Thursday, November 06, 2008

A Proactive Reaction

ShotSpotter, Inc., the leading developer of mission-essential acoustic surveillance systems for law enforcement, homeland security and military end-users, announced today that the City of Troy and the Troy Police Department will implement the ShotSpotter Gunshot Location System(R) (GLS) as a part of the department's latest approach to proactively combating gun crime.

I hate to be contrary, but wouldn't "proactively" mean it could do something about it before the shots were fired?

What, will it send Doug and Tony back to just before the shooting, to tackle the guys?

And y'all have read "The Black Arrow," right?

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

So the 'safest' city in the region will surely be even safer with this waste of taxpayer bucks...time to turn out the mayor and fire that toy lovin' police chief.

jon said...

oh these things are neat! i've always wanted to get someone to pay me to research them, but unfortunately they don't do anything useless and popular like reduce carbon in the atmosphere. but anyway, experiment time!

observation: spot shotters have to be mounted on top of vehicles or buildings or poles or some open place in order to function correctly without being subject to too much echo.

hypothesis: a single shot placed on the spot-shotter itself immediately disables its capabilities. even if the device survives the impact, the kinetic energy is transferred to the entire frame creates internal vibration and therefore interference.

observation: the spot-shotter can fix a direction even when only a single gunshot is fired.

hypothesis: what criminal will bother firing just one shot anymore? unload into that crowd with cheap hardball ammo and make sure the guy on your turf is dead! have a rock solid alibi that's only 176 degrees and 700 feet away!

Anonymous said...

Taking down the "sonic net" was my favorite part of "The Black Arrow."

But, in the meantime, we all need target practice...

Unknown said...

Does it work by using minority report technology?

Kent McManigal said...

I have read "The Black Arrow" and think it is time for him to begin his sacred work.

Anonymous said...

In the (old, but excellent) video game 'Deus Ex' during your visit to Hong Kong the police used gunshot detectors placed throughout the city.

Everybody just used swords and suppressed firearms. Wasn't all that safe.

Anonymous said...

I wish my town would put one of those systems in. I would have a good time with that.

John Hardin said...

"Proactive" in this case means "Hey look! We're doing something!"