An architect doesn’t receive a fee every time a building is viewed or photographed by a member of the public. A product designer doesn’t get anything from people photographing products he/she’s designed. A writer doesn’t receive any royalty every time someone in a library picks up his/her book. It’s probably, in fact, the music industry where the anomaly is, rather than the art world.

It might not be a popular view among (some) artists, but I’m currently of the opinion that as long as they don’t use it commercially, members of the public should be allowed to photograph whatever they want if it’s on public display. If the artist wants to extract extra money from that, he/she’ll have to provide some added value – e.g. postcards with extra information on them, or signed postcards, or extra-special prints.

It won’t be too long (20 years?) before photographic (eidetic) memory and computers start to overlap (or even interface), to some extent, even if it’s only a refinement of something like the Sensecam. What’s going to happen then? If I can ‘print out’ anything I’ve ever seen, on a whim, why will I worry about what anyone else thinks?

You can now purchase an ultraviolet strobe to place above the screen – you can’t see it with your eyes, but it blinds 99% of camcorders and makes bootlegs unwatchable.

If that’s effective, it’s surely a less egregious architecture of control than the Georgia Tech system.

There’s always this, of course!

Damage my camera in a non-governmental security environment (I would not be using it if it were one) and you will be sued. And, if it is an SLR, there is always the possibility that the camera is up to my eye. A laser will permanently damage someone’s eye… I would not want to be the person responsible for that… If it were my eye, financial considerations would not be reparations enough.

#by andresfb

If these people are looking for funding they may want to talk to Hollywood celebrities. Time to un-dust that old film camera.

#by atroxodisse

The only legitimate reason to use these devices would be for people to avoid the paparazi. Otherwise I think companies will find it is not a viable idea because people with sharpies will easily thwart their laser by coloring over the lense or covering the lense with something. You may find people buying these devices to aid in committing crimes. For now it won’t be an issue because most security cameras are probably not digital. The thing about blocking my digital camera is that I’ll be able to see right away if the picture didn’t come out. If the laser is somewhere I can reach I can easily cover it or have someone stand in front of it. If it’s located up high I can cover my camera and block the laser. A boycott of locations with these kind of devices would probably be a good way of getting rid of them too. I really don’t think they’ll see a lot of use though.