San Francisco's Surveillance Cameras Have Horrific Frame Rates
from the just-commit-your-crime-quickly dept
There's plenty of reasonable concern over the increasing use of surveillance cameras -- but if you're going to install them, you'd think that you'd want cameras that were actually useful. Not so in San Francisco. As Engadget points out, the cameras in San Francisco have ridiculously bad frame rates, making them more like still cameras than video cameras. In some cases, there are 10 seconds between frames, meaning that the "footage" is often not particularly useful in solving crimes. San Francisco still insists that the cameras are useful for deterrent purposes. Somehow we doubt that it's a "feature" of these cameras to protect privacy by being horrifically bad. It does make you wonder, though, who makes security cameras that only take a photo every 10 seconds -- and, even more importantly, why would anyone buy such a security camera?
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Filed Under: cameras, san francisco, surveillance
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I know who!
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Muni Wi-Fi
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A modest budget
Translation: Our CEO's took some spare change out of their pockets and voila! Budget.
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Re: A modest budget
Translation: We got lotsa money but our halfwitted manager paid his brother to do it and kept the rest for himself so he can start his own animal psychology practice.
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Our cameras let us adjust frame rate, so I don't know that blaming the technology is the way to go, but rather, lets blame the politicians for yet another stupid decision.
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A. They went with the lowest bidder, and didn't bother learning just how bad a camera can get.
or
B. Whoever was in charge of the purchase knew nothing about cameras, and some salesman managed to unload a massive pile of crappy cameras that no one else would ever buy.
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Could it be
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Other Uses for Video Surveillance
1. They can show traffic - is there none, normal, slow, stopped?
2. They can show nice views - one could imagine "electronic windows" that would stream feeds from video cameras from chosen spots around the world
3. They can verify the state of something -- I note that Google maps shows whether the umbrella on my back deck is open or closed -- in addition to traffic, could show firms open or closed, has parade started, is weather clear or cloudy, are lights still on; are kids still playing in the park; is babysitter still with them
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Camera Maker
Taken from:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/28/MN37TKH6O.DTL
"The cameras in the Mission, [are] made by IQinVision of San Clemente (Orange County), provide optimal footage at 12 frames per second, said Peter DeAngelis, the company's president."
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Because it's theater
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Space some server space?
You'd think Sun, Google or even Apple would throw them a server or two...
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Our cameras let us adjust frame rate, so I don't know that blaming the technology is the way to go, but rather, lets blame the politicians for yet another stupid decision.
Yes..
But still there are no technological 'wonders' that will stop crime.
But - along with the FBI's biometric database, and an implanted chip soon to follow, the Government will have some REAL control.
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