Re: [Debconf-discuss] "Do not photograph" checkbox in registration
Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> writes:
> On Fri, Sep 12, 2014 at 01:23:29PM +0200, Gaudenz Steinlin wrote:
>> I might be wrong on this, but I expect those that don't mind to be
>> filmed to vastly outnumber those that oppose to it. So to me it seems
>> enough to make it clear that talk rooms are filmed and to have a space
>> for those that don't want to be filmed but still want to attend the
>> talk.
> The registration data supports this conclusion. Only a handful of
> people checked the box to say they didn't want their picture taken
> without permission. The rest either don't have a problem with it, or it
> wasn't important enough to them to find this information on the
> registration form (arguably, the same thing).
Just data-pointing here, but when I went to my first DebConf in Edinburgh,
I remember being really taken aback and a little spooked at the amount
that I was photographed, and at people running around the conference
taking tons of photographs of everything without so much as a
by-your-leave. At the time, I'd been attending technical conferences
regularly for a while, mostly LISA, and I'd never encountered that
aggressive of photography before.
I thought about it and made the conscious choice that I didn't
particularly care if my image was available on-line, in part because I'm
rather privileged in various ways that mean there's no risk for me in
that. And while I personally am mostly uninterested in pictures of events
I've attended, I know people in the community care a lot, and since I have
no strong opinion, I feel like it's a gift that I can give them. Also,
I'm very impressed at how well DebConf does for remote attendees, and I
think that's important. So I've never checked the "don't photograph me"
checkbox.
But I have to admit that I've thought about it a few times, just because
the constant photography is so disconcerting and still weirds me out a
little. And I have a lot of sympathy for the folks who are more sensitive
to it than I am. I do think DebConf is a significant outlier here
compared to other professional conferences, in a way that's likely to make
at least some people quite uncomfortable.
I'm not sure how much this is a generational thing. I don't have a
Facebook profile either, and didn't grow up with digital cameras, and
maybe I have a different relationship with photos than people who are
twenty years younger than I am.
--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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