Google Street View captures a picture of you in your underwear as you step outside to collect the mail.
‘Oh, well, what are you going to do?” you shrug.
A security camera at the local bank machine stares as you pick at your nose.
“Let ‘em look?” you decide.
Street surveillance then catches you going into your favourite adult video store.
“It’s for a friend’s bachelor party,” you lie.
We’re watched by unblinking glares almost every day — technology constantly adding to the monitoring — but have any of us changed how we behave?
Not so much, says a Canadian sociologist, who specializes in the way people adapt to change.
Nathan Young, an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa’s Department of Sociology and Anthropology, believes few Canadians have altered their public behaviour.
“When we’re out on the street, there’s an understanding we’re in public and there’s a risk of being seen or talked to,” says Young. “What’s different now is if we go outside to change a tire in our underwear, it can be exposed worldwide.”
Google’s Street View has proven a deep well of opportunity — and odd images — for those who like watching humans.
In the past year, a man wearing a pony mask — dubbed ‘Horse Boy’ — became an online celebrity after his image was captured in Aberdeen, Scotland. A body, photographed at an intersection in Rio de Janeiro, gained a viral audience in early October. And more recently, in Germany, those who patrol streets photographed by Google have spotted what could be a naked man in a car trunk and what looks like a baby being born on the sidewalk.
While many of us couldn’t recall the faces of strangers we passed this morning, the Street View moments are providing mass appeal.
Voyeurism has always been a part of human motivation, says Young, an authority on privacy issues.
But ogling the Google images also tells us something about our sense of fun, he explains, pointing out some of the images are theatrics or misunderstandings of a moment.
“Clearly, there are people out there that want to play (with the technology),” he reasons. “Not for politics or protest. Just a personal imprint.”
Young says there’s no evidence people are more aware or cautious as they head out their doors.
“This is just too new to change our behaviour,” says Young.
“(But) that is coming.”
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