Add Country Identification For IPVM Commenters?

Tim, thanks. I've changed the title from "Country Identification Of Contributors" to "Add Country Identification For IPVM Commenters?" to make it easier for readers to understand.

Related, see: Mapping IPVM Members from 100+ Countries. It's from 2014 and we generated a Google Map then, copied below:

There would be more dots today and some more places added but that is likely still the same pattern.

As for putting a flag next to people's names, I might consider it as an optional feature but I certainly wouldn't require or force it to be shown as I suspect most people are not actively representing their country when they post on IPVM.

Related to this, (UK) Tim has complained numerous times about IPVM being too USA centric. Given that we publish and communicate in English, it's inevitable that the USA will have such a strong position since the USA is the largest English speaking nation (5x larger than the UK, 11x Australia, etc.).

Without the need to identify undisclosed contributors, I think it would be interesting and useful to identify contributors country of origin with their post details.

Are you suggesting flags for undisclosed contributors or not, it’s not clear to me.

- Undisclosed #1

I hereby request the following country identifier:

How about something a little more subtle like listing one's time zone? 

Uploadable flag icons would totally fit in here.  Especially now that we know that Velociraptors are cool and socks are optional.

...rodney (GMT-8)

I don't think the time zones will work at all. I doubt that a New York contributor will be discussing in the context as someone in Bogotá, or an eastern European post in the  post the same as a South African.

It's the subtleties that matter. Data protection requirements in the EU are massively different to the US. UL requirements are not the same as EN requirements. For CCTV recognition how many countries stick to the EN 62676-4: 2015 (pixels/m) resolution standards?

US contributors may not be aware that UL counts for nothing in the EU, with cost of certifying hardware to CE being prohibitive for a lot of US manufacturers - hence the absence in the EMEA of some US kit. Likewise, the strict BS EN50131 standards for intruder kit in the EU means that intruder equipment is probably the single most regionalism product within the sector.

I suggested a flag as I really don't see an issue with providing others with a context that an opinion may be given. 

Whilst I agree with your comment regarding patriotically influenced posts - this is already the case with reference to "America" being mentioned in virtually every discussion. As John has said, this can be expected as the majority of members are in the US.

I also agree that some discussions are also non-regionalised, but probably less than you may expect. The variations can dictate the perception of risk, quality and customer buying patterns.

I guess the simple way out, as suggested by John, would to be have an optional nationality flag, that I would more than happy to use.

Indeed, GDPR is huge and the fines that can be imposed on companies can be eye watering as they are based on 4% of Global annual turnover. 

I doubt very many US based global entities have addressed the issue yet - with only 16 weeks to comply. But it is typical of a major issue affecting the sector that probably doesn't have the coverage it deserves as it's seen as a non-US issue, which it most certainly isn't.

From the UK, although we are still going down the GDPR route, but given our historically extremely permissive use of CCTV, how GDPR affects any retention at all will most likely be decided in case law.

This will also have an impact on the use of Cloud, managed video storage and phone apps. It's a whole massive bag of worms.