alt Hacker NewsMostly due to the antisocial behavior described. I would not feel at all worried if someone walking on the same sidewalk as me was recording their child with me in the frame. Someone following me and jotting down notes is very strange behavior, at least for someone like me without celebrity.
Stripping this down a bit: would I be fine with a very friendly camera crew documenting everything I do outside in public? No, I wouldn’t like that for privacy reasons. I also wouldn’t like government cameras publicly searchable, and wouldn’t like my phone location publicly searchable, but do not mind law enforcement having access when necessary. It’s a good thought experiment though, and maybe exposes hypocrisy in my view? Not entirely sure.
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>maybe exposes hypocrisy
I don't know that hypocrisy is the word, but it does seem that you're going a long way to carve out an exception, where there is no real difference.
That is, it appears that you've simply decided one scenario is okay, even though that scenario itself begs the question. The article on which you're commenting demonstrates one reason that's so—the potential for abuse.
So, seems it all boils down to "out of sight, out of mind" in your framing. As long as you don't see the people invading your privacy, you're okay with believing that no one is. You don't mind that all of the tools of surveillance are in place, because you've defined a scenario wherein it's not possible that they're being used to actually surveil you.
In sum, your thought experiment is essentially, "would this be OK in a world that doesn't exist". But, you're answering "yes" in the world that does.
Maybe that's what you're sensing as "hypocrisy".
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You are intentionally trying to argue that your feeling of personal safety outweighs the privacy violations that are being discussed. There is the classic quote, "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
But to frame it in analogies as you are doing, it is not "a person following you". It is every person following you, at all times. A police officer, your local shop manager who is setting the prices of your groceries, your car insurer, your home insurer, your health insurer. The IRS (etc) agent assigned to you. Me, too. I'm following you, your wife, your children. You don't know me but here I am anyway taking pictures and then selling them to the user above you. Also my bank who sold me a credit card is now also following you. As well as the criminals that want to steal that credit card. Also that criminals kid, who's just curious. There's also a large man in a hat following you. As well as the person who is going to sell you your next car, they're following you too.
All these entities, and more, are following you. Carving you up as a product to sell and exploit.
And to you, you don't mind because you aren't aware. In the same way that a cow in a pen doesn't mind and isn't aware that an enormous system of industry is raising it to be carved up as a product to sell and exploit.