NYC-Dublin real-time video portal reopens with some fixes to prevent inappropriate behavior

When installing a video gate in a public park in the heart of New York City, inappropriate behavior is likely to occur. The portal, a vision of Lithuanian artist and entrepreneur Benediktas Gylys, was designed to bring people together and allow them to share common experiences.

After it opened earlier this month, the vast majority of people who came to the portal from both sides of the Atlantic greeted each other, brought their children and pets, and did friendly human things. But there are a handful who have behaved badly, including an OnlyFans model, who flashed the portal, and another man who visited it.

Some people on the Dublin side held up swastikas and photos of the burning Twin Towers, and officials on both sides decided it would be best to take a break. The main problem was people installing cameras directly on the gate camera, preventing people visiting the facility from seeing what was on the other side.

Organizers have taken a number of measures, including building a non-permanent fence around the gate to discourage people from directly accessing it. Additionally, they now have one or two people guiding the experience to try to encourage more friendly interactions.

Also for now, instead of operating 24 hours a day as Gylys wanted, it will operate from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. in New York and 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. in Dublin.

Nicolas Klaus, partnerships manager at portals.org, says they were surprised by this behavior because they had not experienced this during a previous Portal installation between Lithuania and Poland. The New Yorkers and Dubliners brought a different vibe.

“There were some behaviors that were not ideal. You saw this with someone showing a photo from 9/11, which we don’t know what that person’s intention actually was, but it was just irritating,” Klaus told TechCrunch. Additionally, he said it violated the artistic spirit of the exhibition. “The artistic intention is to provide a window where people can connect. If a single person blocks the entire screen by simply placing their hand on the portal camera, that is not the purpose of the project.

One way to solve this problem was to use software to prevent people from blocking the camera. Video Window, the company behind the software that runs the portal, came up with a machine learning solution while the portal was on hiatus to discourage people from doing so.

Daryl Hutchings, CEO of Video Window, said the software is designed to work with a timer, so it’s not a problem setting hours of operation, but finding a way to discourage people from holding their phones up. the portal camera was more difficult. .

“If a phone or someone’s hand blocks the camera’s view for a period of time, we will immediately blur the local camera feed, meaning the far side will see a blurred image. And then on local display, we blur that as well,” Hutchings said. It also displays a sign indicating that the offending behavior is prohibited on the side where it occurs.

The intention is simply to show whoever is doing it that they are not supposed to block the camera. Creators are experimenting with how long it takes to blur it, but since the portal reopened on Sunday, there have been no incidents that would trigger the blur. This suggests that fences and human guides help encourage more positive interactions as the designers hoped and intended.