Talking CCTV cameras have been installed at two Norwich parks with the aim of slashing anti-social behaviour. Eight cameras at Waterloo Park and one at Eaton Park have been connected to their own loudspeaker system and, through Norwich City Council’s 33-screen, £500,000 CCTV control room, the voice of a camera operator will boom out across each park to tell off those causing a nuisance, committing low level crime and anti-social behaviour. Norwich City Councillor Bert Bremner, responsible for community safety and cohesion, said: “It is a really positive thing for the city. “These will be ways of embarrassing people and reminding them. Someone being told off for dropping litter will respond in a reasonable way, and I believe most people will say sorry and do something about it. There will be some that won’t and, if the matter is serious, the police will follow it up.” The council, which used a £35,000 grant to pay for the installation of the high-tech talking system, is one of 20 areas to receive funding for the project ran in partnership with the government’s Respect Unit. Six full-time operators man the cameras 24 hours a day and there is a direct communication link between the police and the CCTV control room.

I consider being watched by cameras in public anti-social behavior. This has become so commonplace, it seems pointless to even post it. I suspect that’s the plan and it could be working. I’m not familiar with the size of this park or the scope of the problem, but with the cost of the system and 6 full time “operators”, why cant they just hire POLICE to patrol the parks?

A police motorcade the length of a football field escorted troubled pop star Britney Spears to a Los Angeles hospital early Today to get her some help…

She was removed from her home for a “mental evaluation hold,” according to the L.A. Times.

It took the better part of the day to arrange the transport plan, (an) officer said…

Andrew Blankstein, a Los Angeles Times reporter who was at the scene of Thursday’s incident, told CNN that a police convoy, stretching the length of a football field, accompanied the ambulance as it drove down Coldwater Canyon Boulevard — in part to keep the paparazzi from getting too close.

If you’re a redneck junkie – or Black or hispanic – you and three of your friends get tossed in the back of a black-and-white and end up in the detox tank.

New Thoughts On Language Acquisition: Toddlers As Data Miners

Indiana University researchers are studying a ground-breaking theory that young children are able to learn large groups of words rapidly by data-mining.

Their theory, which they have explored with 12- and 14-month-olds, takes a radically different approach to the accepted view that young children learn words one at a time — something they do remarkably well by the age of 2 but not so well before that.

Data mining, usually computer-assisted, involves analyzing and sorting through massive amounts of raw data to find relationships, correlations and ultimately useful information.
[...]
“This new discovery changes completely how we understand children’s word learning,” Smith said. “It’s very exciting.”