Seattle drinking den bans Google Glass geeks
Violent consequences for Google-eyed privacy violators
A Seattle bar has issued a preemptive ban of Google Glass to preserve the privacy of its tipplers.
The 5 Point Cafe in Seattle announced plans to suppress the futuristic devices on its Facebook page this week, and didn't mince words.
"The 5 Point is the first Seattle business to ban in advance Google Glasses," the bar wrote. "And ass kickings will be encouraged for violators."
Google Glasses are not yet widely available, though Google is doling out some of the Chocolate Factory goggles to vainglorious creative social media users as part of a breathless neo-utopian marketing campaign.
These Google-enabled cyborgs will want to steer clear of the Seattle watering hole, or risk violent and abrupt inertial-transference disciplinary measures to their derrieres.
The 5 Point Cafe made the decision to ban Google-eyed punters out of respect for the privacy of its clientele.
"You have to understand the culture of The 5 Point which is a sometimes seedy, maybe notorious place and I think people want to go there and be not known," 5 Point owner Dave Meinert tells myNorthwest.
If you're live-streaming this glyph, don't drop by the 5 Point. (Image credit: Stop The Cyborgs)
"We don't let people film other people or take photos unwanted of other people in the bar because it's kind of a private place people go."
Meinert's anti-Glass stance has struck a chord with the bar's drinking clientele, with many of them speaking up in favor of the ban.
"I plan on carrying flat black spray paint cans for folks who want to google-glass record me without permission," one privacy-conscious tippler wrote... on Facebook. ®
COMMENTS
Re: Hmmm..
" ...expectation of privacy loss when you're out in public."
Yes, you should, when in a public place. The inside of a bar/cafe/restaurant is not a public place, it is private property. The owner of that property can set conditions on you being allowed into the property and being allowed to stay there.
Re: Hmmm..
If there is ample warning signs and they choose to ignore the signs then it is an invitation to an arse-kicking straight back out on to the street - - no complaints, the 'intelligent' glasses should have warned them.
Re: Hmmm..
You don't seem to have read past the headline of the article, otherwise you'd know that it's not just this one device that's banned. They already didn't allow filming/photo-taking anyway.
Re: Hmmm..
and when people are filming in public without asking the people first use of these glasses can expect do get beaten up and the glasses destroyed
That would come under assault and causing damage to property, ditto for using it in a bar and having this done to you.
You see, there are other options. If someone is doing something you don't like, you are facing the one occasion where it is sensible to use your mouth first - ask them to stop.
This is also the goal of a sign in a pub banning those devices - it means you have had your warning, and chose to ignore it. In a bar, it means you then have the legal ability to eject someone or even have them removed by the police if they bother to turn up, because you have cause. However, you still don't have cause to harm people or their property unless you act in self defence, and even then you're limited to appropriate action.
In a public place, you may ask someone to stop, but AFAIK there is no reason for them to listen to you other than them being nice. This is, for instance, the reason why filming police activity is possible, and officers who don't like that have to dream up reasons such as national security of harming an ongoing investigation in order to take the camera off you (and plenty of that has been fought in court - rarely with a positive outcome for the police). The moment you threaten violence as method of enforcing your desire you can be arrested, certainly if you proceed to make good on that promise. It is thus better to at least start with a degree of civility.
Part of growing up is realising that not everything needs to be resolved with fisticuffs..
Re: Hmmm..
> how do you suggest this be enforced? Rent-a-cop? Vigilante justice meted out by drunken customers? Ohh....
It's called bouncers. And indeed some "burly guys" helping.
What exactly about the real world don't you understand?
Next you will be telling us that bars disallowing patrons to carry projectile weapons at their premises are infringing your progressive rights to carry heat wherever you go. Ah no, hold on ...
