I don't really understand his point, it's obviously quite different to passive surveillance cameras which: don't follow you around (are avoidable); don't generally record sound with enough fidelity to discern conversations; and are operated by more reputable entities than some random creep. It wouldn't surprise me if his behaviour in the videos wasn't already illegal.
You could be under active, persistent public surveillance with no way of knowing it is happening, and this would be totally legal in many places.
Why is his behavior illegal? What law is he breaking? Public nuisance, maybe?
Your reaction depicts the typical attitude to surveillance. What this guy is trying to point out is that we are already under surveillance and we have no control over it and no idea who is doing it or how thoroughly they are doing it.
I think it's reasonable to imagine a not so distant future where surveillance equipment can cover all those things: 1) are ubiquitous, 2) can record excellent audio quality (and perhaps be transcribed and automatically analyzed), and 3) is cheap enough for any venue (or random person) to own.
Exactly, the article even mentions Google Glass. Think about the future, what if everyone is recording you, your casual interactions in public. Gets as creepy as those videos pretty fast.
It is not that different though — Is your point that it is slightly easier to hide from surveillance cameras? Even the hidden ones?
"operated by more reputable entities than some random creep", you know you're talking about companies in a capitalist society, right? Not exactly famous for being particularly reputable to say the least.
The avoidable/not following around/no sound aspect comes in question with the increasing Drone popularity. And after all most of those "reputable entities" are most likely using some form of human being with various levels of "random creep"ness as the operator.
In a year or two there will be a lot of people with Google Glass that will be able to record audio and video very conspicuously in these types of settings.
Many surveillance cameras do capture sound. It's important in investigations to know what was said during an incident.
There are technologies like ShotSpotter - http://www.shotspotter.com/ - which according to the NYT has enough fidelity to pick up things like "doors slamming, birds chirping, cars on the highway, horns honking." as well as conversations:
Why do you feel safer just because every surveillance camera is "passive"? If you walk along a street, you will still be "followed" by the surveillance system over multiple cameras.
