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Hey London people: I'm deeply sorry

19:33 / 22.01.03

Old brown-eye is back

19:39 / 22.01.03

I know - it's a horrible, horrible fucking poster. Ad agency irony gone stark raving mad.

19:42 / 22.01.03

It is weird when you jump on a London bus of a morning and stare blearily at the "Crystaleyes" monitor in the front of the bus and see your own much gruntled visage blearing back at you.

On the plus side, when you're broke, if you go upstairs, you can use the spy screen to check how full the bus is getting and where the conductor is, then plan which stop to leap off at so you don't have to pay your fare.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

19:52 / 22.01.03

I wish to hell it was a fucking prank. I know it's just a poster, but the first time I saw it my blood ran cold. "What the fuck? Be more Orwellian!"

They brought it in just as I was leaving the country; I couldn't help feeling as though I'd had a narrow escape from something scary.

19:52 / 22.01.03

So was this ad made by "guerilla artists?" Who's got the inside scoop?

20:00 / 22.01.03

No, I think it was just a normal ad agency...

There's an old Switchboard thread on it here - it gets derailed (thanks in part to me) but there might be something interesting in there.

20:05 / 22.01.03

Er, so is no one prepared to even consider the notion that CCTV might actually reduce, say, racist or sexual assaults on public transport?

%Fuck off Big Brother, leave them to set light to that nigger in peace. It's a free country(TM) goddamit.%

Now why would the words 'jerk' and 'knee' be a-spinning round ma lil' haed?

Less searchable M0rd4nt

20:14 / 22.01.03

I'm not necessarily objecting to the cameras. I relied on public transport to get around London when I lived there because I can't drive a car, and I've spent enough lonely night-bus or tube train journeys fucking bricking it because a bunch of wankers were sitting behind me and discussing my impending demise to be at least a little ambivilent about the presence of security cameras.

I still think that poster is as creepy as hell.

20:16 / 22.01.03

Didn't know this had already been discussed. My bad.

Well, after giving this some thought, I'm starting to lean toward the possibility that some kool kats found a way to fuck up things from the inside, yo and that this is dada. (as is mixing up names of fringe movements, which I did on half purpose) I'm pretty sure this is a normal ad agency, and that some not-so-normal (dare I say Invisibles) managed to find their way into the party.

20:35 / 22.01.03

I am disturbed that this comes under the 'Mayor of London' banner. I (don't laugh here) can remember when the present incumbent of the Mayor job was genuinely cool (c. 1977). Once upon a time the only surveillance on the top deck of a bus was a mirror/periscope arrangement whereby the driver could see what was going on. Cover that with a coat, bag etc and you could enjoy a quick w*nk, f*ndle etc without fear of discovery. I personally don't feel that video recording would be any help in capturing people who committed assaults on buses etc because (unless every bus has a satellite uplink, which I doubt) information recorded would inevitably be second-hand ie. there's no way of following assailants once they depart the bus. At least with Underground trains the driver can radio ahead to the next station...

When wider scale use of CCTV etc was first suggested, as I recall IN 1984, I said "I will buy a lot of hats then", and maybe that holds true ie. someone who wanted to commit an offence on a bus would only need to go up to the cameras (adjust the outer clothing which would be clocked when you got on the bus, pull something over the face) with a big sheet of sticky plaster and - blank!! - no evidence.

20:41 / 22.01.03

Er, 'kay, never in legal history has CCTV been used to prosecute.... no, not ever... how foolish I was. I stand corrected.

Jack The Bodiless

21:03 / 22.01.03

Surely anyone committing assaults (to pick the most prevalent example in this thread) is caught on camera, like, doing it? In which case, surely pictures of them would help when trying to, like, identify the culprit? I mean, you, know, just in case other people might have seen or met them, and, I guess, tell someone who they were?

And, just FYI, it's already been used on several occasions to repudiate large and fraudulent personal injury claims from bus passengers claiming to be involved in 'accidents'...

But the poster is shit.

The Return Of Rothkoid

21:56 / 22.01.03

Hey, artistically, I like the poster. That kind of GOOD WORKER NOW! thing appeals to me.

But the idea behind it is shit, yus.

09:13 / 23.01.03

So nobody else thinks that it might have been made by a SubGenepool to cause outrage?

A

09:27 / 23.01.03

It's got a real 5o's sci-fi feel to it. Tell me that's not a UFO in the top right hand corner.

Old brown-eye is back

11:07 / 23.01.03

I'm not opposed to the idea of CCTV (or CITV for that matter.) What did wind me up was those images and ideas becomming grist to some bastard's hilarious ironic cultural mill. It could be a Dadaist ad guy's prank I s'pose, but a) If it is, I don't think it's a particularly effective one and b) It isn't.

13:47 / 23.01.03

Gee, I leave London and four months later you have giant floating disembodied eyes everywhere.

Do they shoot laser beams, too?

13:53 / 23.01.03

That poster gives me the screaming heebie-jeebies.

It's just made for cowering beneath in anguish in the pouring rain as you learn that your train home has been cancelled for ever!.. in the opening chapter to a SF dystopia book.. or something..

13:56 / 23.01.03

In fact, looking at it again, I think Rage has a point with the dadaist prank idea.. I mean how could anyone possibly have looked at that and thought "yes, let's use this image - it'll help convince people that CCTV on buses is a good idea", as opposed to "you want us to stick that in bus shelters? Come off it, that's fucking freaky!"

14:01 / 23.01.03

Christ, is that Dame Judi Dench in the purple raincoat standing in the shop doorway to the left of the poster?

15:29 / 23.01.03

Although the written message gives the impression that the poster is aimed at the potential victims of assault (ie the innocent public), it is quite clearly aimed at the potential perpetrator. That is, it's primary purpose is to scarify the would be baddie ("we're f...ing watching you, pal!"), just as the primary purpose of CCTV is to act as a deterrant. Either that, or it's a sort of double bluff, meant to reassure us that they're putting the heebi-jeebies up the bad men and ladies who would do us harm. An "I know that they know that I know that he knows" sorta thing.

15:30 / 23.01.03

Christ, is that Dame Judi Dench in the purple raincoat standing in the shop doorway to the left of the poster?

*LOL*

Yes I really think it has to be someone who knows how scary the ad looks. And btw rage there is a pamphlet as well that has the same picture on the cover and reads without a hint of irony.

15:42 / 23.01.03

I know I'm a facist but CCTV and police officers on buses in London used to make me feel a bit more safe. On more than one occasion I've reported passengers being hassled by others to a conductor (when I've felt unable to deal with them myself), who has been entirely disinterested. While I appreciate that they are probably not paid enough to risk being attacked, someone has got to look out for people's safety. We - the people - should do this for each other, but unfortunately that doesn't often happen.

15:49 / 23.01.03

Haven't buses had cameras for ages, anyway? Bus cameras are one of the few places where I think they could be useful - they operate over short distances so you've got a better chance of properly IDing someone, as opposed to CCTV elsewhere where you might as well stare at a blank screen.

What's more, surely they are a damn sight more useful than giant floating eyes, which would only really be handy if they were peering in the windows and using their laser beams to melt people's mobiles. And that might distract the driver. Plus, what happens in high winds? Will the eyes be blown against buildings and vehicles, causing untold havoc? What happens if a pigeon flies into one?

I'm not sure I can approve of this floating eye measure. Ken's gone too far this time.

17:21 / 23.01.03

Maybe it's just an advert for London Underground contact lenses. If so, I'll have a pair, please.

19:55 / 23.01.03

I've never noticed before how much the London Transport symbol looks like a "no doing this" road sign:

19:57 / 23.01.03

..even more so in that bus stop ad.

Can someone tell me why the ad reminds me of Zenith Phase 4? There's something about the eyes in the sky, but I can't be arsed digging my old 2000ADs out.

20:10 / 23.01.03

Can you say infiltration?

14:01 / 24.01.03

for shortfatdyke:

It appears we Americans have the British beat when it comes to contact lens designs:

The underground would be pretty darn cool, though.