Front-window spy cam puts Tenderloin on the Web

nevius_0084_df.jpg C.W. Nevius, columnist with the San Francisco Chronicle. Photographed in San Francisco on 8/3/06. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) nevius_0084_df.jpg C.W. Nevius, columnist with the San Francisco Chronicle. Photographed in San Francisco on 8/3/06. (Deanne Fitzmaurice/ The Chronicle) Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice, The Chronicle Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Front-window spy cam puts Tenderloin on the Web 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

Somewhere in a room with high ceilings and a wall full of law books, the city's deep thinkers are still arguing about how to use San Francisco's video surveillance cameras.

More than three years after they went up, that civic camera program is still mired with restrictions, regulations and red tape. Nobody's watching the 76 cameras' feeds, the cops can't rely on the tapes for clear footage, and prosecutors say they're often worthless.

The city will likely ponder this issue for years more. Meanwhile, citizens and business owners have their own program, installing cameras at entrances to stores, apartment buildings and restaurants. More often than not, the police use these cameras to solve murders, assaults and thefts.

And now a self-described computer geek named Adam Jackson has gone a step further. He's created adamsblock.com - one of the hottest live shows on the Internet - simply by pointing a camera out his Tenderloin apartment window.

Jackson, 22, moved to the city in June from a small beach town in Florida and quickly discovered the realities of San Francisco real estate. Prices were so high that he said he "jumped on the first place I found."

It turned out to be on Taylor Street, just across from Glide Memorial Church. It's an ideal location - for watching crack deals, late-night violence and random crazy behavior.

"By the third night I was basically fed up with the crime and noise," Jackson said. "I didn't really have a plan. I just put the Webcam up, my girlfriend made a little Web page to display it, and here we are."

If you haven't checked out adamsblock.com, you are missing one of the greatest at-work time-killers ever to pop up on your monitor. There are two cameras, both on 24 hours a day, and a real-time chat room that crackles with activity. And no wonder - there is always something to talk about.

Jackson's camera has caught a man throwing himself into the side of a bus, apparently hoping to work an injury scam. It didn't work. The bus didn't stop. Viewers have also watched fights, car chases and break-ins.

If it sounds like an idea that might attract a crowd, you're right. After clips were posted on YouTube, the original group of 50 viewers grew to more than 500,000.

A dot-com company gave Jackson a high-resolution camera and Lefty O'Doul's, the nearby restaurant, chipped in for a microphone. Jackson got the new camera Monday and started the improved site Tuesday.

The results have been pretty dramatic. In three days, adamsblock.com has had 80,000 views and 25,000 visitors, a remarkable 40 percent of whom live outside the United States. On Friday, a woman from the United Kingdom joined the regulars in competing to see who could be first to identify the number stamped on the trunk of taxis that drive by.

"At any given time," Jackson said, "there is an average of over 100 people in the chat room."

Jackson is now hoping to parlay that interest to a fundraising effort for Glide Memorial. Starting at noon on Dec. 13, he will host a 24-hour live Web fundraiser. He's hoping to pull in $5,000 to help fund Glide's programs.

That's all great, but there's more to this. With people watching at all hours of the day and night, some of them have watched crimes taking place. Viewers picked up the phone and called 911, and the police arrived in no time flat.

Last week Jackson stopped by a neighborhood bar a few blocks away and noticed something interesting.

"I saw a lot of the old regulars who used to be on my block," he said. "They'd moved since I put the camera up."

That's not unexpected, said police Capt. Gary Jimenez from the Tenderloin Station. Take the vicious, gang-related shooting on Turk Street in August. As soon as it happened, his officers went to local businesses and found "four cameras, all of them positively identifying the guy and his accomplices. We caught him two blocks away."

Of course, there was a city camera that also captured the scene.

"But we didn't get the tape for three days," Jimenez said.

Jackson knows how effective the private cameras can be. Late one night when three characters stood on his sidewalk yelling, "We're going to shoot you," Jackson knew he was on to something.

Now Jackson, who said his day job is as a social media consultant, is eager to take this to the next level. He says if interested people in high-crime areas e-mail him (adam@dailytechtalk.com), he will help set up a camera. He only asks that the new sites split any advertising revenue with him. Jackson envisions a network of cameras, tied together through a single Web site, so viewers can keep an eye on the streets at all hours.

Of course, that was the original idea behind the city's cameras. The problem is that they've become so entangled in red tape that they are rarely effective. Private operators, like Jackson, may be a real alternative.

What about those who say they are they an invasion of privacy? They will not get a sympathetic hearing from Jimenez.

"What's the big deal?" he said. "We may have a thousand cameras in the Tenderloin. You cannot walk down the street without being filmed. If a few more people want to jump on this, I say God bless 'em."