Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

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661-Pete
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by 661-Pete »

[XAP]Bob wrote:So why do smoke alarms come with circa 10 year expiry dates?
You are the Marketing Director of a medium-sized Smoke Alarm company. Your brief is to promote more and more sales of your Company's products. You have ten seconds to come up with an idea..... :twisted:
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The fat commuter
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by The fat commuter »

Ellieb wrote:I drive a car. I don't carry a camera.
I walk. I don't carry a carry a camera.
I cycle. I do carry a camera.
Are people suggesting that my personality changes when I get on a bike and I suddenly end up spoiling for a fight? Or is it perhaps something to do with the way people behave towards me when I am Cycling

No, no-one on here is suggesting that.

What the problem is is that in the same way that drivers of a certain German car make have got a bad name because a few of their drivers are discourteous to others. Or the fact that the occasional white van driver who drives badly has given white van drivers a bad name. Or the fact that some cyclists jump red lights so the general perception amongst Joe Public is that all cyclists jump red lights.

Not all camera carrying cyclists are people who go out of their way to draw attention to bad motoring skills - some use the camera as a 'just in case' type of tool. For some that tool has worked - there are people who have been knocked off their bikes in roadworks where a sign states single file. There have been assaults where unfortunately the police haven't done anything so the video has ended up on YouTube and the jury has been the public. But there are other videos out there where a motorist makes a mistake and the cyclist pounces on it, races after the motorist with the goal of having a go. Sometimes they even put themselves at danger by doing so. These are the videos that are seen by the public that are meaning that before long a generalisation is going to start that cyclists with cameras are spoiling for a fight.
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by [XAP]Bob »

It's that the majority of poor drivers gravitate towards premium German cars...

From my experience driving a white van it's actually quite hard to cut anyone up - they just stop as they see you approaching...
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
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irc
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by irc »

[XAP]Bob wrote:
irc wrote:
maxcherry wrote: :shock: NO NO NO!

Please check your batteries and give it regular tests. Wouldn't want to see any harm coming to the bikes......or you.


Don't need to. It goes from silent to giving single beeps when the battery gets low.


You just have to hope the battery doesn't fail prematurely - which could leave it without the power to beep.

Also check the date on the alpha source...


I rely on burning toast once or twice a year to ensure it still works.
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Lance Dopestrong
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by Lance Dopestrong »

The helmet cam footage is usually interesting. Of the head mounted cams, see how many cyclists actually don't bother looking left or right or even behind them how many turn or pull from the gutter to primary without shoulder checking. A lot of even the conscientious and otherwise sensible riders exhibit quite poor road craft

Then there are the camera vigilantes, the small but massively high profile minority who give every one else bad name.

I don't use a camera, and rely on riding safely, anticipating the world around me, and actually looking around me now and again and don't seem to get into the scrapes that these camera boys do.

At best a camera is good for a bit of legal retribution after the event. It does nothing whatsoever to actually make you any safer.
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karlt
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by karlt »

irc wrote:
[XAP]Bob wrote:
irc wrote:
Don't need to. It goes from silent to giving single beeps when the battery gets low.


You just have to hope the battery doesn't fail prematurely - which could leave it without the power to beep.

Also check the date on the alpha source...


I rely on burning toast once or twice a year to ensure it still works.


Sausages. It's almost impossible to grill sausages without setting off what we now refer to as the sausage alarm.
Tom Richardson
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by Tom Richardson »

Lance Dopestrong wrote:
At best a camera is good for a bit of legal retribution after the event. It does nothing whatsoever to actually make you any safer.


The law doesn't allow retribution - only that you should be at least no worse off as consequence of someone else's negligence. So if the law is on your side it's useful to have evidence to back it up in the face of the inevitable denial.

And as motorists become aware that they can't run in to you with impunity they're likely to take more care, which in turn does make you safer.
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by Vorpal »

karlt wrote:
irc wrote:
[XAP]Bob wrote:You just have to hope the battery doesn't fail prematurely - which could leave it without the power to beep.

Also check the date on the alpha source...


I rely on burning toast once or twice a year to ensure it still works.


Sausages. It's almost impossible to grill sausages without setting off what we now refer to as the sausage alarm.

Maybe I should burn more stuff cooking... :shock:

Actually, I go around and replace all the batteries in the smoke alarms once per year, then use those batteries in less critical stuff, like toys. I also test them (using the little 'test' button) after I've installed the new batteries.

As for helmet cams.... Like everything else drivers with dash cams are 'just protecting themselves' agaisnt claims, etc. but the same camera somehow transforms a cyclist into an aggressive maniac?
“In some ways, it is easier to be a dissident, for then one is without responsibility.”
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by The fat commuter »

Why are we talking about smoke alarms in a debate about helmet cams?

Vorpal wrote:As for helmet cams.... Like everything else drivers with dash cams are 'just protecting themselves' agaisnt claims, etc. but the same camera somehow transforms a cyclist into an aggressive maniac?

But it doesn't! It makes some cyclists into aggressive maniacs - not all of them. The problem being is that as more and more videos make their way into the public domain where a motorist has made a mistake and a cyclist goes out of their way to belittle them then the public will start t think that all helmet cam cyclists act that way, and then that all cyclists act that way.

Cameras have their use. Someone does something dangerous and the evidence can be supplied to the police and some form of education can be given and maybe some punishment. Whether this happens, we are not to know - I've heard some people say that it has happened and some say it hasn't.

However, what I see on the majority of these videos is a cyclist going out of their way to say that they are better than someone else. Yes, the driver made a mistake but is there a need to chase them down, wind them up to a state that they start making fools of themselves and then put that online? The 'Clown takes a pratfall' video comes to mind a lot in this mindset of winding up motorists. Yes, that fella in the Peugeot was a first class idiot but the cyclist knew after he had his first verbal encounter with him that the motorist was not going to back down. Why not be a bigger man and just forget about it there and then - you've made your point but it hasn't sunk in. Is there a need to goad the man so that he makes a fool of himself and then let the whole world see? What if that man had some past that the press got hold of that they turned against the holder of the video camera? Suppose the press make out he was a war hero from the first Iraq war who had suffered from psychological issues and anger problems - but had got over these through therapy and then this cyclist comes along and winds him up. It doesn't even have to be that true - once the press get hold of a tiny smell of a better story that will sell their papers then they will and mud will stick.

I get some close passes occasionally. I get motorists cutting in on me - usually I make a type of gesture of "astonishing was that all about?" Not any aggression towards the other driver. Sometimes after doing this the next driver that passes me will make a gesture at me in the tone of "Blummin' heck, that was close". In my mind, whilst the first motorist got away with it - but maybe he saw my gesture, the second motorist thought about things and he/she will give just that little bit extra thought around cyclists. Cloud cuckoo land - maybe. But going out of one's way to humiliate people or have heated arguments is bad for cyclists in general.
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661-Pete
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by 661-Pete »

I believe that cameras should be inconspicuous. Not to go so far as the hidden 'spy' camera so beloved of James Bond and the like, but at the very least, something not likely to be noticed before the other road user actually comes to a halt and engages in aggro. That's one of the two reasons why I go for a handlebar mounting (the other being, I don't have a helmet to fit a camera to.... :roll: ). There's often a lot of stuff on the handlebar already, you can easily 'bury' your camera amongst it.

If I wanted a second, rear-facing, camera, I'd stick it on the seat post, I think.

The fat commuter wrote:Why are we talking about smoke alarms in a debate about helmet cams?
Mea culpa, I'm afraid. I was putting across the point about 'fit and forget' as being equally applicable to the camera - until you need it. But by all means, could people try to stay on the original topic of this thread from now on, please?
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by Psamathe »

One important aspect I've wondered about this issue is that of CCTV and "Data Protection". There may be a case that helmet/bike cam video recording is effectively the same as CCTV (i.e. video surveillance); arguably you are not taking a photograph of something but carrying out general surveillance and outside your property.

And if it is the case that helmet/bike cams constitute CCTV, then recorded images come under the Data Protection Act which gives those recorded a number of rights e.g. that you have to let people know they are being recorded, that they can request copies of the "information" (video) you are holding on them. And I would suspect that publishing personal details about them on the internet might be questionable becaus eof privacy cnsiderations.

https://ico.org.uk/for-the-public/cctv/

In the past I've considered getting a video recorder/camera thingy and I've considered getting a vi-vis waistcoat with "Video Recording" on the back (even with no camera) - yet to date I've done neither and the decision is still in-limbo.

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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by The fat commuter »

Psamathe wrote:In the past I've considered getting a video recorder/camera thingy and I've considered getting a vi-vis waistcoat with "Video Recording" on the back (even with no camera) - yet to date I've done neither and the decision is still in-limbo.

Ian

I've often wondered whether simply having a waistcoast with the camera sign on it would have a positive (or negative) effect on drivers' behaviour?
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by blackbike »

I'm not surprised a motoring group dislikes helmet cams.

They are not too keen on speed cameras or any cameras which record the bad behaviour of motorists.

Rather than whining about cameras why don't such groups concentrate their efforts on telling motorists to obey the law, to drive in a considerate fashion and not to explode into paroxysms of hilarious temper when they get annoyed?

Then the cameras would have nothing noteworthy to catch on film.
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by Vorpal »

The fat commuter wrote:But it doesn't! It makes some cyclists into aggressive maniacs - not all of them. The problem being is that as more and more videos make their way into the public domain where a motorist has made a mistake and a cyclist goes out of their way to belittle them then the public will start t think that all helmet cam cyclists act that way, and then that all cyclists act that way.

But cameras don't make anyone, anything. I'm not sure why a few individuals feel the need to publish recordings of them reprimanding drivers, etc. I've said something to drivers a couple of times when I felt they had endangered me & I saw a chance to *politely* have a word, but I generally avoid it.

I have, on the other hand been harrassed, verbally abused, run off the road, deliberately 'buzzed', and had overtakes close enough to make me ward the vehicle off with my hand out to the side. They aren't things that have happened often, but an accumulation of incidents amongst thousands of largely safe and happy miles.

Riding with a camera is relatively easy and might make the difference someday. I haven't yet gotten one, but every time I have a close call or scary incident, I consider it. IMO, if all motorists behaved the way the best do, there would be no need of cameras. Maybe the aggressive maniacs would be playing rugby or something.
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Re: Helmet Cams Are Inflaming Road rage

Post by reohn2 »

Lance Dopestrong wrote: ....I don't use a camera, and rely on riding safely, anticipating the world around me, and actually looking around me now and again and don't seem to get into the scrapes that these camera boys do.

Neither do I,but a couple of recent very dangerous and deliberate intimidating incidents by drivers has made me to think seriously about it.
One deliberate extremely close overtake on a very wide road with a high 'teens mph side wind from my left,when the fourth car in a line of vehicles which had given me 2m+ of room(obviously seeing me struggling with the wind)I was o/taken with inches to spare,and followed by physical threats,which I'm convinced could definitely have lead to a prosecution if I'd had camera footage.

At best a camera is good for a bit of legal retribution after the event.

That would be my primary reason for using one,though it could also perhaps teach me a thing or two by hi-lighting any failings I may have in my own riding/driving,though I do try to constantly evaluate any bad habits I may have developed.
It could also be used for fun recoding my off road rides too.

It does nothing whatsoever to actually make you any safer.

See above.
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