FIND A SOLUTION TO TAKE GOOD PICTURES OF UFO !!!

Perhaps better would be to randomly pick one photographer as ‘bait’, covertly surrounded by other photographers (cameras hidden) aimlessly wandering/browsing, who then pounce and photograph those persons who attempt to intimidate the bait.

Imagine their surprise!

I’ve been wondering, is there some kind of ideology or top-down influence causing this war of photography?

I’m 3,000 miles away in Sticksville, FL and I won’t be able to be there. But sign me up for a donation, I’ll buy the t-shirt and be there in spirit.

I’ll be watching with glee. Go get ‘em.

http://www.kantor.com/blog/Legal-Rights-of-Photographers.pdf

http://www.krages.com/phoright.htm

I am thrilled to hear about this!

I wish I could afford to fly in and participate.

I simply cannot wait until the rest of the nation gets in on this and says “ENOUGH!”

Harassing people for taking pictures is ABSOLUTELY F@CKING RIDICULOUS – Seriously, the terrorists HAVE won at this point.

#1 – I don’t think they are making T-Shirts available for sale – I think they are advising participants to make T-Shirts for the event.

I pledge to participate in any similar event that takes place here on the island of Maui and support, with donation of time and money, any nation-wide organization who takes up the challenge of ending this insanity.

Go Team!

I am familiar with the law that the links you gave explain. The problem is that a property owner has the right to kick you off his property for any reason. If you refuse you are trespassing and that is illegal.

What I am looking for is some kind of right/exemption enshrined in case law that states that a property owner cannot bar me simply for taking photographs.

Now I don’t want the right to walk into a private home and start snapping. I am talking about spaces where I would normally be warmly invited like malls, subways and the like.

This is from PRUNEYARD SHOPPING CENTER v. ROBINS, 447 U.S. 74 (1980)

Soon after appellees had begun soliciting in appellant privately owned shopping center’s central courtyard for signatures from passersby for petitions in opposition to a United Nations resolution, a security guard informed appellees that they would have to leave because their activity violated shopping center regulations prohibiting any visitor or tenant from engaging in any publicly expressive activity that is not directly related to the center’s commercial purposes.

So: While photography does not seem to be involved in 447 U.S. 74, does any case law exist to connect photography and “publicly expressive activity”?

P.S. If after all this I end up with the right to photograph in a mall but also the “right” to be nagged by a bunch of United Nations petitioners when all I want to do is buy tube socks, I am going to regret this.

There in spirit. Fuck YES, guys, good luck! Here ready to kick up a FIT if anything goes wrong. Bravo, everyone who is participating in this.

TAKE IT BACK TAKE IT BACK TAKE IT BACK.

/cough.

fMRI technology will continue to evolve. Your thoughts – won’t be so free anymore.

The police state starts with cameras, ends with us under brain scanners.

That is absolutely untrue. A property owner has the right to kick you off his property for any reason except an illegal reason. For instance, race, gender, disability, etc. Opening private property to the public carries with it a substantial set of legal obligations and relinquishing of property rights. The photography issue will not be resolved until it makes it to the US Supreme Court.

One of the keys to making this successful is bringing together different communities that have encountered this phenomenon of misinformed officials.

Airliners.net, a site for aviation enthusiasts with a strong photography community, would be a good place to start. Railpictures.net, is another bastion of geekdom with a dedicated community of photogs.

Anyone up for a flashmob (should it be a strobemob) in Philly? There’d be something apropos about descending on Independence Mall to make a point.

I’d call it self-organizing coherent madness. Everyone “just knows” that it is illegal to take pictures, because everyone “just knows” that “terrorists” need pictures to plan all those thousands of attacks that the terrorists have in the pipeline. The proof? There haven’t been any more attacks, so they are therefore correct in their “just knows”.

Something to contribute: Hendrick Smith, the writer who wrote “The Russians”, and later “The New Russians”, pointed out that in the early 20th century in Tsarist Russia, it was a crime to take pictures of railway stations for security reasons. He pointed this out as a fabulous example of their paranoia, both pre-Communist and after. Really, what threat would present itself if someone had a picture of the station? Ha ha, it is to laugh. Silly Russians.

Conclusion I’ve come to: people is monkeys. If you let them have their head, they will collectively pull you down and kill you because the voices tell them to, even if the voices are the ones they hear on the cable channels. A small number of rationalists since the dawn of the Enlightenment have made the world a somewhat saner and safer place to live. The rationalists are not in ascendancy now, and with population pressures driving violence, they will have a hard time gaining traction again.

Host your own Photographers’ Rights Day event.

You are of course correct. However I could point out that my “any reason” is not “absolutely untrue” but rather “partially incorrect”, but I would like to keep this thread on track.

I could also point out that while a landlord cannot post a “No Irish” sign by the entrance, they do have the right to “refuse service” to any individual. A few years ago a large shopping mall in my town started aggressively banning transients, the homeless, teenagers and anybody else they felt would “offend it’s customers”. The press and city government raised a fuss but in the end the law was clearly on the mall’s side. They got away with it because mall’s profiling did not target any of the protected groups you mentioned.

I am of course seeking to have photography added to that list of existing exceptions.

I’m bummed it’s on June 1, as I’m starting the AIDS LifeCycle ride from San Francisco that day. I’d love to partipate, but I’ll be making a statement in my own way hundreds of miles away.

I’m so excited! Good luck!!!

You want me to speak in nuances? That’ll cost you extra. I’ll be really interested to see how the law eventually views this. The closest metaphor that I can come up with is that you lose your right to privacy (as in conversation) when you’re in a public space. I’m hoping that The Mall has lost its right to privacy (of images) by opening up to the public. Realistically, it will depend on who’s on the court more than on the underlying ethics.

Hell Yes! June First is hereby BBATPA Official Camera Possession Day! All are urged everywhere to wear a camera in solidarity. Dig out the antiques to show them off, give the obsolete to those without! Make paper cameras for the kids! Wear camera T-Shirts! Bake camera cakes! Take back the Right To Make Images!!!