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Comment by cronix | Hacker News Reader

Now if only you could get your neighbors to quit too. The ones that have it are all still recording you. You really only need one or two per block to monitor everyone on the street. ML should easily be able to work out "Silver Corolla with license plate ABC123 left 1200 Sunnyside St at 4:32pm and headed East." Then another one 3 blocks away can report the same car turning North on 127th, and then another can report...

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That would assume that nest and ring cameras are even capable of making out license plates. They're all crappy sensors with horrible night vision.

So you're saying it will only be a few more years then? Look at where cellphone cameras were 20 years ago, and where they are today. The present inadequacy of hardware doesn't give me any comfort.

Why would you stop at the first model once you are already in the ecosystem? People upgrade their devices all the time.

This is much easier (and already accomplished) by the government installing license plate readers.

It is even easier by the government using EZPass and electronic toll readers. No optics or OCR required.

I'm kind of amazed the government doesn't embed a RAIN RFID sticker in renewal tags. They can be read ~30ft away and cost just a few cents per.

Oh that's definitely on their mind:

https://stevenmcollins.com/auto-license-plaste-to-have-rfidt...

https://www.nbc12.com/story/20500107/virginia-lawmakers-want...

Which is why I will never have one.

license plates have a bit more adoption, though.

Here in the north east metro areas, the toll plazas are everywhere and cash lanes are scant and backed-up. It is almost impossible to be without an electronic tag. Between my home in Princeton NJ and my office in Manhattan, there are probably 3 or 4 toll collections in each direction, depending on the route.

NYC was trying to do congestion pricing, in which case it would be pervasive.

It is still possible to avoid, but difficult.

Who needs the hassle and appropriations process when you can just send a friendly email to the country's biggest data broker and they'll give you whatever you want?

To be fair, though, there's a flip side. My neighbors seem to get more utility from my driveway feed than I do. Every couple of months, I get a text from a neighbor asking if I got footage of some such thing. Everybody knows who has cameras, and those people are invaluable whenever something nefarious happens (mail theft, break in, kids running amok, etc).

Or live in a metro area with WAMI already in place...

Don't live so close to your neighbors? Easier said than done, but on the long scale...

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