‘We Sold Pictures of a Man Cutting His Hands Off For Entertainment Purposes’: The Story of Mr. B and CCTV

Abstract

Chapter 4 suggested that CCTV systems do not form part of a growing network society (Castells, 1996) of ever more connected information flows, rendering bodies and information more mobile, in greater quantities, over greater distances (Urry, 2000). It also suggested that town centre CCTV systems did not involve the automated functioning of power (Smith, 2004). Instead it was suggested that accounts of town centre activity flowing through CCTV’s data-flow were messy and contingent, while much work went into the continued separation of the information flows of CCTV and a local bank. It was argued that greater connectivity between town centre systems was resisted, rebutted and reformulated in line with financial and privacy concerns. While local people did make connections between such technological systems as CCTV and the bank (e.g., when calling for CCTV attention during the use of cash-points), these did not form a network society, but a series of temporary, ad hoc and uncertain (or partial, Strathern, 1991) connections. Through paying attention to the closed-circuit of CCTV and the bank’s attempts to avoid further town centre connectivity, it could be argued that in place of ever greater connectivity, there was continuity in system separation which only altered slightly with the introduction of new technologies.