Photography is Not a Crime

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The Battle of Los Angeles

October 4th, 2009 · 7 Comments

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By Carlos Miller
Here we have another video from Los Angeles photo activist Discarted who has an ongoing battle with the Universal Protection Service, the company that apparently guards all the important buildings downtown and whose guards tend to react negatively to photographers even though they don’t have any laws to back up their actions.

In the following video, the guard named Ivan starts hassling them for photographing the Gas Company Tower, which is owned by Maquire Properties.

The guard first tells them they are not allowed to take pictures of the building, even if they are standing on a public sidewalk, because the building is private property.

But then Discarted asserts his rights and the guard changes his tune, proving that these guards really have no clue about their job and have absolutely no skills in dealing with the public.

This all happens in almost ten minutes, which is a little too long for a Youtube video, in my opinion.

Also, Discarted tends to record his videos with one of those cameras that you wear around your neck – which is great because the guard doesn’t have a clue he is being filmed – but it’s horrible because all we see is the guard from the neck down.

For almost ten minutes.

Then to top things off, somebody filed a privacy complaint with Youtube about the video. Whatever.

(If you are reading this Discarted, please tell us about your camera and where you purchased it because I have readers who are emailing me inquiring about it.)

Via War on Photography.

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Tags: First Amendment

7 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Wicked Feleena // Oct 5, 2009 at 12:04 AM

    Discarted uses a “Vievu.”
    http://discarted.wordpress.com/2009/03/07/record-protect/

    http://www.vievu.com/

  • 2 discarted // Oct 5, 2009 at 7:19 PM

    carlos. thanks for the post. wicked feleena is right…i use the Vievu. Originally, the camera was made by cops for cops, but for obvious reasons cops and their unions are refusing to wear them. So the device is being sold on amazon and other retailers now. That way people like us can catch various assholes assaulting us or violating our 1st Amendment rights. Too bad you didn’t have one when you were arrested.

  • 3 Carlos Miller // Oct 5, 2009 at 7:22 PM

    Discarted,

    I just noticed the video has been removed “due to terms of use violation.”

  • 4 Jay // Oct 5, 2009 at 8:03 PM

    Um, YouTube…what’s terms of use where violated here? Stupid idiotic DMCA.

  • 5 ALL BE DAMNED // Oct 5, 2009 at 10:05 PM

    hey i was looking forward when i had time to see the video WTF

  • 6 Carlos Miller // Oct 5, 2009 at 10:09 PM

    Just upload it again to Vimeo or Viddler.

  • 7 discarted // Oct 6, 2009 at 2:32 AM

    the video was removed by youtube for a “privacy” rights violation even though the entire encounter took place on a public sidewalk. it’s BS. others have uploaded the video to youtube though. just do a search for maguire properties and it will pop up. i’ve uploaded it to vimeo too, and will give viddler a shot.

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