Depending on whom you ask, it's either a smart crime deterrent, or it's the next step towards our collective Orwellian future. Slashdot reports today that Shoreditch, a community in London's East End, has launched a television channel which consists entirely of live feeds from hundreds of surveillance cameras situated around the neighborhood. England has been in the throes of a closed-circuit television boom for some time, but the Shoreditch experiment appears to be the first time a "CCTV" network has effectively been turned into broadcast television.

Not surprisingly, privacy advocates are concerned, while those behind the new channel downplay their concerns. "This is not naming and shaming or spying," says James Morris, CEO of tech-provider Digital Bridge to The Telegraph. Most Slashdot readers are dubious, however, both about system's efficacy in fighting crime, and the notion that it is not an invasion of privacy. Comments one reader, "CCTV cameras are known to have a definite effect on crime: they displace it to camera-free areas." Says another: "The issue is not just whether you're monitored in real-time (that's bad enough) but that you are being recorded for all time! Worse, you're being watched by people with the power to have you arrested if they so choose."