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Comment by michaelbuckbee | Hacker News Reader

A neighbor recently got a Ring out of some security concerns (partner got deployed for a year and they have two young kids). However, I've think it's made things worse in some ways:

- Every potential interaction is viewed with suspicion

- Everybody who walks up to the door prompts an interruption wherever you are (on your smartphone)

The local neighborhood sharing aspects of Ring strongly remind me of NextDoor, whose suspicion raising and general uselessness can pretty much be summed up in this tweet:

https://twitter.com/bestofnextdoor/status/112232088963729817...

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I've never seriously considered installing cameras outside my house, and the #1 reason is that I don't want a reason to fear something when there's nothing to fear.

I've never had my home broken into. But I guarantee you there have been all kinds of suspicious-looking things happening outside of my house. Someone's probably looked in the windows of our cars. Hell, I'm sure folks have wandered into (and out of) our gated back yard. Nothing's ever been stolen or disturbed, and while it would still be trespassing, it's not hurting me. My life would be worse, rather than better.

Maybe I'll sing a different tune when my house gets broken into some day, but for now I'll be blissfully unaware. And what would the video do for me, anyway? It seems the news is full of video clips asking people to call the police if they recognize the person. And what? Usually, nothing.

I live in the bay area, and have never once worried about package theft. I think homogeneity is probably the biggest predictor of it. Live in a multi-generational neighborhood? No problem.

Live in a cookie cutter subdivision with one way in and out, and every single resident is gone all day? Package theft heaven.

I have a few coworkers who recently got Ring devices. Now I see them constantly checking their phones and watching the security footage. The level of paranoia this device creates is pretty remarkable. These are rich tech workers living in low crime neighborhoods too.

Having a security camera isn't a bad idea at all, but one that gets you to check it constantly like it's instagram can't be healthy.

As a counterpoint, I live in Arizona (hardly rich tech workers living in my neighborhood, excluding me). Tons of people here have them and almost every instance is either just a delivery person OR literally someone trying to steal crap from their porch etc.

> OR literally someone trying to steal crap from their porch etc.

To significantly reduce the chance of package theft, I got a simple outdoor cabinet (no lock) and put up a sign on my door asking deliverymen to place packages in it. They do it 95% of the time now, so it's very difficult for a potential package thief to know if there's anything to steal at my door.

Specifically, I got one of these and spray-painted it to match my house:

https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/products/storage-furniture/outdoo...

>OR literally someone trying to steal crap from their porch etc.

On one border you have CA (which basically laughs at the idea of prosecuting people for property crime), on another you have Mexico (a place to liquidate stolen goods). AZ is screwed from a property crime perspective.

That paranoia dies down quickly once you realize how boring your neighborhood is. At least it did for me. In fact, I recently had an item stolen, and didn't even know it until my neighbor told me about a strange man in her backyard (I had missed the notification entirely).

I do agree with the article, however. It makes sense that a constant drip-feed of local crime news can have a detrimental effect on perceived security and danger.

A good friend got one. Checks it constantly. He has slipped down the slope of constant surveillance. Cell phone buzzes while we are out..."let's see who is visiting the wife?" Let's listen in on how she's interacting with the kids as they play in the driveway.

It makes me uneasy and any suggestions I have made jokingly or seriously about it being weird are brushed off. I genuinely feel it straining our relationship as he turns into this other person every time he checks in on what's happening.

That is gross. It is the inflexible that shape society. This is why we have overly clean things, scents everywhere and a myriad of disposable one time use items.

It’s primary season in New York, and Nextdoor in my area is a cesspit of people worried about the the pair of people with clipboards ringing their doorbell.

Replies range from “they could be casing your house” to “I think they stole packages from my porch” to helpful hints like calling 911, calling the gas company, or drive around looking for them. Usually somebody brings up something off topic like 5G towers as well.

It’s such a awful snapshot of paranoia and crazy. Ring happens to be a major sponsor on Nextdoor.

My local nextdoor recently had a 30 post flame-fest because someone was concerned that 3 11 year old girls walked up to their door and asked if they could have a glass of water. It's amazing how shitty neighbors will treat each other online but would never say similar things in person to each other.

Living in a state where everyone could be a backstabbing busybody you can't help but treat every interaction with suspicion. Like, I assume my neighbors are fine people. I still would be totally unsurprised if one of them called the police because my wife screamed loudly or something.

Should your neighbors not call the police if they hear a woman screaming loudly?

There's plenty of reasons to scream that don't necessitate a police call (the most common one seems to be "unexpected spider"). When you take the frequency of the various reasons to scream into account the chances that calling the police is a reasonable response to any particular instance is practically nil.

Your attitude is exactly the problem I have with a lot of the people of my state.

Thanks for explaining. This seems to be an expected value problem. If, indeed, there are many innocuous reasons for a loud scream (which I'm not convinced of) that may not need a police call, there are still some reasons that very much do need a police call.

The inconvenience of dealing with the police in the former is dwarfed by the value of them showing up in the latter, in my opinion. I would 100% most definitely want my neighbors to call the police every time they hear any screams from my wife or I.

> Everybody who walks up to the door prompts an interruption wherever you are (on your smartphone)

Only if they actually ring the bell. Or if you're some sort of masochist who turns on motion alerts for your doorbell.

I had a ring for six months before I realized you could turn them off...

Explore every single setting and preference for every single thing you ever buy, and that won't happen to you again. This philosophy has served me well in life.

> that won't happen to you again

Well, until they add a new setting.

Bonus points for quietly defaulting a privacy-impacting new setting to "on", too.

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