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> I am not a believer in Zuckerberg's idea of humanity's future. I don't know what Zuckerberg's idea of humanity's future is but I believe it's basically inevi

> I am not a believer in Zuckerberg's idea of humanity's future. I don't know what Zuckerberg's idea of humanity's future is but I believe it's basically inevitable that most people will be wearing always on cameras on their face in the future. The same way they carry always on phones today. The use cases will be too compelling. There have already been demos. Ask the AI watching over your shoulder anything about your past and present and have it act on it. I'm sure as a hater of that future you don't beleive. For me, I'd pick 2040 as the latest that people wearing always on cameras will be as common as smart phones in 2010 and grow at or faster than smartphones when they get it to actually work and be stylish. I'm not saying I'll enjoy being watched by all of those cameras. I'm saying I don't believe I'll have a choice any more than I have a choice of people having smartphones today.

sublinear 8mo ago
That's way off base. There's a very significant chunk of people who rarely if ever use the camera on their phone right now. It's not even a matter of who they are or their personal opinions. Cameras simply aren't an exclusive gateway to anything critically important. In many cases a photo or video is an objectively worse format than text. Smartphones became common because they are now the only way to access certain information or authenticate. It's to the extent that we eliminated hard copy documents and changed publishing and proving identity irreversibly. People frequently use smartphones because they have to, and a smartphone without a working camera is still perfectly usable and always will be. This isn't a matter of the public being wooed by a sales pitch or wanting anything in particular. Images require less accessible and reliable methods of interpretation to convey information whereas text is the information. If you're not convinced then consider that both can be generated by AI. A generated image can be convincing and so can generated text, yet we depend on special forms of text such as keys which cannot be generated by AI and any image trying to encode the same is always inferior. An image is never acceptable as a sole or even primary means of authentication. For all these reasons and more, an image is never the only format available.
- sprinkly-dust 8mo ago
  I would disagree that a smartphone without a working camera is perfectly usable. A lot of the world — especially in developing countries — runs on QR Codes for everything from restaurant menus to electronic payments. Without a camera, other stuff too, like KYC, just doesn't work. These are the sorts of changes that, as you mentioned, are forcing people to use smartphones. And they rely on the camera.
  - sublinear 8mo ago
    QR codes can be unreliable and unnecessary to convey a URL. That's why I said "an image is never the only format available". If it's a deliberate thing people must pay attention to, the friction is already too high. Most QR codes are not permalinks. Nobody wants to print out another one or retry scanning with better lighting only to find it doesn't work. When it really matters the link is dynamic and invisible. It's baked into a script your phone runs when you perform a more interesting higher level task in an app, tap-to-pay when you arrive, etc.
swiftcoder 8mo ago
> There have already been demos. Ask the AI watching over your shoulder anything about your past and present and have it act on it. Demo, or verbatim plot of Black Mirror episode?
- socalgal2 8mo ago
  Demo. As much I enjoyed Black Mirror I thought it's Season 1, "The Entire History of You" entertaining but was poorly conceived. It showed catching your partner cheating as a "would rather not know" thing and it ignored any possible positives. The episode wasn't really about the tech, it was about a failing relationship, a cheating partner, and an untrusting obsessive person. In any case, in that world, which didn't have AI to review and catalog what you saw but only playback of recorded sight, positives they could have mentioned * an end to almost all date rape - since it would be recorded - leaving only the ambiguous cases * a likely decrease in various crimes - since they'd all be recorded * harder for execs/government to make backroom deals - since they're be recordings of them * might end gaslighting in personal relationships * eyewitness reports/testimony would be way more reliable * medical symptom checking - when did some symptom start would be recorded * better performance review - like a pilot reviewing a training landing or an athlete reviewing their own performance. * proof of abuse by customers or by staff. * checking your actual time spent vs you're perceived time spent - I studied for 4 hours, checking though you studied for 45 minutes and kept getting distracted with non-study * less lost items - check where you left your keys, etc.... * more accountable police - everyone is recording them * no more need to take photos for memos, since you know everything you looked at is recorded * all car accidents recorded - easier to determine blame Of course adding AI to all of that would add orders of magnitude more usefulness. I'm not saying there are no downsides. As one example, every bowl movement, shower, self pleasure, sex, cold, vomit, misspoke word, awkward situation, etc would be also recoreded.
  - latexr 8mo ago
    > The episode wasn't really about the tech, it was about a failing relationship, a cheating partner, and an untrusting obsessive person. Good (or decent) science fiction is never about the tech, but about its impact on people.
alkonaut 8mo ago
This sounds like a regulation issue to me. If it's regulated it can't be inevitable that "most people" are breaking the law. And if there is a resistance among people then hopefully it will be regulated (I'm talking outside the US now, i.e. where there is a positive correlation between what people in general want and what laws eventually become).
- saikia81 8mo ago
  In the united states the first amendment of the constitution makes it so that any public usage of camera tech cannot be controlled by the state. Except in some very specific scenarios.
  - magicalist 8mo ago
    > In the united states the first amendment of the constitution makes it so that any public usage of camera tech cannot be controlled by the state I'm repeating a comment of mine from another thread, but this is not true. Both recording the audio of a conversation that you aren't party to and deriving biometrics from video without consent are both broad categories that are regulated depending on the state you're doing the "public usage" in.
  - alkonaut 8mo ago
    I don't mind anyone taking my photo in a public place. That was always legal. It's what's done with it that could be illegal. E.g. if they use my photo in a commercial without my consent? Illegal. If it was also illegal to (for example) input a photo of someone non-consenting into any kind of AI model or post it to any other online service? Then I don't see much problem.
- iso1631 8mo ago
  The regulation needs to get ahead of the product, otherwise you'd be criminalising existing behaviour and that doesn't work People normalised installing spy doorbells, so every doorstep is centrally available to large organisations who want to do harm (government, amazon, meta, whoever)
latexr 8mo ago
The pushback to and ultimate failure of Google Glass proves it’s not inevitable.
- saikia81 8mo ago
  The fact that every new technology has had pushback before adoption makes your claim meaningless.
  - latexr 8mo ago
    That is simply not true. There was no pushback for washing machines or vacuum cleaners or refrigerators, to name just a few. Furthermore, the point isn’t the pushback but the ultimate failure and thus lack of adoption. I feel like that’s fairly obvious. This idea that all new tech faces pushback is at best ignorant and at worst a wilful deception to justify every draconian idea pushed forward by tech bros who only care about extracting money from people at all costs.

sublinear 8mo ago

That's way off base. There's a very significant chunk of people who rarely if ever use the camera on their phone right now. It's not even a matter of who they are or their personal opinions. Cameras simply aren't an exclusive gateway to anything critically important. In many cases a photo or video is an objectively worse format than text. Smartphones became common because they are now the only way to access certain information or authenticate. It's to the extent that we eliminated hard copy documents and changed publishing and proving identity irreversibly. People frequently use smartphones because they have to, and a smartphone without a working camera is still perfectly usable and always will be. This isn't a matter of the public being wooed by a sales pitch or wanting anything in particular. Images require less accessible and reliable methods of interpretation to convey information whereas text is the information. If you're not convinced then consider that both can be generated by AI. A generated image can be convincing and so can generated text, yet we depend on special forms of text such as keys which cannot be generated by AI and any image trying to encode the same is always inferior. An image is never acceptable as a sole or even primary means of authentication. For all these reasons and more, an image is never the only format available.

sprinkly-dust 8mo ago
I would disagree that a smartphone without a working camera is perfectly usable. A lot of the world — especially in developing countries — runs on QR Codes for everything from restaurant menus to electronic payments. Without a camera, other stuff too, like KYC, just doesn't work. These are the sorts of changes that, as you mentioned, are forcing people to use smartphones. And they rely on the camera.
- sublinear 8mo ago
  QR codes can be unreliable and unnecessary to convey a URL. That's why I said "an image is never the only format available". If it's a deliberate thing people must pay attention to, the friction is already too high. Most QR codes are not permalinks. Nobody wants to print out another one or retry scanning with better lighting only to find it doesn't work. When it really matters the link is dynamic and invisible. It's baked into a script your phone runs when you perform a more interesting higher level task in an app, tap-to-pay when you arrive, etc.

swiftcoder 8mo ago

> There have already been demos. Ask the AI watching over your shoulder anything about your past and present and have it act on it. Demo, or verbatim plot of Black Mirror episode?

socalgal2 8mo ago
Demo. As much I enjoyed Black Mirror I thought it's Season 1, "The Entire History of You" entertaining but was poorly conceived. It showed catching your partner cheating as a "would rather not know" thing and it ignored any possible positives. The episode wasn't really about the tech, it was about a failing relationship, a cheating partner, and an untrusting obsessive person. In any case, in that world, which didn't have AI to review and catalog what you saw but only playback of recorded sight, positives they could have mentioned * an end to almost all date rape - since it would be recorded - leaving only the ambiguous cases * a likely decrease in various crimes - since they'd all be recorded * harder for execs/government to make backroom deals - since they're be recordings of them * might end gaslighting in personal relationships * eyewitness reports/testimony would be way more reliable * medical symptom checking - when did some symptom start would be recorded * better performance review - like a pilot reviewing a training landing or an athlete reviewing their own performance. * proof of abuse by customers or by staff. * checking your actual time spent vs you're perceived time spent - I studied for 4 hours, checking though you studied for 45 minutes and kept getting distracted with non-study * less lost items - check where you left your keys, etc.... * more accountable police - everyone is recording them * no more need to take photos for memos, since you know everything you looked at is recorded * all car accidents recorded - easier to determine blame Of course adding AI to all of that would add orders of magnitude more usefulness. I'm not saying there are no downsides. As one example, every bowl movement, shower, self pleasure, sex, cold, vomit, misspoke word, awkward situation, etc would be also recoreded.
- latexr 8mo ago
  > The episode wasn't really about the tech, it was about a failing relationship, a cheating partner, and an untrusting obsessive person. Good (or decent) science fiction is never about the tech, but about its impact on people.

alkonaut 8mo ago

This sounds like a regulation issue to me. If it's regulated it can't be inevitable that "most people" are breaking the law. And if there is a resistance among people then hopefully it will be regulated (I'm talking outside the US now, i.e. where there is a positive correlation between what people in general want and what laws eventually become).

saikia81 8mo ago
In the united states the first amendment of the constitution makes it so that any public usage of camera tech cannot be controlled by the state. Except in some very specific scenarios.
- magicalist 8mo ago
  > In the united states the first amendment of the constitution makes it so that any public usage of camera tech cannot be controlled by the state I'm repeating a comment of mine from another thread, but this is not true. Both recording the audio of a conversation that you aren't party to and deriving biometrics from video without consent are both broad categories that are regulated depending on the state you're doing the "public usage" in.
- alkonaut 8mo ago
  I don't mind anyone taking my photo in a public place. That was always legal. It's what's done with it that could be illegal. E.g. if they use my photo in a commercial without my consent? Illegal. If it was also illegal to (for example) input a photo of someone non-consenting into any kind of AI model or post it to any other online service? Then I don't see much problem.
iso1631 8mo ago
The regulation needs to get ahead of the product, otherwise you'd be criminalising existing behaviour and that doesn't work People normalised installing spy doorbells, so every doorstep is centrally available to large organisations who want to do harm (government, amazon, meta, whoever)

latexr 8mo ago

The pushback to and ultimate failure of Google Glass proves it’s not inevitable.

saikia81 8mo ago
The fact that every new technology has had pushback before adoption makes your claim meaningless.
- latexr 8mo ago
  That is simply not true. There was no pushback for washing machines or vacuum cleaners or refrigerators, to name just a few. Furthermore, the point isn’t the pushback but the ultimate failure and thus lack of adoption. I feel like that’s fairly obvious. This idea that all new tech faces pushback is at best ignorant and at worst a wilful deception to justify every draconian idea pushed forward by tech bros who only care about extracting money from people at all costs.