Pokemon Go

Even the Knoxville Police are hip to the phenomenon that is Pokemon Go:

We have great city parks, however, they are closed between dusk & dawn. #PokemonGo players please take note of hours pic.twitter.com/eURDTU3Tyq

— Knoxville Police (@Knoxville_PD) July 11, 2016

Watching the Watchers

Target Blu Eye:

"The £999 system (plus £100-£200 for installation) monitors the frequencies of emergency services’ Tetra and Airwave radios and, according to the manufacturer, listens for the distinctive regular pulses sent by the radios every four seconds. These could be emitted by marked or unmarked vehicles; by radios worn by beat officers or mobile speed camera operators; or by radios in police helicopters. When a transmission is detected, the driver is alerted."

And I agree they really wouldn't like this if someone created a network of dectors and publicized their locations.

Via Slashdot

Bad Dog, Bad Dog

Whatcha gonna do when the SWAT comes for you? They need to add the Benny Hill music to this video. (Like the bike video.)



Video via Ace

Keystone Cops

Too funny...



Via Bayou Renaissance Man

Swedes Closing Unneeded Prisons

Clearly they need more laws to help get that utilization rate up!

Bad Boys, Bad Boys

Citizens arrest! Citizens arrest!

Sign me up.

Liturgical Mysteries

Want a cheap thrill? Slim introduced me to these books about a small town police chief/organist/writer. While I am not Episcopalian, the church humor is easily translatable to my own experience. I hear if you are a member of a choir, there are lots of jokes for you that probably went sailing over my head. I was sick over the week-end and read a couple of them during my downtime - easy, fun reads.

Less than a buck if you want the Kindle version... if you click the link below to buy, I get a cut of your $0.99. No one has ever used my Amazon links before, so I don't even know what that would be.

If you'd rather go to the author's site directly, click here.

Breaking the Law!

Sorry for the lack of radio posting. I had been running my pirate radio station (2 x the legal limit!!!) using my UV-5R and an FCC SWAT team raided my house. They confiscated my radio charger and mouse, so it really has hampered my ability to get on the air and to post.

Seriously, this post was 100% inspired by Hans' last two articles:

2013, Narrowbanding and Ham Radio

and

UV-5R Group for Illegal Users

I commented on the first by saying:

"It seems like people forget about 50+ (100?) years of history when they start talking about rule changes. I don’t think all the war surplus rigs that my father-in-law has will magically become compliant with every mandate. Nor will all the stuff he designed and built. Unless you are being a real jerk and causing interference, I don’t see the FCC breaking down your (US) door to confiscate a Chinese HT."

Maybe my rule should be a) don't be a jerk and b) don't be dumb - then you shouldn't have to worry about the FCC SWAT team.

UV-3R: Prevent Transmit

If you are using your UV-3R to monitor frequencies where you do not have transmit privileges, you can program the transmit frequency to "0" or NULL. If you press the PTT, then the radio beeps at you, but nothing is transmitted.

Jamming

Jamming mobile phones is bad enough, but disrupting speech!?!? Scary!

ExtremeTech link via Slashdot.org

The First One Should Be Enough

Five reasons you should refuse a police search.

Stephen Coleman: The moral dangers of non-lethal weapons

An interesting Ted Talk... in this one, Stephen Coleman discusses the problems of non-lethal weapons. He tells how one police department introduced non-lethal weapons as an option between "shouting and shooting." The data shows that the non-lethal weapons did not replace the handful of shooting deaths, but rather created a whole new category of confrontations with over 2,000 uses of pepper spray.

Another key point is that the perfect non-lethal weapon, one that is "nasty enough that people don't want to get hit with" it, but "doesn't leave any lasting effects," is also perfect for abuse.

Shame Game

It is a shame that the differences between the police and the army are becoming non-existent. Their roles are supposed to be different, so one would think they would be equipped differently.

Apparently that is not the case. I present the "Cop or Soldier" quiz. It should have been easy. It was not.

Via Says Uncle

Watching

Continuing on today's theme of watching, I found this scary infograph about the data a phone company collected about a customer in Germany. (See the interactive version here.)

Or the government could team up with a mobile phone company to track you via Silent SMS texts.

So big companies are tracking you. The government does lots of tracking.

I think we'll see more things like this neat bit of technology (Escort Live) that help level the playing field...

"Escort Live (an accessory for Escort radar detectors) not only detects police speed traps, it also broadcasts their times and locations to other Escort Live owners. They (the traps, not the owners) show up on a map on the phone’s screen, thereby creating a speed-trap social network. The police can’t be thrilled."

Cameras Everywhere - Sousveillance

Clive Thompson talks about sousveillance:

"Sousveillance is the monitoring of events not by those above (surveiller in French) but by citizens, from below (sous-). The neologism was coined by Steve Mann, a pioneer in wearable computing at the University of Toronto."

I like the term and the balance of power it suggests.

Examples of videos providing evidence of when people do bad things is all around. Most commonly, we think of catching people in positions of authority misbehaving as in the video below:

Sometimes it even gets people fired -  like the officer that threatened to kill permit holder in what seemed to be a simple incident.

LawDog points out that doing good may have a price. Even knowing the potential consequences, I would hope that I would be like Mr. Green, who recorded the video above, and do the right thing.

Just like you and me...

... only better.


Gary Varvel

Undercover Cop Car

They stole the idea from Running Scared.


Via ENDO

Shooting Suspects in a Barrell

Shooting a handcuffed suspect that is in the back of a police cruiser doesn't pass the smell test to me.

Via SaysUncle

Bad City Councilman, Bad City Councilman

Mr. Alan Schulman (Canton City Council President):

If you aren't going to address the issue of a near homicidal police officer, then I don't think you need to be talking (or whining) about anything else. And I agree with WizardPC, I don't think there is a better time or place to carry.



After hearing more about this incident, it finally clicked. I've seen that police officer...

Bonus Link: Tam - That explains rather a lot, actually.

Via Snowflakes in Hell

Local Police use iPads

Speaking of tech in the car, our local constables are using iPads in their cruisers.