Ghost story makes it to Australia

Okay, some people prefer to suspend disbelief more than I do. The ghost-in-the-gym story has made it to Australia.

I love how every story about this makes sure to mention that bugs, dust, and headlights have been ruled out. Those, of course, are the only possibilities. If it's none of those things, it must be a ghost. Clearly.

Maybe the best press release ever

This came into my email box today. I'm pretty happy about it.

Dear Boss,
 
Please check our new product information and waiting for your reply.
Thank you, keep in touch and have a nice day.
 
Our products also have some advanced features:
Simultaneous MPEG-4 and Motion JPEG
Two-way Audio with Built-in Microphone
Mobile Phone Streaming Live Video through 3GPP/ISMA RTSP
Built-in Multi-window Motion Detection



James Sung

Okay, there are a bunch of product descriptions, too, that I cut out. Boring. I mean, "No way! Your camera has superior low-light performance?!? Wow. And a 1/3" Sony CCD?!? It's like I've been searching for you all my life, but no camera maker could ever fulfill my every dream the way you can. Let's get married."

Products don't matter. It's the form of address that counts. If you start out your email with "Dear Boss," it's just about a guarantee I'll read through it. Other greetings you might try: "Hey Champ"; "How's it hanging, Big Guy"; and, maybe if you're of the opposite sex, "Dear Sweet-Cheeks." Those are almost certain to get my attention.

On a serious note, how on God's green earth are integrators and end users supposed to make heads or tails of all these camera manufacturers? And how do all these camera manufacturers all turn a profit? The mark-up on those things must be amazing.

It's meta-surveillance video

You post-structuralists out there will appreciate this story:

Jacksonville police have video of someone stealing surveillance video.

I know. Wha?

The story is about as badly organized and constructed as possible, but the first paragraph gets the gist of it:

One day after three men robbed a young mother at gunpoint, inside her home - someone stole the surveillance video from detectives. That theft was caught on camera.

I mean, that's a really crappy couple of sentences (is there a reason for the hyphen?), but the point is that one crime (the robbery of the young mother) was caught on home surveillance footage. And then that footage, which was in the possession of the police, was stolen. And they got that crime on video, too.

And, seriously, I've got to go through the whole rest of this article because it's just too crazy in so many ways:

Doctor Royce McGowan refuses to watch Wednesday's surveillance video of the invasion into his Arlington home. His wife, mother-in-law and baby were inside the home when the men kicked in the front door.

"I just listened to it once. I can't listen to it again. It enrages me," said McGowan.

Yes, really, that's the next paragraph in the story. Yes, you can figure out why we're talking about McGowan (I like how they spell out "Doctor" - that's totally AP style), but it's not actually clear from the preceding paragraph which seems to talk about a young mother. And in the first paragraph, why was only the young mother relevant? Usually, if there's a baby involved, that baby's in the lede (that's a journalism term there - you're supposed to spell it wrong). And why are we talking about "listening" to surveillance footage? Shouldn't we be watching it? Did McGowan refuse to watch the video and only listen, and only do that once before turning over the footage to the coppers? I'm confused.

He gave the video to the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office. He hopes the clear pictures of the men will help detectives find them.

Why are we in the present tense for the second paragraph here, especially considering this next sentence?

However his home surveillance video was stolen from police. The theft was caught on his office surveillance camera Thursday. "Crime is everywhere - you can't escape it," said McGowan.

This doesn't really seem like a potential problem. How could the video be stolen? There was only one copy of the footage and that was given to the police? What was it a VHS tape or something that they didn't make a copy of? This doesn't seem remotely possible. And I'd like the "his office" to be a little clearer. Why are the cops interviewing the couple at McGowan's office if the incident happened in their home? I'm still confused.

While a JSO detective was interviewing the couple inside the office, the surveillance cameras caught a man pulling up next to the detectives car in the parking lot.

It would kill people to use apostrophes correctly. How do we show possession? Maybe by writing "detective's"?

After scoping out the car for more than 10 minutes, the man broke out the car's back window and stole the laptop.

Inside that laptop was a DVD of the surveillance video from Wednesday's home invasion. "Without that... we wouldn't have any recollection on who did it," said McGowan.

Okay, I love that a guy was able to smash the window of a cop car, steal a laptop, and get away without anyone doing anything about it. That's awesome. But, seriously, why is a reporter acting like it's news that a DVD of surveillance video was stolen? Is it possible that's the only copy of the footage, like there's a security camera out there that just spits out DVDs and if you lose that DVD, well, you're SOL (that's also a very important journalistic term, but I'm not going to spell it out for you)?

Isn't it more newsworthy that a cop's laptop was stolen? That seems like a bigger deal to me.

McGowan had just moved into the Brentwood Avenue office two months ago. The cameras have been in place for fewer than three weeks.

This doesn't seem relevant to me, but those are, indeed, two declarative sentences.

His security company, Homeland Security Group, was able to replace the DVD. The laptop and the thief are still missing.

Huh. So that first paragraph, where it was newsworthy that the surveillance video was stolen, was kind of disingenuous, wasn't it? Because you, the reporter, already know that footage was easily replaceable and therefore this isn't news. And what about the surveillance footage of the laptop theft? Did we get a license plate number? Is the face visible? No idea. At least they named the security company. That's a rarity.

JSO says there is no sensitive information on the laptop.

This might be my favorite part. A cop's laptop has "no sensitive information" on it? How are we defining "sensitive" here? What does he use the laptop for? Playing Minesweeper when he's bored by the side of the highway? So, a cop's laptop is stolen from the back of his car and we're worried about the DVD inside of it? Super.

McGowan plans to add cameras to their home and business.

Why? You caught both recent crimes on video. Is this just a last sentence because it seemed like there had to be a last sentence somewhere?

Well done, award-winning news anchor Victor Blackwell (or, more likely, Victor's intern). Well done.

Are the spiders getting to you?

That was the single worst photo of a spider I could find. They're apparently "camel spiders" (not sure if this information is urban legend or not) and they terrorize soldiers in Iraq. Apparently they like to hide out in sleeping rolls. Gives me the crawlies.

Anyway, such spider interest is triggered by the following press release that came in today. For some reason, this product seems oddly very attractive. Perhaps you want to buy a "tin."

QED, UK distributors of security equipment and accessories have developed a new spider deterrent in the form of an aerosol spray.

The product, called Spiderex has been launched under their new Midas brand.  It is a specially formulated clear spray which when applied to any area will deter spiders for up to 8 months.  This is a revolutionary new product that has been developed specifically for the security industry.

It's "revolutionary," mind you.

Spiders like creating their webs in warm places, which, unfortunately for security installers, includes around CCTV camera housings and PIR detectors. This, in effect, causes false alarms with PIR detectors or build up of material in front of a CCTV camera. In any case, maintenance is required to resolve these issues.

Too much time has been spent by installers getting rid of spiders and the issues they cause for security systems. QED’s Marketing Manager Matt Byrom commented: “Spiderex is a simple product yet having a can will provide a massive impact on the time spent on maintenance and profits of a security installer.”  He continued “In fact, even if Spiderex was to stop one service call it would have paid for itself many times over.”

A "massive" impact.

QED believes this will solve one of the biggest causes of false alarms in CCTV systems and also stop the build-up of spider related material such as webs in CCVTV cameras and housings.

Spiderex is on Special Offer now at £5 OFF per tin + FREE Delivery and available from www.spiderex.co.uk.

Please, please, please leave some comments (click on the word "comment" below - it's easy) on whether spiders are actually a big problem for you on the installation end. I'm desperate for some good spider stories. Seriously. I hate spiders. And my wife always makes me kill them. You should have seen the size of the dock spider I killed in the living room of our lake house last week. I hit it with my shoe, but kind of whacked it instead of leaving the shoe on the carpet and the spider bounced about three feet into the air and scared the crap out of me. But then it was pretty dead.

China Security & Surveillance

I was cruising around my standard financial pages today, which includes The Motley Fool, a sort of consumer-plus investing strategy site (I probably read it because they print bits of it in my local paper). I was surprised to see a glowing account of China Security & Surveillance, a manufacturer that seems to be way under the radar for the amount of business its doing.

Here's the Fool's take:

Highly-rated China Security is considered by some to be a stock on sale. The security company is seeing not only rapid sales growth, but consistent profitability without an extreme valuation.

The company recently reaffirmed strong guidance for first-quarter and full-year 2008 based on $100 million in new security contracts won in the final quarter of 2007. Despite the optimism, in a market where many companies are increasingly downgrading forward growth projections, China Security trades at a very palatable 8.7 times forward earnings.

They did $65 million in 3Q sales in 2007. Did you know that? I never would have guessed they were that big a company. Looking at their growth, they could easily do $300 million in 2008. Where are all those cameras going? How come I never hear of anyone actually installing their equipment? Is everything going into China? If so, why are they listed on the NASDAQ?

Edit: My fault - A savvy reader notes that China Security trades as CSR on the NYSE. Find the details here.

More from my colleague, Ling-Mei Wong, who's an editor at A&S International Magazine, an English trade publication based in Taiwan.

"We have a sister publication in English called China Best Buys, which is based in China. According to their reports (the magazine just launched last year and doesn’t have its own Web site yet), CSST was listed on the New York Stock Exchange last October. It pretty much corners the market for security, being very aggressive with manufacturing mergers. (From a draft of my colleague’s article: “CSST’s subsidiaries encompasses all major products, from front-end to back-end devices, such as HTZ and Minking for box, bullet and speed dome cameras; DIT for digital transmission devices; HighEasy for compression board products; Chenova and Skyvision for DVRs; Stonesonic for LCD monitors; and Longhorn and Alean for alarm detectors.”) A newly formed division within CSST is China Security and Surveillance Manufacturing, or CSSM, dedicated to managing manufacturing.

As you mentioned, most of these brands are unknown outside of China, but domestically, CSST is doing very well. Having the bragging rights to be the first Chinese security provider to go public in the United States has also boosted its credibility."

There you have it. Keep an eye on CSST and CSSM.

Worst PR ever for surveillance camera installation

Okay, so this happened in China, where maybe privacy isn't as closely held by government employees, but having surveillance footage of people kissing on a subway platform show up on YouTube has got to be the worst possible PR for those pushing cameras as a way of reducing crime.

Here's the video. Sorry, couldn't resist.



If this happened in the U.S., I'm pretty sure Nancy Grape's head would explode.

It would be wise, in general, for security professionals of all stripes to acquaint themselves with privacy laws and best practices. If you can advise your customers in this area, you might find yourself with another piece of RMR, acting as an outsourced chief privacy officer.

If you're looking to start down the path of privacy, you can't do better than the IAPP. And, hey, they're in Maine, so they must be smart.

CCTV in "Little Guyana"

It's hard to pass up these mainstream videos from news organizations covering the proliferation of cameras in public spaces. It's such a great window into how the general population feels.

We talk often about educating the end user, but maybe not often enough about educating the level below the end user. Is this something SIA could take on? A general public educational campaign about the benefits of CCTV? It might get more municipalities buying, I think, with less public uncertainty and cynicism.

Go here to check out the latest from NYC. Pardon the ad that starts the video - everybody's got to pay the bills somehow.

Nice mainstream piece on a courthouse installation

I always point out when the mainstream press gets security wrong, so I thought I'd point out this article that really does a nice job of explaining to the general public what's going on at their local courthouse. Nothing revolutionary, but the installer is interviewed and the nuts and bolts are outlined well.

On a smaller note, I can't decide what to think about this quote:

"The courthouse can be a violable place," Armentrout said. "If something were to happen, we hope to be able to respond to it adequately."

Did he really say volatile or violent, and violable is a typo, or did he really say violable, using an archaic adjectival form of the verb to violate? Meaning, I guess, the courthouse can be a place where people are violated, in the broad sense of the word?

Good times for camera sales in FLA

This story, from First Coast News in Florida, is classic mainstream journalism regarding security systems - in that it's terrible.

Basically, the story is "Security Camera Sales Skyrocket," but, of course, they give no actual evidence for this supposed skyrocketing, they don't consult any of the easily available market research data gatherers (Frost & Sullivan have overall camera sales growth at about 8.6% for 2006), and they take the word of one integrator, Certified Security, as gospel for the entire industry.

Now, Certified is a fine First Alert dealer and I'm sure owner Joe Hassan knows what he's talking about, but check this part of the story:

Hassan says business has skyrocketed in the past 18 months because the devices have become less expensive, and more necessary.

"People do less bad and more good when they know they're being watched. It's a fact of life," said Hassan.

Actually, this is not a fact of life. There isn't, in fact, a direct correlation between people knowing they're being watched and their behavior. Just see this study on intersections where people are told they're being filmed and the rate of red-light running. Or, even better, this study about convenience store robberies.

And I quote:

Cameras were removed from control stores that previously had them and put into experimental stores. Also, the experiment was announced publicly to make potential robbers aware of the changes. The results of the experiment showed that there were no statistically significant differences between experimental and control stores. In fact, robberies decreased in all stores except Baton Rouge, where the increase was too minimal to be considered significant. These results suggest that increased reliance on cameras as opposed to other robbery prevention techniques is not effective. However, there are problems with drawing inferences from this experiment since randomization was not used.

People who commit crimes are not rational actors. They're motivated by something much stronger than reason - usually a need for drugs, really. I believe cameras are great for business efficiency and for catching people after they commit crimes, but they simply don't work as deterrents unless they have analytic capabilities that can alert a responder in real time to prevent the crime from occuring. You'd think a news organization would look into that sort of thing. It's a kind of interesting slice of human behavior.

Here's more from the news article:

"Your alarm systems prevent and detect, your video camera's actually after the fact, help catch, prosecute, and basically give proof to put someone in jail," said Hassan.

Okay. Sounds reasonable. Is there a reason we're making cameras plural by using an apostrophe?

"Camera's catch everything," said Shea.

Wow, they did it again.

Hassan says some businesses that have really gotten into the surveillance systems are day cares and insurance companies that are requiring the companies they insure to have the cameras installed.

Another feature of the surveillance camera's, is that you can access them from anywhere in the world on the internet.

A third time! Cameras are apparently so special and selling so fast that you need to make them plural with apostrophes! Now that's skyrocketing. Also, I love that this is the last paragraph of the story. They didn't feel any need to elaborate on this point? Also also, I'm sure Hassan is mostly selling to day cares and small businesses that are mandated by insurance companies to have cameras installed, but is it likely that these two verticals are where you find most cameras installed? I'm thinking not. Good reporting First Coast News. Don't you have a car crash to cover somewhere?