Amazon: We see you when you're Peeing, We know when you're unsafe...

[Bombastinator]

2 minutes ago, Jtalk4456 said:

OK, that was vaguely worded. I'm not referring to ANY government worker, just the main elected officials with the most possibility of corruption. President, Senate, House of Reps, Judges. This isn't to apply to local dmv worker or teachers, though in many cases they are already under surveillance due to the nature of the job, that's a different story. Both my parents were teachers, so I get ya on that and do apologize for lack of clarification and conflation.

1. Again it's not a crazy measure in it's own rights, but between Amazon's history and their investment in data and AI, I have a healthy skepticism. Legal is not always good.

2. Actually we can and do. There are many labor laws that currently exist. It doesn't feel like this is quite the same thing because of the new tech and how specific this is, but it's a simple issue of progress. Labor laws are in place to serve as a minimum standard of being treated fairly and respectfully. Now you and I may differ on how fair or respectful this is, but conceptually if enough of society (and the government of course) agree that there is a conflict of interest with Amazon collecting biometric data from non amazon vehicles or that delivery drivers can't be fired for not meeting quotas that are deemed unreasonable given the time and workload, then society is agreeing on a new standard of good treatment and then can force companies to treat employees according to the new standard.

3. I see what you're trying to say here, but in a literal sense it IS Amazon's problem. Amazon is a bohemoth who comes into an area and is creating tens of thousands of jobs and the ratio of good small business jobs to Amazon jobs go way down. It's simply hard to compete, and Amazon is well aware of this. On top of that, they often do not contribute much if anything in local taxes, keeping an area under poverty rates and dependent on the benevolent amazon warehouse to keep them afloat.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/27/technology/amazon-kentucky.html

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Brenda Allen, Campbellsville’s mayor, said: “Amazon has had a really good business here for 20 years. They haven’t been disappointed at all. And we’re glad they’re here.”

But, she added, “I really would feel better if they would contribute to our needs.”

In central Kentucky, Amazon has reaped benefits, including a type of tax break that critics label “Paying Taxes to the Boss.” In the arrangement, 5 percent of Amazon workers’ paychecks, which would ordinarily be destined for the county and the state, go to Amazon itself. The company netted millions of dollars from this incentive over a decade.

 

You might find it hard to believe nefarious plots of secret data collection and unauthorized use, fine. But when you come to a poor area, grab up swaths of land, make your big money making factory and pay everyone barely livable wages, and can't afford to even pay local taxes, instead taking 5% of your workers taxes for yourself, that is intentional and greedy. They create a dependence with these people where they can't afford to work there, but they can't afford not to.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/10/19/amazon-headquarters-seattle-215725/

I see someone has been playing red dead redemption lately XD

I'm honestly on the fence about them. IMHO, a union should be temporary with an everlasting threat. Company is treating bad so they group together enough they can make demands and the company can't find enough people willing to work in bad conditions. Once contracts are made and demands are met, the union disbands to continue working in the better conditions. There's a constant threat where they can do it again on a dime if the company starts acting up. I worked under the UAW for a bit and it was horrible. They were super pressuring, basically if you didn't agree to super large union dues coming out of every paycheck you would be hated and ostracized. And when I

 

 got fired and given no reason, I wasn't able to speak to my union rep or argue anything. It was just a money collecting scheme. Part of the issue is they were outside the company. They were basically paid attack dogs at the ready, apparently to do nothing in my case. They didn't actually work there so their only interest was the dues.

 

see above, I hate them

Never played RDR or RDR2.  RDR2 was on my Christmas list but it didn’t get bought.  Last game I played was breathedge.

[Jtalk4456]

15 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

The issue I think is no Union system at all creates abuse, a full fat union can create abuse, the mere threat of a possible unionization generally largely alleviates abuse, at least to some extent, but as unions lose power the ability of the threat to do that diminishes.  A middle ground might be an interesting development if it could be found, but the problem there is all it might do is create the same issue except the threat situation would be more abusive to workers.  A hard problem and a long term unsustainable situation. 

Like I said above, it should be a formation of employees, no dues, just people willing to stand up. That would give a constant threat to the employer that it can happen again if need be.

 

8 minutes ago, Lomac said:

 

Looks like they're using the Netradyne’s Driveri platform, which is a fairly bog standard fleet-based dash cam.  Generally you want dash cams geared to the fleet market because they're more reliable, are less prone to sensor issues, can operate in a higher temperature range, and can provide specific data points if you need them.  My company uses these in our tech fleet vehicles.  We do get notifications if the system detects a driver has exceeded the speed limit by x-amount (in our case, anything over 20km/hr) or if a driver has run a red light.  Any other data points we just use to act as a general overview of how the fleet is driving and don't care about any specific person.

This is an example of what the dash cam records:
Also, here's an Amazon driver's perspective on the dash cam:

Thanks for the info! I'm not sure if it's the same camera though. The new issue is supposedly about the biometric data from recording the face, and that video didn't show the driver at all. That kind of camera in the video shown I think is perfectly fine. The 15 min to turn off from the 2nd video, that's the kind of crap that worries me. 

[Bombastinator]

6 minutes ago, Jtalk4456 said:

Like I said above, it should be a formation of employees, no dues, just people willing to stand up. That would give a constant threat to the employer that it can happen again if need be.

 

Thanks for the info! I'm not sure if it's the same camera though. The new issue is supposedly about the biometric data from recording the face, and that video didn't show the driver at all. That kind of camera in the video shown I think is perfectly fine. The 15 min to turn off from the 2nd video, that's the kind of crap that worries me. 

Dues are funding for actions.  Money has to come from somewhere.  A union without dues is effectively an unfunded mandate.  The problem is things can go too far.  Called featherbedding.  The big example for that one were rail unions and firemen.  Firemen were the people that shoveled coal on steam trains.  When the switch to diesel electric came they were no longer needed but the union wouldn’t allow them to be laid off.  Instead they were given the silly job to “watch for fire”  

Edited March 27, 2021 by Bombastinator

[Brooksie359]

4 hours ago, Master Delta Chief said:

There's a solution to it, it's called unionize. Companies never should enforce policies that go against the rights of the workers in which in case for Amazon, they are. Unions in the US aren't exactly all that widespread, but there's some progress at least being made.

That not really a solution. What are they going to do strike? Then Amazon can simply replace them with other people. Sure you are protected from being fired by law for doing lawful strikes but you also aren't protected from the company finding replacement employees in which case you are effectively fired. If they were workers with some professional skills its not feasible to simply replace them but in this case they are not so striking likely won't work. 

[Bombastinator]

4 hours ago, Master Delta Chief said:

There's a solution to it, it's called unionize. Companies never should enforce policies that go against the rights of the workers in which in case for Amazon, they are. Unions in the US aren't exactly all that widespread, but there's some progress at least being made.

Unions have lost tremendous amounts of power rather than the reverse in the US. A lot of the things they fought for got codified into US law, with the side effect that they became less necessary.  The people that hated them still hated them just as much though.  Unions have been attacked in very subtle ways for a very long time in the US.  One interesting measuring stick is to look at the differences between what jobs union tradesmen do in red v. blue states.  There seems to have been a game for a long time revolving around how far can a company push its workers before they unionize in defense.   There have been numerous almost unionization over the years where management backs off just a hair at the last minute.  It’s a constant lean pressure though.  Every year it gets just a little harsher.

Edited March 27, 2021 by Bombastinator

[Brooksie359]

3 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

That doesn’t make any sense.  None of those have anything to do with nefarious reasons.  It’s real possible there aren’t any.  If there were it would change the dynamic completely.  I’m just talking about as is.  It’s a really invasive way to do what they want to do.  Jobs have pros and cons.  An easy fun joyous low stress job that anyone can do such as small childcare pays very poorly. A high stress difficult demanding job not everyone can do pays much better.  Because it has to.  If it didn’t the people would just choose young childcare and no one would do the other job.  By instituting these rules they make the job harder and higher stress.  This means if they want to fill the slots they’re going to have to pay more.  That’s how it works.  They’re not accounting for that in their calculations though and it could bite them.  I also don’t think you understand how collective bargaining works but that’s neither here nor there.  All companies have always been rabidly against unions.  Look up the history of the Pinkerton detective agency.  Someone told me once the organization still exists btw.  They just don’t advertise at all except through word of mouth which is also the only way to get contact information.  No idea how true that is.  Industrialist owners had a habit of murdering workers they thought caused problems a hundred years ago.  Dale Carnegie was a major player in that one, and he’s one of the most LIKED industrialists of all time. 

Collective bargaining only works if you have something special set of skills. There is a reason you don't see unions at McDonald's. Its because they are replaceable. What are the employees going to do? Strike? While it is illegal to fire an employee for striking if it is done lawfully it is legal for the company to find a replacement worker and once the strike is over for the employees to find out that they have been replaced. 

[Bombastinator]

13 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

That not really a solution. What are they going to do strike? Then Amazon can simply replace them with other people. Sure you are protected from being fired by law for doing lawful strikes but you also aren't protected from the company finding replacement employees in which case you are effectively fired. If they were workers with some professional skills its not feasible to simply replace them but in this case they are not so striking likely won't work. 

There are rules about how far a company can go with scabs and what all can be done.  It’s not quite that simple.  A company CAN break a strike with scabs.  It has happened. It only works if the job doesn’t suck though.  If the company attempts to find scabs with bonuses or higher pay, that is accounted for.

[Donut417]

12 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

There is a reason you don't see unions at McDonald's

And a reason why service at those places aint worth a shit, why they are under staffed and why they can never find reliable employees. 

 

The last stats I read a few years ago stated that 30% LESS high schoolers are getting in to the work force. Add to the fact that the population at least in the US is shrinking because people are choosing to have no kids to very few kids. The OLD WAY's of running business like McDonald's dont work. People now days are not going to put up being talked down to. So while fast food workers have skills that any one could perform, you have to have applicants wanting to work those jobs. In my area, if your 18 years or older and have half a brain you can probably make $12 an hour working in a warehouse not having to deal with ass holes all day. 

 

Fast food places in my area have to pay above the states established Minimum wage. Even then with the reputation most of these places have for working conditions they can barely find people. Mostly the people who work in fast food are there for extra money OR have felonies on their record and its the only place that will hire them. 

[Jtalk4456]

6 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

Dues are funding for actions.  Money has to come from somewhere.  A union without dues is effectively an unfunded mandate.  The problem is things can go too far.  Called featherbedding.  The big example for that one were rail unions and firemen.  Firemen were the people that shoveled coal on steam trains.  When the switch to diesel electric came they were no longer needed but the union wouldn’t allow them to be laid off.  Instead they were given the silly job to “watch for fire”  

dues are necessary for action, but there shouldn't be dues to just sit there and exist after the contracts are over. That is what I experienced with the UAW, they demanded I pay I think like 20-30 per paycheck, and they did me literally nothing when I was fired with no reason.

[Bombastinator]

$20-30/mo is perhaps high.  There’s a lot of space between that and zero though.  The UAW is an unusual union.  They’ve got full time workers that do nothing but be union reps.  As a brand new worker you’re going to get less support than someone who’s been there even 6 months.  Last hired first fired is common. 

[Brooksie359]

15 hours ago, Jtalk4456 said:

dues are necessary for action, but there shouldn't be dues to just sit there and exist after the contracts are over. That is what I experienced with the UAW, they demanded I pay I think like 20-30 per paycheck, and they did me literally nothing when I was fired with no reason.

Honestly you don't need a union to do something about wrongful termination. That being said it happens all the time and most people don't bother to fight it especially if the job doesn't pay all that well. 

[Bombastinator]

2 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

Honestly you don't need a union to do something about wrongful termination. That being said it happens all the time and most people don't bother to fight it especially if the job doesn't pay all that well. 

Heh. you don’t need it ANYMORE.  Wasn’t always that way.  One thing unions did was get a lot of their stuff turned into national laws.

[Brooksie359]

21 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

There are rules about how far a company can go with scabs and what all can be done.  It’s not quite that simple.  A company CAN break a strike with scabs.  It has happened. It only works if the job doesn’t suck though.  If the company attempts to find scabs with bonuses or higher pay, that is accounted for.

You realize that while Amazon does have some crapy practices they do lay fairly well compared to the alternatives. It wouldn't be hard to find people willing to work there. There is a reason why the majority of successful unions are in trades where there are skilled workers that are harder to replace. Also these trades typically make enough to support union dues that can help it run effectively. I doubt you would see this be all that effective if it were to happen at Amazon. 

[Brooksie359]

10 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Heh. you don’t need it ANYMORE.  Wasn’t always that way.  One thing unions did was get a lot of their stuff turned into national laws.

Tbh most wrongful termination law has to due with discrimination based on gender, race or age so idk if I would attribute that to unions as there has been a ton of work done by other groups to fight discrimination. 

[Bombastinator]

32 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

You realize that while Amazon does have some crapy practices they do lay fairly well compared to the alternatives. It wouldn't be hard to find people willing to work there. There is a reason why the majority of successful unions are in trades where there are skilled workers that are harder to replace. Also these trades typically make enough to support union dues that can help it run effectively. I doubt you would see this be all that effective if it were to happen at Amazon. 

I’m responding to the phrase “you know they haves some crappy practices they do lay costly well compared to the alternatives” I direct you to the matrons reply to Oliver Twist when he asked for more gruel.

 

As for finding people willing to work there, OK, maybe.  I’m not sure how much specific knowledge or training is required.  If it’s zero and the job is relatively pleasant compared to what else is out there at that pay level you could be right.  I strongly suspect though that even then the compensation level had already been balanced for the level of unpleasantness.  If so and they increase the unpleasantness level, which they apparently are, they may find themselves on the wrong end of the equation and unable to hire enough workers.  It’s effectively an obfuscated pay cut.   Maybe they’ll get away with it maybe they won’t.  I am a bit doubtful. And that’s without the tinfoil hat and assuming only the best of intentions from Amazon.  It only goes down hill from there.

Edited March 28, 2021 by Bombastinator

[Donut417]

9 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

$20-30/mo is perhaps high.  

The UAW handles all of the healthcare for union workers. Basically the big 3 made the UAW take over the healthcare as a concession in one of the negotiations a few years ago.

 

15 hours ago, Jtalk4456 said:

and they did me literally nothing when I was fired with no reason.

My dad filed a few grievances when he worked for Ford's, and the UAW did jack shit. Its part of the reason he doesn't really like unions.  

[Bombastinator]

9 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

The UAW handles all of the healthcare for union workers. Basically the big 3 made the UAW take over the healthcare as a concession in one of the negotiations a few years ago.

 

My dad filed a few grievances when he worked for Ford's, and the UAW did jack shit. Its part of the reason he doesn't really like unions.  

In that case theyre doing crazy well.  They have better healthcare than I do and at one point I was paying ten times that.  I was paying double that for really crappy almost worthless healthcare in the 80’s as a college student.

Edited March 28, 2021 by Bombastinator

[Donut417]

2 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

In that case theyre doing crazy well.  They have better healthcare than I do and at one point I was paying ten times that.

Keep in mind of how many employees the UAW have. I think health insurance is like anything else. When you buy in bulk you get a better rate. 

[Bombastinator]

2 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

Keep in mind of how many employees the UAW have. I think health insurance is like anything else. When you buy in bulk you get a better rate. 

Not that much better.  Remember, from double to 10 times the cost for less good care.  It’s still a great deal.

[Brooksie359]

13 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

I’m responding to the phrase “you know they haves some crappy practices they do lay costly well compared to the alternatives” I direct you to the matrons reply to Oliver Twist when he asked for more gruel.

 

As for finding people willing to work there, OK, maybe.  I’m not sure how much specific knowledge or training is required.  If it’s zero and the job is relatively pleasant compared to what else is out there at that pay level you could be right.  I strongly suspect though that even then the compensation level had already been balanced for the level of unpleasantness.  If so and they increase the unpleasantness level, which they apparently are, they may find themselves on the wrong end of the equation and unable to hire enough workers.  It’s effectively an obfuscated pay cut.   Maybe they’ll get away with it maybe they won’t.  I am a bit doubtful. And that’s without the tinfoil hat and assuming only the best of intentions from Amazon.  It only goes down hill from there.

No the pay was increased because the public wanted it to. It had little to do with people not wanting the job. Idk why it came up but at some point there was a trend of people pointing out that Amazon is basically the wealthiest company in the world yet it pays its employees so little so then they adopted the 15 dollars per hour thing for PR purposes. And let's be honest here its not easy to find an easily accessible job that pays 15 dollars per hour. Alot of places pay less than that or its a job that requires a set of skills. You will find it difficult to find a 15 dollar per hour job that basically requires 0 experience or college degree. Now you could argue that the less paying jobs have alot less stress and whatnot but at the end of the day getting paid less than 15 dollars per hour makes it much harder to get by financially. 

[Bombastinator]

6 hours ago, Brooksie359 said:

No the pay was increased because the public wanted it to. It had little to do with people not wanting the job. Idk why it came up but at some point there was a trend of people pointing out that Amazon is basically the wealthiest company in the world yet it pays its employees so little so then they adopted the 15 dollars per hour thing for PR purposes. And let's be honest here its not easy to find an easily accessible job that pays 15 dollars per hour. Alot of places pay less than that or its a job that requires a set of skills. You will find it difficult to find a 15 dollar per hour job that basically requires 0 experience or college degree. Now you could argue that the less paying jobs have alot less stress and whatnot but at the end of the day getting paid less than 15 dollars per hour makes it much harder to get by financially. 

I translate that as “workers are lucky to work for Amazon!  The pay is a gift over and above the value of their work!”

Public preference isn’t a normal cause of pay increase by a corporation.  Strikes me as odd. I could see them having to pay the same to all workers no matter their location though.   If they can make the job more unpleasant while not increasing remittance for it they undoubtedly will.  We shall see.  The company will know what they can get away with or not, or they are capable of finding out.  As far as 15 dollars an hour goes that’s barely minimum wage in some cities. Costs in different areas are not equal.  There are mcDonalds workers in NewYork that make more than that, and from the sound of it this job is going to be a lot more unpleasant than working at McDonald’s.  $15/hr. May be a lot in some rural red areas, but it’s not in a lot of the country.  It’s the issue of living wage vs non living wage. Rent on a not very nice studio apartment too small for even two people to live in is well over $1000/mo in New York.  The places where Amazon does most of its business could be hardest hit. If Amazon wants to pull out of a lot of cities I suppose they could get away with it. I doubt they do though.

 

what might happen is if they can increase pay in areas where the pay is not competitive they could get away with it, but that will cost money.  How much money lost vs how much money saved would need to be looked at.  In some places though they are going to have to  pay at least garbage man wages for a job less pleasant than being a garbage man.

Edited March 29, 2021 by Bombastinator

[Bombastinator]

On 3/27/2021 at 4:20 PM, Lomac said:

 

Looks like they're using the Netradyne’s Driveri platform, which is a fairly bog standard fleet-based dash cam.  Generally you want dash cams geared to the fleet market because they're more reliable, are less prone to sensor issues, can operate in a higher temperature range, and can provide specific data points if you need them.  My company uses these in our tech fleet vehicles.  We do get notifications if the system detects a driver has exceeded the speed limit by x-amount (in our case, anything over 20km/hr) or if a driver has run a red light.  Any other data points we just use to act as a general overview of how the fleet is driving and don't care about any specific person.

 

This is an example of what the dash cam records:

 

 

 

Also, here's an Amazon driver's perspective on the dash cam:

 

 

This guy is also contradicting a bunch of things claimed in the original post. It describes a different system than the one mentioned.  My understanding is that the system described hasn’t even been rolled out nationally yet.  Could be an older video.  I don’t know.  I can’t manage to find a date for the video.

Edited March 29, 2021 by Bombastinator

[Brooksie359]

2 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

I translate that as “workers are lucky to work for Amazon!  The pay is a gift over and above the value of their work!”

Public preference isn’t a normal cause of pay increase by a corporation.  Strikes me as odd. I could see them having to pay the same to all workers no matter their location though.   If they can make the job more unpleasant while not increasing remittance for it they undoubtedly will.  We shall see.  The company will know what they can get away with or not, or they are capable of finding out.  As far as 15 dollars an hour goes that’s barely minimum wage in some cities. Costs in different areas are not equal.  There are mcDonalds workers in NewYork that make more than that, and from the sound of it this job is going to be a lot more unpleasant than working at McDonald’s.  $15/hr. May be a lot in some rural red areas, but it’s not in a lot of the country.  It’s the issue of living wage vs non living wage. Rent on a not very nice studio apartment too small for even two people to live in is well over $1000/mo in New York.  The places where Amazon does most of its business could be hardest hit. If Amazon wants to pull out of a lot of cities I suppose they could get away with it. I doubt they do though.

 

what might happen is if they can increase pay in areas where the pay is not competitive they could get away with it, but that will cost money.  How much money lost vs how much money saved would need to be looked at.  In some places though they are going to have to  pay at least garbage man wages for a job less pleasant than being a garbage man.

Yep site the most expensive place to live in the US and then say that is the norm. The fact of the matter is 15 dollars an hour is a significant amount for a large portion of the country. If there are exceptions to this it would be in large cities but tbh if you are working at Amazon you really shouldn't be living in a city. It also doesn't help when you live in a state with much higher taxes like New York or California. I am fairly certain that they will get away with this until someone finds out they are using it for nefarious reasons or it is abused in some manner. 

[Bombastinator]

8 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

Yep site the most expensive place to live in the US and then say that is the norm. The fact of the matter is 15 dollars an hour is a significant amount for a large portion of the country. If there are exceptions to this it would be in large cities but tbh if you are working at Amazon you really shouldn't be living in a city. It also doesn't help when you live in a state with much higher taxes like New York or California. I am fairly certain that they will get away with this until someone finds out they are using it for nefarious reasons or it is abused in some manner. 

It is.  If Amazon drivers were paid differently by area such things could be arranged.  A pay bump for those living in NYC or other extremely expensive areas for example.  Cost of living by area makes a lot of difference. 
 

The problem with your concept of “you really shouldn’t be living in a city” is that is where over half of all deliveries are going to be.  If you work in a city the farthest away you can live is a suburb where the cost of living is generally near the same.  As it is a rush hour commute from a suburb to a city can be 45 min or more.  At a point you have to start factoring in commute time at which point pricing no longer helps because people aren’t paid to commute.  Standard amount people in the US seem to be willing to spend on commute time is something like 20 minutes.

[dizmo]

On 3/25/2021 at 8:01 PM, Jtalk4456 said:

1. In their personal vehicles? doubt it

2. To extend to that, it should be alright for isps to set up security cameras in customer homes so they can ensure no one is pirating content or looking at child pornography or hacking. That would reduce the rates of those crimes a ton. But of course that's silly, because privacy is NEVER irrelevant.
3. not amazons vehicle so yes they should be entitled to

4. Refer to the quote above on added pressure to perform leading to unsafe driving. 

 

So because the percentage of people complaining is small it's fine? Also I highly doubt there's only 5000 employees complaining... As you said it's entry level driving, it SHOULDN'T be hard it shouldn't be stressful. The fact that it is isn't a reflection on workers compatibility with the job, but rather the ridiculous working conditions Amazon has created.

1. Wasn't it already confirmed that it's for the Amazon branded vehicles? Even if it wasn't, that's something you can either choose to accept or not. Don't like it, work elsewhere that doesn't require it. Amazon is far from the only delivery service. Hell, they're far from the only delivery service that delivers Amazon packages.

2. You're comparing apples to oranges. You're not working for your ISP.

3. Not if you're using it for work. Same thing if you use a phone or laptop for work; they have access to that portion.

 

If you think we're ever going to live in a world where everyone feels the same about everything, you're enjoying a very fluffy cloud 9. You can never cater to everyone. There's loads of people that can't handle retail environments. When I was working retail, I hired and fired many. So, what does that mean? That all of retail should change because some people can't cut it? Nope. It means that there's simply some jobs that some people aren't cut out for.

On 3/25/2021 at 3:29 PM, leadeater said:

Basically every minimum wage worker that uses a money till, those almost always have a camera (multiple) pointing at them and around them. Not that this is the only use case for cameras watching workers or being in work environment. I can't walk in to my office building without going in to view of multiple cameras and if I go in the to the actual datacenter I'm covered by multiple angles and are used for my safety monitoring not just security, something could happen to me and someone would see it.

I get the feeling he's never worked a job where that's a situation he's come across, and thus it seems incredibly invasive to him, when really it's not.