Mr. and Mrs. Boring sue Google over Street View pics A Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania couple has sued Google for invasion of privacy, accusing the world's largest search engine of photographing their swimming pool and posting it to the web. Aaron and Christine Boring claim that in offering 360-degree panoramic pics of their private residence via Google Street View, the web giant has " …
..to have contacted Google, expressed concern about it the pictures, and suggested that if they pull the pictures for the short term, stump up half the material costs for a four foot fence [I'm of the opinion that any pool should be fenced off, full stop - child/animal safety, and your own privacy when in it] and that they could come back and take more pictures once that was up.
As opposed to just attempting to sue the bollocks off of them, which just looks petty, childish and infantile.
Whatever happened to meeting people half-way?
Steven R
Paris, because she's quite used to having her privacy invaded.
True but that's probably what it's worth. Over here the same house would be worth £80,000 too but greedy people / estate agents / lenders have all lost the plot.
I looked through our local property pages last night (just for a laugh of course!) and there was a one bed flat in [a reasonably nice semi-rural location in] Derbyshire for £130,000. There's also a 2 bed bunaglow (small bungalow on small plot - built in someone's back garden in fact) on for over 300k. Again this is in Derbyshire - a nice county to live in but not the most prosperous part of the UK by a long stretch.
On the subject of the google pics if they were taken from a public road at a normal eye-level and with a wide-angle that doesn't zoom on an individual or particular subject within the property then I can't see how the Borings' legal argument will stand up. They're like the people who dislike passers-by looking into their living room from the street, but refuse to fit net-curtains.
So are they going to start suing the US Government next for having 'homeland security' satellites buzzing over their house, the recruited teen geek ex-hackers who operate the systems getting their rocks off watching their daughters frolic in the lovely swimming pool?!
Paris, cos I think she'd gladly get all the coverage (with lack of coverings!!) that she could get!
You're both wrong. All politicians are equally corrupt. A politician in the UK, however, has less opportunity to indulge his kleptomania than one in Nigeria. That does not change his essential nature. Put a tiger in a cage and he will act differently from a tiger in the jungle, but he remains a panthera tigris. He does not suddenly change into a different species which looks and acts like a tiger but eats what handlers give him rather than what he can tear apart with his claws.
If i'd payed a considerable sum of money for a property that looked little more than a converted set of prefab concrete garages and a paddling pool then i'd want it keeping private too!!!! Me thinks that they want the cash compensation to go towards buying somewhere that justifies having a private road.
The Streisand Effect will probably be the justification for the sheer size of the claim.
If Google was in the wrong, it's a wrong that can't be undone. In seeking reparations, the situation becomes worse; this is not the couple's fault. They must then either settle for:
a) no reparations, meaning continued invasion of privacy;
b) reasonable reparations for small invasion of privacy, but with large invasion of privacy;
or
c) reasonable reparations for having their names and faces plastered all over the internet and laughed at.
No win situation, so why not nail 'em. It's the only way they'll learn.
>The strength of their case seems to hinge on whether signs for private road should have been ignored. But what if the photos had been taken from a low flying plane? The road being private does not necessarily preserve the privacy of property on that road as they could hardly claim the sign covered airspace!
Actually, that's how the press in the UK get around the problem of taking photos of houses, etc, that can't be seen from public land. They regularlty hire helicopters and planes to get the overhead shots of stars' homes and so on. A no-fly zone is the only way around it.
...so many here think it's unreasonable for the Borings to have some expectation of privacy. Complain about phorm, but when real life (tm) issues occur, how dare we complain!!
Should phorm be an opt out only? DNA entries for all?
These people should have a perfectly reasonable expectation of privacy. Just because Google has decided it wants to photograph the world doesn't mean that it is right. And just because the couples house falls below some of you aesthete's high standards, doesn't make it any more right that Google, or anyone can drive up to their door and invade their privacy.
The Borings didn't cause this. Google did. Google decided to take pictures and splash them across the web for anyone to see. Nice house or horrible house, freedom and privacy shouldn't be an opt in deal. It should be an expectation.
I hope the couple are successful. A take down order will make no difference to the company. A $25000 dollar take down for each infringement might.
Google remove any pictures people complain about, so if they'd just asked nicely the pictures would have been removed and nobody would have cared about their house.
It's not like google scaled their fence or anything....these pictures are of whats clearly visable to their neighbours when they drive up the road, or anyone taking a wrong turn.
$25,000 looks like it would be alot to these people (enough to paint the house and water the lawn atleast) google won't have to pay it, but if all the people that think google should have to pay each dontated $1 they might be able to put those $4-5 to some antidepresants so they can stop being so miserable.
Anybody else suspect that many of those who are saying that the Borings shouldn't expect/don't deserve privacy are actually government/police employees trying to weaken expectations/demands for privacy from the general public?
Hmmm?
Oh god I can't hear any helicopters must run... no no! Not the tas... aaargh!
"Google Maps is so out-of-date the subdivision I've been living in for the past 6 months is still a farmers field."
My current apartment complex shows as halfway done. Thats the current pics, but about 6 months ago, there was *nothing* showing in the area where my apt stands.
The other city I lived in has a pretty nice BRT system, but if you check the city (Leon, Gto, Mexico) on Google Earth you'll suddenly see the BRT stations "disappear" when going south-east. Notice that this system's been working since 2003, and I noted this during late 2006.
While Google Earth seems as a nice idea, I really don't see the "advantage" over Street View other than a voyeuristic's fantasy come true.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
