David Brin's Official Web Site: "The Transparent Society" (Chapter One)

Tiny cameras, panning left and right, surveying traffic and pedestrians, observing everything in open view.



Have we entered an Orwellian nightmare? Have the burghers of both towns banished muggings at the cost of creating a Stalinist dystopia?



Consider City Number One. In this place, all the myriad cameras report their urban scenes straight to Police Central, where security officers use sophisticated image-processors to scan for infractions against the public order -- or perhaps against an established way of thought. Citizens walk the streets aware that any word or deed may be noted by agents of some mysterious bureau.



Now let's skip across space and time.



At first sight, things seem quite similar in City Number Two. Again, there are ubiquitous cameras, perched on every vantage point. Only here we soon find a crucial difference. These devices do not report to the secret police. Rather, each and every citizen of this metropolis can lift his or her wristwatch/TV and call up images from any camera in town.



Here a late-evening stroller checks to make sure no one lurks beyond the corner she is about to turn.