We will digitize the output of those cameras. We'll use CU-SeeMe shareware to send the video out. The question, of course, is where to send the video. Well, we West Coasters are eight hours behind the UK, which is eight hours behind Australia, which, in turn, is eight hours behind us. So when it's prime crime time in any of those places, it's late morning or early evening in the others.
People are wide awake, and, if they are Wired types, they are near their computers.
The plan is to find neighborhoods in the UK and Australia that also have high nocturnal property-crime problems, and that are also inhabited by computer users. They'll set up cameras in their trouble spots and patch them into the Net, too. Imagine that I'm sitting in front of my PowerBook one morning, writing fiction or balancing my checkbook. Suddenly a window pops open on my screen, showing me live video from Australia. If the culprit is a stray dog or a tree blowing in the wind, I hit the green button, and the window is dismissed.