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I am also no fan of Ring or similar, though the reasons are slightly different. We lost our cat recently, and I went round my neighbourhood knocking/ringing on
by dm319 4y ago
I am also no fan of Ring or similar, though the reasons are slightly different. We lost our cat recently, and I went round my neighbourhood knocking/ringing on every door to ask around.
It was a strange experience as around 30% had these ring doorbells. It was unpleasant to know I was being recorded and judged, and often as a result, not answered.
I vowed at that point we would never consider one, if only because I don't agree that everyone should be treated with suspicion by default.
- vorpalhex 4y agoI had two suspicious people come to my door (separate incidents) which resulted in me getting a video doorbell (I'm going to migrate from a cloud one to a closed circuit one). I've also had two cases of salespeople who didn't understand the phrase "not interested". One escalated to me threatening a trespass call before he left. (This is with No Soliciting signs clearly visible) I worry my wife would not get the same effect.
- dm319 4y agoHow do you judge how suspicious someone is through a video feed?
- vorpalhex 4y agoIf it's 90° on a hot summer day and they are wearing a big bulky jacket, that raises eyebrows. Are they wearing a uniform? If they are pretending to be part of a company and not wearing a uniform, that is suspicious. What about the time of day? ADT sales people don't knock on my door at 8pm at night. How are they acting? Are they waiting calmly? Are they checking their pockets or waistline? Are they glancing around seeing if other people are around? Are they hiding their face? Did they ignore a no soliciting sign? Did they walk by and check out the property before approaching the door? Did they knock on my neighbors door first? Or did they come straight to my door? Did they park? Where did they park? Was it a company vehicle? How many people is it? Are those people dressed in a similar way? Are they all standing together or did one of them wander off? If you don't answer immediately, how do they act? Do they get annoyed and wander off or do they become insistant? Do they escalate to knocking or shouting?
- dm319 4y agoI guess it depends where you live and what experiences you've had so far. Your 'pre-test' probability I guess. I doubt there is much I would see on a video feed that would stop me finding out for myself who they are.
- bogomipz 4y ago>"It was a strange experience as around 30% had these ring doorbells. It was unpleasant to know I was being recorded and judged, and often as a result, not answered." Ugh, the idea that these things would be encouraging neighbors to become unneighborly by using Ring cameras as screening devices is truly dystopian. Helping neighbors with pets that have gone astray seems like one of the most basic neighborly and and potentially reciprocal interactions. I really hope you found your cat. I agree with commenter above that the prime utility of these for Amazon is as a form of delivery receipt mechanism for the army of Amazon's last mile contractors. The panopticon eye effect of the Ring network appears to be just another externality foisted on society by Mega Corp.
- dm319 4y agoThank you, my cat mysteriously returned one day :) It was a weird experience, and I don't even look 'weird' (at least as far as I'm aware!).
- deltree7 4y agoIf you had a Ring, you would have most likely gotten clues about your cat. If you had asked your neighbors nicely to view their Ring history, you would have mostly likely gotten even more clues or even found your cat.
- dieortin 4y agoIf he had a police squad patrolling in front of his house he would’ve also gotten clues about his cat I guess. And it’s hard to ask something nicely to someone that doesn’t even answer based on your looks or whatever.
- dm319 4y agoSeeing a cat pass on a video feed is unlikely to tell you where your cat is.
- googlryas 4y agoI find this viewpoint very strange. Why are you jumping to the idea that you're being treated as suspicious, and being judged, and being avoided as a result of that judgement? What if people were just...doing something else? At work? At the movies? Driving? Pooping? Do you feel judged when you walk up to doors with peepholes?
- dm319 4y agoBecause when you can hear that people are clearly in, and you know yourv video feed is available to them, and no one answers the door after waiting and ringing twice, it's a reasonable conclusion. Especially when this seems to be a feature of those with Ring doorbells.
- googlryas 4y agoSure, but you're assuming it is something about you which prevents them from answering the door. Maybe they just get a lot of door to door salesmen and ignore the door bell when they aren't expecting anyone.
- brokenmachine 4y agoYou should keep your cat inside and not leave it free to roam the neighborhood killing wildlife, and then going to disturb your neighbors when it does exactly what a cat does and runs away.
- dm319 4y agoI wasn't asking for your opinion or your judgement.
- brokenmachine 4y agoNeither were your neighbors.
- dm319 4y agoI haven't been offering my judgement or opinion to or on my neighbours. My judgement is on the device, and to be honest, I might well have installed one of these devices without realising how it may make others feel. The story about the cat was just a background line to give context for why I was calling on my neighbours, but it could be any number of reasons, I might even have been saying hello after moving into the area. That's not enough information for you to judge, or to know that we picked up the cat as a stray and took it in, but it is very much an outdoor cat and we're ok with that - it is after all, where we found it. Are you always so judgemental and critical?
- brokenmachine 4y agoIt would have been better for local wildlife to take the stray cat to the pound, rather than just enabling it but letting it roam regardless. I was against Ring cameras because of the privacy implications, but the neighbors that own Ring cameras being the ones that managed to avoid being interrogated about a "lost" stray cat is the most convincing argument in support of them that I can imagine.