Under the category of Paranoid? Who Told You I Was Paranoid? check out Gigapan.
The pictures are taken with a Canon digital camera mounted on a robotic base developed by Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Lab and NASA Ames Research, to result in a 1,474 megapixel image. [ed. note: this was corrected per comment posted below.] Double click on an area of the picture to view a detailed area shot or individual. Click and drag the cursor to scan over the picture.
Where once it as possible to be anonymous in a crowd, that will no longer be. You can be spotted and watched, followed. In the hands of the good guys, we can easily track the bad guys. Unless the bad guys get ahold of the same technology, then the bad guys can track the good guys.
Who watches the watchers, indeed.
Additional note: I do think this is marvelous technology and we've only just scratched the surface of where this stuff can take us. I keep being reminded of the line from Milton Friedman, The power to do good is also the power to do harm. The technology is not the problem, the problem lies within the hands of those with the technology and how they view their ability extended by this technology. Few people ever believe their actions will result in evil. Most evil is done by people with the best of intentions. Naiveté seems more popular than ever before.
I believe that you've misunderstood the mechanism here. Canon has not developed a "robotic SHD 1,474 megapixel camera". A standard consumer Canon point and shoot camera was mounted on a robotic base developed by Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Lab and NASA Ames Research. David Bergman, who shot the Inauguration GigaPan explains the process here: http://www.davidbergman.net/blog/2009/01/22/how-i-made-a-1474-megapixel-photo-during-president-obamas-inaugural-address/
[He's correct - and the link better explains the mechanism of how this was done. DMZ]
Posted by: Ron Schott | 07 March 2009 at 10:02 AM