July 22nd, 2008
Japanese iPhones Get Exclusive Feature to Prevent “Upskirts”
By Michael Santo
Editor-in-Chief, RealTechNews
In case you don’t know, an upskirt photo is one taken surreptitiously by pointing a camera upwards and … well, I’m hoping you can figure it out on your own, as well as the analogous downblouse photo.
It’s not something that I would have expected from somewhat uptight Japan, but apparently upskirt and downblouse photos have become very popular there, with the advent of high-resolution camera phones. Witness the photo above of a warning poster in a Japanese subway (photo by Jeff Epp).
Because of that the iPhone 3G has one “feature” in Japan that it doesn’t have in any other incarnation: no matter what the setting, the camera on the iPhone will always make a “shutter” sound.
This is because, to combat the aforementioned practice of prurient photos, Japanese phone manufacturers have taken to disabling the ability to silence the shutter sound on cameras and camera phones, as reported by freelancer Nobuyuki Hayashi.
However, it appears that Steve Jobs didn’t know about this “feature” of Japanese camera phones, as the first-generation iPhone didn’t have it. And now that the iPhone 3G has the feature, you can bet those first-gen iPhones will sell for even more than they currently do on eBay.
Keith says:
I don’t get it. You risk getting screamed at, slapped, maybe even jailed (not to mention what damage that discovery would cause the victim). All for a relatively low resolution photo lacking in detail and arousal factor compared to free, much more easily accessible photography or video available on the Internet to suit any taste or distaste.
I say good for Apple for this feature. Better yet would be a feature that starts making beeping noises / flash strobes if a camera is in shot mode whilst the lens is pointed upward. I am a prolific inventor and would patent that, but can only imagine the abuse my company and I would get for “IBM patents the anti-upskirt camera”.
July 22nd, 2008 at 7:53 pm
happy_surfer says:
do want this poster in hi-res.
July 22nd, 2008 at 10:53 pm
LZW says:
I honestly don’t know what to say… I believe this is the first topic I’ve ever read on Real Tech News about internet porn.
I bthink we’ve all seen porn before but lets cover some basics for the uninitiated… Japan has a very traditional culture but some of the younger people are as wild as any thing in American or European culture, and have been for many years.
Down blouse - Up skirt is a softcore voyeur fetish and taking up skirt pictures is infact illegal because it’s done secretively… I believe down blouse is legal because a woman can tell when a camera is pointed at her breast area.
As Keith pointed out, it’s possible to design a camera that cannot take a picture while pointed upwards. The easy way to do this would be a mercury switch with the help of gravity… (a common component in bimetal thermostats before they knew how poisonous mercury was) A mercury switch is a small glass tube with an electrode on each end and a small amount of mercury inside. (mercury is a liquid metal conductor) Laying flat, (horizontal) there is a connection… Pointed up, (vertically) all of the mercury falls to one end and there is no connection.
Even though I find nothing interesting about down blouse or up skirt, I try to be aware of what things really are since I’m a big fan of p2p/torrent stuff.
The latest japanese-centric fetish porn I’ve seen out there is something called blouse sharking and it requires 2 people + victim. Bassically, some horny japanese teenager will run up to a woman and pull down her blouse while his buddy records it on a cell phone camera.
In America, I’m pretty sure “blouse sharking” would be illegal… (a simple assault misdemeanor or something) Yet it fits right in with the voyeuristic nature of other japanese softcore fetishes so who knows how they may view it.
July 23rd, 2008 at 3:07 am
tornadoes28 says:
You shouldn’t be surprised about this aspect of Japan. japan maybe uptight but this activity is very common. It is related to the groping problem they have on crowded Japanese trains. They have even created female-only cars for some of their train lines so the women can feel safe from the groping.
July 23rd, 2008 at 11:48 am
Erik says:
The upskirt photo is about as sexy as “watching” soft core on a scrambled cable channel. But titillation is cultural. I’ve heard that women’s ankles are fetishized in places with the full coverage burkas.
July 24th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
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December 14th, 2008 at 10:04 pm