
I think the first thing I would do is ask permission and save myself the trouble of starting things off on the wrong foot. It doesn’t make it right but there’s no rational point in making the situation worse.
The problem as I see it is the fact that our nation isn’t secure at the perimeter so we try to make up for it in the interior.
I’ve worked in factories that didn’t allow cameras and would fire anyone caught with one.
Watch: Police Video Shows ProPublica Photographer Detained in Texas
Interesting how taking pictures of a refinery, or proprietary secrets in a factory are being compared to taking pictures of police.
Well, I wish I agreed with your re that there are no similarities here (if I understand you correctly). There’s something peculiarly sinister with the government not wanting regular citizens photographing occurrences affecting the average citizen. As to photographing water dams, nuclear facilities, etc., I can accept that public safety overcomes personal desires to snap photos.
I agree with the “sinister” part, but we are not at the stage where owning a camera is a crime against the state.
A way around such problems is non-impersonation deception.
For example, say “I need to take pictures for the insurance company”, or act like they were sent there to work for you, and doing something rather frivolous and dull, like ‘smelling around’ for natural gas fumes that they should report immediately if they smell them.
You can try puzzling them. “Glad you’re here. My assistant should be by anytime with the money. Now we won’t have to worry about those robbers.”
True. But, don’t you think this is a slippery slope?
True, but a security guard can still violate your constitutional rights if his or her actions can be construed as actions of the state. For example, in NYC certain private security guards can be commissioned - for lack of a better term - as so-called public safety officers, which effectively gives them some very minor police powers to exercise when they are in the course of performing their duties for their private employer. I do not know if the matter has ever been litigated, but I would most definitely take the position that, by the very fact of the commission, that security guard’s actions were prospectively adopted by the City as its actions, and that therefore there would be the requisite “state action” sufficient to create a violation of one’s constitutional rights.
Owning a camera wasn’t a crime against the state in the Soviet Union. I used to have a colleague—who since moved to another university—who is the only person anyone has ever heard of who successfully collected on a Soviet consumer warranty—a warranty on a camera. He actually traveled something like six hours out of Moscow to confront the manager of the plant that made the camera, and, for his trouble, got a new one to replace the defective.
Getting permission - in writing - is required if you ever hope to sell the photos. And you should have it for private use as well.
Buildings/property are now protected by copyright law - for sale or not.
http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-protect.html
Dumb law? I dunno - I do know its the law.
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