A Moogle  🏳️‍🌈 💻 🎮 🎶 🇸🇪

Who is this person going around telling people that they'll magically not be trespassing in a privately-owned business while foolishly recording their impotent vitriol towards a hapless retail employee if they only claim that it's "for their safety"?

It seems like people in the USA generally have a wildly incorrect perception of how, why, and where you can record people on your cell phone. So here's a free bit of advice (not legal advice, just advice) from an ignorant jerk who grew up around a parent going to law school.

"In public" doesn't mean "everywhere that isn't your home". If you're in a business, you're not in public. If the company owning the business is publicly-traded on the stock market, you're still not in public. So just forget that stupid line of argument.

Second, if you're in public, you have no reasonable expectation of privacy. It's not illegal for someone to record you on his or her cell phone. You might strongly prefer that they not do so, but it's not illegal. Please stop claiming that it is. It just makes you look stupid.

Third, if you're in someone else's business, you still have the right to record - to a point. If an authorized employee of the business tells you to stop, you don't *have* to, but at that point you will be trespassing, and the police can and should be called on your entitled ass.

Basically, at the point at which you're asked or told to stop recording, you can continue to record, but unless you're doing so while you walk your petty ass out the door, you're trespassing. "Hurr durr it's for my safety!" are not magic words.

So yes, you can record in public. Businesses are not "in public". You can still record, though, if you're okay with getting a trespass warning. And if you're a retail employee, it's not illegal for someone to *record* you. It's illegal for them to still be there while doing so.

I’m honestly kidding when I ask this but what if I have a cohort who’s pretending the hold a door open for “someone” and I film from the street using a zoom lens. Quid pro quo. Checkmate. Now king me.