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Pastimes : Digital Photography -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mike Buckley who wrote (7858)	6/6/2004 2:06:43 PM
From: Done, gone.	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 21662

I think the initative is going to come to a pretty fast death. Help speed up said death by letting them know exactly how you feel about their proposed ban, as I have: mta-nyc.custhelp.com I simply don't understand how in the world the banning of photos anywhere is going to be enforced if cell phones that contain cameras become as ubiquitous as I think they'll become. That's one of the reasons why the ban is a dumb idea. Here are some others: ______________________ 1) Increased workload for overburdened police force, distraction from real safety and security issues, patrols and intelligence gathering. 2) Criminalization of citizens who are the most vigilant and knowledgeable in terms of recognizing and reporting serious safety concerns, terror related or not. 3) Restricting the rights of tourists. Warning, detailing, questioning and fining them, will only result in decreased tourism to NYC. 4) Enforceability: The rule is impossible to enforce entirely, and will be viewed by the population similar to the laws against Jay Walking: It will be ignored and considered a foul joke issued by an out of touch government agency. 5) Asking photographers to apply for a permit creates more paperwork, and requires more employees to issue, manage and track these permits. There is no justifiable reason to expect tax payers and fare paying customers to either pay more taxes or pay an increased fare to maintain any permit system. 6) Permits, like press cards and drivers licenses, can be forged. 7) "The Horse has left the barn". With hundreds of thousands of photos of the NYC Subway system already on file in libraries, books, and easily available on any number of websites, this proposed ban would be too little, too late. To truly control key information about the NYC Subway system, many books and websites will have to be banned as well. Where do you draw the line? 8) Crime prevention tool taken away. How many times have crimes been solved due to photographic evidence taken at or near the scene of a crime? It is a daily occurrence. 9) Criminals bent on mugging robbing or other antisocial behavior rarely carry out such acts when they know people with cameras are around. 10) March Of Dimes fan trips cancelled - these trips, occurring several times a year using historic subway cars to raise money for the March of Dimes, will likely become extinct. The vast majority of the patrons for these trips buy tickets purely for the purpose of not just riding on historic train cars, but also to photograph them. Indeed, several stops are made during the course of each trip just to accommodate photographers. What incentive will anyone have to pay for a ticket if they can't take photos? 11) Photographers have previously been told that they need permits to take photos in the subways even though they did not. Those who inquired as to how one might obtain a permit were met with red tape and run around. We have not been told of any actual method whereby one might actually obtain a permit should the ban go into affect. Thus, it is fair to assume that the MTA has zero plans for issuing anyone permits if and when their ban is put into effect. 12)Several polls have been completed at news media websites whereby 80% or more of respondants voted against any photography ban. Clearly, the vast majority of the population feel that this ban is unacceptable. photographersrights.mtude.com