Don't panic: We just need 'safe selfie' guidelines

Selfies or self-photography via smart phones are a rage globally. Everybody from President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Narendra Modi to celebrities like Amitabh Bachchan to ordinary folks on India Gate and Marine Drive seem to love selfies. For a nation of a billion plus population with one billion phones, selfie has truly become an obsession with people, especially the youth.

Clicking one's own image with a phone is a fun element that smart phone companies introduced in their products. Millions of self-clicked images are shared on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram every day. Yet selfies are also becoming a nuisance at public places, public functions and even funerals.

The death of two young girls in Mumbai while attempting a perfect selfie by the sea has exposed dangerous dimensions of this new digital habit of smart phone users. The Mumbai Police is reportedly considering "no selfie" zones on city beaches to prevent people from going dangerously close to the sea for a perfect angle. In July last year, the Russian Police had launched a safe-selfie campaign following deaths of youth posing with weapons, with slogans like "a cool selfie could cost you your life". Such high risk behaviour has been reported from other countries as well.

When camera phones were introduced almost 15 years ago, concern arose about invasion of privacy at public places like restaurants and university campuses. Early camera phone models did not produce a "click" sound when an image was clicked. The feature was added to address privacy concerns. You could not stop someone clicking a picture in a public place with you in the frame, but a "click" sound, at least, alerts you that you are being photographed. Today not only one gets photographed unknowingly in public places, but images get transmitted to the world in no time via social media.

The use of earphones or headphones to listen to digital entertainment while driving or walking on the road or walking past an unmanned railway crossing has also led to unfortunate accidents in the past few years. Traffic police in some cities place sign boards near pedestrian crossings to warn pedestrians against wearing earphones while on the road.

Now selfie rage is posing similar challenges to public authorities in cities. The telecom regulatory authority, phone companies and local authorities like traffic police should come together to develop "safe selfie" guidelines. Tourism ministries and state tourism development boards can work along the same lines to develop "safe selfie" zones in tourist attractions. They can develop "selfie spots" or "selfie zones" in places where tourists can get their best self-shot. Such spots are particularly necessary in tourist locations like forts, palaces, lakes, towers, caves, waterfalls and so on. In good old days, hill stations used to have photography points on hilltops.

A "safe selfie" zone rather than a "no selfie" zone should be preferred while developing guidelines for safe use of self photography. Special selfie or photo spots can be created in city centres or attractions like India Gate and Gateway of India. The large "I Amsterdam" installation near the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has become an iconic photo spot.

There is no point in being moralistic about selfie or looking at it solely as an act of narcissism or potential addiction. Selfies are not just about stereotypical images of young girls with pouts. Now we have political selfies, selfies for a cause, selfies with authors and marketing campaigns built solely on selfies. The phenomenon is just evolving. The crux of the argument here is to do it safely and with a sense of responsibility.