Freedom Not Fear 2012/Spot the cam: camspotting activity
Practical
when?
Saturday, 15 September 2012, 14:00-16:00
where?
aquarium room (max. 16 people) and the streets of Brussels
what?
Camspotting and Brainstorm & Networking. You can either go out into the streets of Brussels and spot the cams or you can stay in and join our brainstorm to improve the camera map.
Content
More and more social problems are being formulated as problems of safety and security. The common response to these problems is control and repression. The tendency of placing surveillance cameras is a good example of this trend. But who is guarding the guardians?
On our website (www.mensenrechten.be) we track the locations of surveillance cameras. We want to expose all the surveillance cameras. The Liga voor Mensenrechten (Flemish League of Human Rights) and Datapanik.org already organized plenty camspotting activities to locate surveillance cameras and place them on our map. The weekend of Freedom not Fear is an ideal opportunity to do this in Brussels. Come and join us! Spot the cam, take a picture and place it on our map. Or join our brainstorm: how can we build a better map? One that is technically more enhanced, more appealing and more user-friendly as a result of a good search function and ranking. Maybe we can design an international map that could be used worldwide… Is anybody into that? Who is doing this already? Which organizations? Will you join us in developing the camspotting activity and the map? Would be nice to team up or to create an international network…
Camspotting
We’ll explain the concept. It’s quite easy actually. You go into the streets of Brussels, take a picture of every surveillance camera you see and write down the location. At 15:40 we’ll meet again in the aquarium room and place the spotted cams on our camspotting map. But you don’t have to stop there: we can help you organize a camspotting in your own town or community.
Brainstorm & Networking
The camspotting map on our website is rudimentary. What’s worse: it’s a Google map (I know, sorry) so we’ll have to change that. You can upload photos, locations and optional comments. You are also able to search a town in Belgium. But that’s it.
Can we make it better? We are looking for people with inspiring ideas and the technical skills and knowhow to improve the camspotting map: no more Google map, better functionality (search, ranking of cities, …), appealing lay-out, a whole new site, or even a stylish easy-to-use smartphone app… All ideas are welcome. Come along and bring examples of other maps and techniques or contacts of people and organizations who might be interested too. It would be nice to team up and develop the camspotting format. Or to design an international map which other organizations can use. Let’s put those surveillance cameras all over the world on our map!
Organization & contact
Liga voor Mensenrechten & Datapanik.org
