Subject: [NEXTEL-1] At Strip-Joints, Camera Phones Have a Dark Side

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Home > Business

Technology

At Strip-Joints, Camera Phones Have a Dark Side

Provided by Pinnacor , 07.31.03, 2:41 PM ET

PEORIA - When Homo Erectus discovered that a good blunt stone would make a great weapon, the misuse of technology was born.

Fast-forward a few million years and add tiny cellular phone cameras to the list of technology that gets misused along with gunpowder (murder), the Internet (porn) and alcohol (drunken driving).

While industry experts admit that the small, poor image quality cameras integrated into new cell phone models have some less-than- savory uses, they stress: Don't blame the technology, blame the twisted minds that use it.

"Ever since shoe mirrors, people have been using technology to sneak a peak," said Becky Worley a reporter for the technology- based cable network TechTV. "You can't condone the behavior, but it's not the technology's fault."

In Japan, people are secretly taking photos up women's skirts and down into bathroom stalls or avoiding buying books and magazines by snapping free shots of desired pages.

"The problem with a new technology is that society has yet to come up with a common understanding about appropriate behavior," said Mizuko Ito, an expert on mobile phone culture at Keio University in Tokyo. "No matter what the technology, there'll always be people who don't mind their manners."

Tony Henning, editor of the Net-based mobile digital imaging research firm Future Image WIRE, agreed with Worley and said there should be some concern over misuse of any camera, especially one so discreet.

"There are always people who will use technology for the wrong reasons," Henning said. "There have been instances with camera phone voyeurs trying to shoot up women's skirts. People are worried about the immediacy of it.

"It's going to raise a lot of social issues, many of which are just about courtesy."

Introduced in the United States near the end of 2002, cell phone cameras allow users to send digital pictures almost instantly to other cell phones or via e-mail.

Last year, more than 18 million cameras were sold worldwide, with nearly 15 million sold in Japan, according to Henning.

Only about 200,000 of them were sold in the U.S.

"We don't look at our cell phones in the way (the Japanese) look at theirs," Henning said. "Most people don't think of their phones as anything but phones and that's going to have to change."

Henning expects worldwide sales of mobile phone cameras to reach 50 million by year's end, with all major U.S. cell phone carriers, except Nextel
(nasdaq:
NXTL -

news
-

people
), offering packages.

The image quality is below 1 megapixel, according to Worley.

The highest-end digital camera, the Canon
(nyse:
CAJ -

news
-

people
) EOS-1d, shoots at about 11 megapixels.

"The optics on the (cell phone) camera aren't that great," Worley said. "Certainly the images you are seeing in the commercials aren't comparable to what you get in real life."

But if the picture quality is so poor, and there is such concern over misuse, then what good is a cell phone camera?

Worley, who has followed the cell phone imaging phenomena for the past year, said there are several practical uses for the camera phones, but it's mostly just a novelty gadget.

"Let's say you're shopping and you think, 'I want to get this,''' she said. The user can just click a picture of the item and check it out later to see if they still want to spend money on it. "Imagine if you are a Realtor and you want to convey an image quickly."

But not everyone is filled with good intentions. In response, some businesses have taken steps to make sure trade secrets stay within the company walls.

According to Henning, cell phone manufacturer Samsung banned the phones in its semiconductor plants over fears of industrial espionage.

"It's a nice little irony," he said since Samsung produces cell phones.

Officials at Caterpillar
(nyse:
CAT -

news
-

people
) said they don't allow any cameras of any kind in their facilities.

"Some of our processes are proprietary," said spokeswoman Lori Porter. "The same guidelines would apply to cell phone cameras."

Guy Brenkman, whose Fantasyland strip club sports a "No cameras" sign, said his club already has had a small problem with the cell phone cameras.

"He had one of the camera phones and one of the employees spotted him holding it up and acting like he was taking a picture with it," Brenkman said of a patron who was caught red-handed. "He denied having taken any pictures with it. Whether or not he succeeded I just don't know."

Big Al's owner Al Zuccarini said the cameras haven't been an issue in his club.

He thinks they would be bad for business, especially in a business where people don't necessarily want to acknowledge they are Big Al's patrons.

"If it went over the Internet it would create big problems, I guess, for people who work here and for customers," Zuccarini said. "You can't take pictures of customers without their consent."

Officials at the Peoria Civic Center said they haven't addressed the cameras with a formal policy, but wouldn't rule out doing so in the future.

"It's kind of beneath our radar to consider phones as cameras," said Civic Center marketing director Marc Burnett. "It's something we are going to have to deal with but we haven't formulated a policy."

Burnett said performers are less likely to throw a fit over camera phones because the quality of the images is so poor.

"What they have less of a problem with are people who have disposable cameras, or people who are using them for their own enjoyment," Burnett said. "It's still not legal, nor is it allowed, but it's less of a violation of the copyright codes than camcorders and 35 millimeter cameras are because the quality isn't good enough."

(C) 2003 Peoria Journal Star. via ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved

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