It doesn't seem so big brother-ish somehow when big brother is giving you a hard time to your face - or maybe the part in your hair - rather than telling you what you can't wear though the law:

As the boy picks up the pylon to carry it off, a loud and authoritative voice booms from above: "Please put it back." The crowd appears bewildered and the would-be prankster is too startled to do anything but follow the order. Jack Bonnar pauses the tape, which he is showing at the closed-circuit television command centre. "See that? The look on his face is phenomenal," the manager of the centre said. "Most people are so ashamed that they've been spotted that they stop. We've even stopped a punch-up between two people."

Big Brother is no longer just watching -- he is barking orders. Middlesbrough in northern England is experimenting with seven CCTV cameras fitted with loudspeakers that shout at people who misbehave.

There does seem to be a reality that has not shifted much since "Concrete Jungle" over 25 years ago that this addresses. And I was mentioning the other day about the massive senior sergeant with the Halifax police who, along with plenty of patrol cars, walked downtown most Friday and Saturday nights yapping with us and at us that was a big part of why that time and place was not filled with much violence despite what else people were filled with. But shouting cameras on telephone poles?