Geyser Notes

So the camera was down for a few hours. When it finally came back (or at least, I was able to check and see it was back), what was I treated to? The camera operator focusing in on some dancing fools with cell phones. (13:18 on 16 Oct to be precise.) I've noticed more and more lately that the camera operators have been zooming in on people, like later that afternoon on a couple with the two large dogs walking away from the camera after an eruption. It's getting kinda creepy, actually. And not in a good way.

When the still camera went online years ago, some morons at the VC thought it would be cute to change the OF prediction to say "Hi Matt!". They were treating the camera as a personal toy, and this is no different. I watch it to see geyser activity, not to see people playing games with it, not to snoop on people minding their own business, and definitely not to see people make fools of themselves. And in this case, make fools of themselves with the help of the NPS.

Why do I complain about this? Keep it up and there's going to be an incident that gets this camera turned off. Anybody remember the advertising fiasco? The NPS's first reaction is to always panic, assume the worst, and then to clamp down. By focusing in on friends acting stupid, the camera operators are only making sure that that incident, and a reaction to it, becomes more likely.