Customers don’t know what they want until you show it to them. Steve Jobs said that. But he wouldn’t sell you a creepy doorbell.
There are things we think we can’t live without. For example, I am sure I need bananas for my mental health and well-being. Until about a hundred years ago, someone like me may not have known what a banana was. How did my ancestors (who I think were serfs under the Russian czar) survive without them? Some of us may not think we could survive without DoorDash, Uber, Tubi or Weebo, Flibo or Gluppo. Yet none of these curiosities existed until a few years ago. People were fine without them. How could that be?
Ring is an Amazon subsidiary that sells surveillance cameras that are also, in theory, doorbells. The problems with Ring are heavily documented. Footage from it is shared with law enforcement, used for facial recognition and has invasive terms of use. Ring recently tried to partner with the tech company Flock Safety to give police access to live footage and information wherever these cameras are installed.
Surveillance cameras aren’t new. After a crime, cops can go into businesses and see if they have footage that can be used to build a case. What is new is individuals’ ability to have a surveillance camera that is hooked up to everyone else’s. I imagine that soon this footage will be mainlined directly into your local cop’s Meta Ray-Ban sunglasses.
Not everything law enforcement does is for the greater good. A lot of us are upset about ICE. Ring technology is being used to track people, causing them to distrust their neighbors and fear going outside. It was only a matter of time before this technology was turned on groups of people who should be protected.
Ring is not for catching porch pirates. It’s for the domestic abuser cop trying to catch his runaway partner. It’s for jailing peaceful protesters. It’s for finding people who are sheltering immigrants. By owning one of these cameras, you are not making yourself safer, you are making yourself useful. That in exchange for knowing who’s at the door without getting out of bed? So you know when your damp, 30-minute-old burrito arrives – complete with a photo of the person who brought it to you?
I know there are places where neighbors don’t trust each other, where there is danger everywhere one turns, where the sound of a knock at the door brings fear. But we live in Somerville. We are meant to be a community. We live stacked on top of each other in triple-deckers, we hang out in coffee shops, we go to Porchfest. Despite that, whenever I walk by many of my neighbors’ homes, their doorbells take my picture. To them I say, if you really want to see me, just knock on my door.
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