Railroads "Policing" Youtube?

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

One of the best know railroaders on youtube was a guy with the user named “TheRecorder”. He had alot of video of train including in-cab videos of rides and sitting at a signal videoing other trains go by.

However, about a month or 2 ago, BNSF (who he worked for) found his videos on youtube and made him take all of them off. This made alot of his friends and hundreds of subscribers quite angry. He also luckily still continues to work for BNSF.

I am not suprised that their arent many cab videos on youtube, with the way that it is “policed”. However, the ones that are are exceptionaly good made and informative videos.

What I am asking is, dont you think that railroads should have more important things to do than be looking at videos on youtube to make sure there is no cab videos?

Do truck companies search youtube trying to catch one of their drivers making videos of the cab in their truck for truck fans? I dont believe so.

I know its a matter of “safety” but how does having a camera sitting in the cab (not being held) in any way affect the safety of the train? I can understand the engineer holding the camera and trying to run it at the same time; but if the train is stopped and your holding it or if it is sitting on the dash, is it really that unsafe?

2

While it’s great to see such videos, try to put the shoe on the other foot. Would you allow someone to put a camera in your car? And post the resulting videos on YouTube? With today’s litigous society, there’s always somebody out there looking to sue somebody for something, and if you hand them some evidence on a silver platter, well, great!

As more than a few people have found out, such postings have a way of coming back and biting them later.

You can be sure that if a railroad was to approve such an activity, the video would be thoroughly scrutinized for potential liability, etc, before it made it into the public arena.

Not to mention that by virtue of it being an electronic device, it’s a rules violation, too.

3

An increasing number of video cameras are being made at factory with encoding GPS that puts a very small stamp inside the video or picture showing exactly where the image was shot on the Earth.

Some cameras are capable of finding thier own wireless connection to net and automatically uploading media if not streaming it hot to the net.

I deliberately use older hardware and am careful where to shoot trains. Once uploaded it stays.

Besides the railroads ought to be thankful for more eyeballs on thier trains. Makes things safer and have evidence should something really bad happen.

4

Troll ALERT!!

LC

5

Hmmm… Thats a interesting statement… I hope you have some evidence to back that up.

Probably 80% of railfans who want to view videos go to youtube, and cab videos probably make up a good perecentage of those searched, because alot of people want to see them.

I post a thread about the fact that the most well know cab videographer had to remove his videos and asked why, and I am cited as a troll? Logic please?

I have been on the series of Trains forums for over 2 years now, with probably 90% of my postings to Classic Toy Trains, because I am a O Gauge Modeler.

I come here a few times to ask some questions that bother me, but when I do so, I am calle d a troll? Logic please?

Perhaps this is forum where you need to be “approved” to post. I’m pretty sure its not.

Now if possible, I hope this thread can go back to the orginial thread subject. The first couple of posts where very informative and what I wanted. The third, not exactly.

6

I’d think that what you do in your workplace should stay there. Youtube?, a fodder pile. The guy most have gotten far from his job to even think of doing that.

Management should have canned him or put him on a rehab program.

RIX

7

Folks, the rules are clear. No electronic devices operating when you are on-duty. Not cameras, not games, not I-pods. Cell phones are allowed in emergency situations, and as redudant communications. Laptops only for rules reference.

What I am hearing is, a bunch of folks who want real railroaders to risk their jobs for some videos, the heck with Safety.

8

The guy is lucky to have not been disciplined. You’ve got to be dumber than a box of rocks to break the rules and then flaunt it on youtube. It’s guy like that who make it worse for the rest of us.

9

To your first question, yes, and that’s the whole point. The rule was theirs to make, they posted the rule, the rule was willfully violated, and when they learned of it they acted to support the purpose of their rule. What about that is odd?

I don’t know about trucking companies in this respect, largely because they are irrelevant, just as would be lead acid batteries, bus companies, dandelions,…whew…the list is endless. But how this company learned of the videos is also irrelevant. They learned, and then acted in keeping with their internal policies to ensure compliance. Again, is that odd?

Finally, about safety. Wantonly flaunting one’s own disregard and disrespect of one’s employer’s rules doesn’t sound like a very safe, or smart, thing to do. If you want oddity, that would indeed be odd.

-Crandell

10

Hmmm. Writing in about an area clearly within the private property of the railroad from which outsiders are excluded by law. An area considered both safety and security sensitive and from which heavy, very heavy equipment is controlled and you think that because railfans are interested in cab videos that somehow matters?!?

You are either trolling for railroader responses or you are completely clueless.

Neither you nor any employee has any right to shoot such video and such video is clearly in violation of safety rules, Federal Regulations (FRA and TSA at least) and possibly even Federal Statutory Law. The individual shooting the videos should have been fired and I’m somewhat surprised he (or she) wasn’t.

Oh, and I don’t care if you don’t like either of my responses, as I am and have been in the RR industry for some time both in operations (Engineer and Conductor) and Management.

LC

11

I have been away from this forum for a few months, come back and this is the first thread I look at.

Has there been much tension between railroaders and railfans lately for the railroaders to come down so harshly on magicman?

I found the answers by Tree68 and Selector very helpfull as I am not working in the industry, are an ocean away etc. If I were new here and every question I had would be answered by railroaders on the forum in this way it would turn me away very quickly.

In short, LimitedClear your answer this time was particularly unhelpfull because of the way you answered and it annoyed me greatly, in youtube terms it was a thumbs down. Please, when we have a question do not answer it in this way again. I prefer you remain silent.

12

All Class 1 roads, and most others for that matter, have the same basic rules about employees taking photographs and videos on property while on duty…simply put, any such photographs and video is the property of the railroad, and must be submitted to the carrier prior to publication.

I take quite a few photos of the railroad where I work, and as a matter of safety, never do so while I am on duty…it is dangerous, and a violation of my railroads safety rules.

If BNSF had their employee remove the video from youtube, there are some fairly good reasons to do so.

Said video may have shown proprietarily information or procedures, or may have contained footage that management felt left the carrier liable in some way…it really doesn’t matter, it is their railroad, their locomotive, and their employee, whom they are paying to run a train, not a video camera.

Imagine the result if, while he was video tapping, the train was involved in a grade crossing accident.

I can easily imagine the prosecuting attorney asking the engineer,

“So, instead of paying attention to your surroundings, you were adjusting your video camera, and didn’t see the car approaching the crossing…”

Or asking management, “Does BNSF routinely allow their engineers to play with cameras and such while operating something as dangerous as a train?”

By allowing this video to remain on youtube, it could be argued that BNSF encouraged or endorsed such actions, which leave the railroad wide open for all types of lawsuits.

I would imagine that the Risk Management folks from BNSF routinely surf the net looking for such things, as do the same folks at UP…their job is to protect the carrier from liability, not entertain railfans.

You guys need to understand that when a railroader does post photos or video, he or she is risking their job doing so.

If it comes down to my job, or your entertainment, well, guess which one win

13

its not just youtube they look at… big brother from the railroads is everywhere where employees might post censitive company information for the public… even here…

csx engineer

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[quote user=“edblysard”]

All Class 1 roads, and most others for that matter, have the same basic rules about employees taking photographs and videos on property while on duty…simply put, any such photographs and video is the property of the railroad, and must be submitted to the carrier prior to publication.

I take quite a few photos of the railroad where I work, and as a matter of safety, never do so while I am on duty…it is dangerous, and a violation of my railroads safety rules.

If BNSF had their employee remove the video from youtube, there are some fairly good reasons to do so.

Said video may have shown proprietarily information or procedures, or may have contained footage that management felt left the carrier liable in some way…it really doesn’t matter, it is their railroad, their locomotive, and their employee, whom they are paying to run a train, not a video camera.

Imagine the result if, while he was video tapping, the train was involved in a grade crossing accident.

I can easily imagine the prosecuting attorney asking the engineer,

“So, instead of paying attention to your surroundings, you were adjusting your video camera, and didn’t see the car approaching the crossing…”

Or asking management, “Does BNSF routinely allow their engineers to play with cameras and such while operating something as dangerous as a train?”

By allowing this video to remain on youtube, it could be argued that BNSF encouraged or endorsed such actions, which leave the railroad wide open for all types of lawsuits.

I would imagine that the Risk Management folks from BNSF routinely surf the net looking for such things, as do the same folks at UP…their job is to protect the carrier from liability, not entertain railfans.

You guys need to understand that when a railroader does post photos or video, he or she is risking their job doing so.

If it comes down to my job, or your entertainment,

15

Yes, it’s far better that LimitedClear spare your feelings than tell you the truth.

IMO it was a very helpful answer - he clearly ans succinctly explained why in-cab videos made by traincrew are a no-no. If you had an ounce of sense you’d realise this.

Mark.

16

the guy is lucky to have a job as rrken said he broke the rules and that is that. It dont matter what the public likes its a buisness and truth be told if your taking pictures they can stop you. even in the picture that you take it can show your treaspassing, they can have you fined, if you catch someone breaking a rule ( smoking in cab getting on moving etc) you get them disaplined or fired, then you wonder why railroaders dont wave or want you around. its your money cause i turn everyone in.

17

So, employees of any given company should be able to post sensitive company information on the web??? I don’t follow… It’s not “Big Brother”, it is a business protecting it’s interests. In this electronic information age, companies have to take steps to make sure that their trade secrets, procedures, and etc, are not made public, or made available to people who shouldn’t see them. If a group of people put their money together to develop a business idea, then, shouldn’t they have the right to reasonably protect that investment? Companies, from Microsoft to Kellogg’s Cereal have trade secrets, procedures, and other things that they must protect from falling into the hands of their competitors, lest they lose their competitive edge. So what if a company goes to forums and other message boards that are industry specific (Trains.com could be considered “industry specific”) looking to see if sensitive things leak out about their company. I worked at a company about 10 years ago, where we dealt with the manufacture of color laser printers, a field that was highly competitive back in the late 90’s. Since I worked in the Field Service unit of the company and had access to all of the technical info about the company’s products, I had to sign a confidentiality agreement, and my email and phone calls were regularly monitored, as was everyone else’s in my department.

So, if the BNSF yanks the videos on You Tube, then that’s their business. The first time I saw a “cab ride” video on there, I was wondering just what the crew member was thinking. First off, I don’t find the videos all that interesting, but that’s beside the point. My first comm

18

Security, liabilitiy and safety. Railroads have to consider those three important things when deciding on such matters. They fear that an “enemy” could learn too much about the railroad and its operations (carry over from WWI admittedly then more sustainable an arguement after 9-11). In fact many rule books or timetables warn employees to be suspicious of people asking too many questions and tell employees not to give any information when asked. Of course, in the filming of such a ride or whatever, someting happens that the railroad is liable for, the film could be used against them. And if someone gets hurt because of this or during this unauthorzed filming, then there could be bad reprecussions. Plus, if an employee is supposed to be doing his job and is instead filming, that’s another serious matter to be concerned with.

19

Well, I have been away from this forum for a reason as I have to deal with some complicated personal issues that leave me in a very irritated state of mind.

The tone of LimitedClear’s answer seemed to me different then he used before I left this forum.

I leave it at that as I do not want to irritate railroaders. They have been helpfull before explaining things about their job and I appreciate that very much.

greetings

20

Man…he had the best videos! Just noticed there gone…wow