You gotta love parents. Maybe it's all those childbearing hormones, but they sure can get their panties in a twist over the strangest things. Like saying "good girl." Or a baby maybe getting a couple of drops of Mountain Dew. The latest parental outrage -- outrage! -- comes from Kansas. There, a statue of a bare-breasted woman taking a picture of herself has caused the local parent population to draw up a petition with thousands of signatures to get rid of the offending work of art. The problem? Not that you can see the woman's bronzed boobs. But that she's taking a picture of herself. And ... dear God in heaven ... she appears to be taking this picture in order to send it to someone. She's ... auggghhhh ... sexting!

Oh, that Prince Harry. Was everyone shocked, shocked that he got nekkid in a Las Vegas hotel room with a bunch of pals and strange women? C'mon now, this is the guy who wore a Nazi costume to a Halloween party. I don't care how much we crush on this ginger, Harry ain't the brightest bulb in the royal bunch. But maybe you wouldn't be either if you had a bunch of "handlers" to keep you out of trouble, as Harry has had since he could crawl. When you've got other people paid to make your judgment calls for you, why learn any judgment? Only this time, Harry's handlers failed too. Whoops!

These days, so many people have a video camera on hand via their cell phones that it would be difficult to sneeze without someone, somewhere, having film of it.  What I remember most from the story about the JetBlue pilot who had a ranting meltdown was all of the passengers holding up their handheld devices to capture the scene on camera. When a homeless man with a knife was shot multiple times in Times Square recently, some people didn't flee the dangerous scene -- they chased after it, cell phone cameras held aloft. And the tragic bridge jumping suicide of famed director Tony Scott is no exception. Reports say several witnesses videotaped the tragedy and tried to sell the footage.

Let's say you're a rich young adult or teen who lives in a mansion, drives a Ferrari, travels by private jet, and vacations at the most exclusive resorts in the world. Oh, and let's say you don't pay for any of it -- your parents do. Would you a) thank your lucky stars for your freak of birth and keep your mouth shut about it, b) photograph your freakishly luxurious lifestyle and share it with the world. Well, if you're the "Rich Kids of Instagram," you of course do the latter. Because there's no point in being a member of the one percent if the other 99% don't know about it!

Are you the type of person who gets freaked out by the thought of Big Brother-esque conspiracy theories? Maybe watching Minority Report gave you a panic attack (for reasons unrelated to Tom Cruise). Perhaps halfway through The Truman Show you felt so claustrophobic you had to get up and leave the movie theatre. Or -- let me guess -- your phone's ring tone is "(I Always Feel Like) Somebody's Watching Me" by Michael Jackson. Am I right?

Then stop reading now, because you are gonna hate the heck out of this story.

Okay, I warned you! Here goes: The NYPD and Microsoft are teaming up to create a "citywide terror and crimefighting surveillance system" which will collect "data from thousands of video cameras, radiation detectors, and license plate readers around the city, as well as from 911 calls and crime statistics, to give police near-instant information." NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg calls it a "one-stop shop for law enforcement."

I call it ... scary.

Some people are blessed with the ability to look fabulous no matter what they're doing. Take runner Zeddie Little. In April, someone snapped a photo of him on a 10-mile run. He should have looked tired. Or sweaty. Or anything other than what he did look like -- which was like he just came out of the salon and was posing for a Brooks Brothers ad. So the Internet appropriately dubbed him "Ridiculously Photogenic Guy," and he went viral. But I doubt even Zeddie could make wrangling various critters whilst in a plain brown exterminator suit look sexy. Enter David Seerveld, the world's most ridiculously photogenic exterminator!

There it is, sitting in your inbox: "Buffy tagged a photo of you on Facebook." You hover over the See Photo button, but you're hesitant to actually click the damn thing because you're not even sure you want to see which of the Candid Photo Fails you were committing when Buffy whipped out her iPhone. Eyes half closed? Mouth agape with visible tonsils? Jabba the Hut Chin?

Now that camera phones are ubiquitous and there are a plethora of social media networks on which to share the images they capture, you've basically got two choices when a friend points a lens in your direction: 1) shriek hysterically about how cameras steal the soul, or 2) smile and cross your fingers the photo doesn't come back to haunt you later.

For those who tend to go with option B, I found a surprising trick for avoiding at least one unflattering effect, the dreaded double chin. Not only that, I personally gave it a try—and because I have no shame, I even documented the results.

I recently discovered a giant stack of photo albums from my childhood, and was surprised by 1) how, ah, vintage they look, and 2) how many photos are clustered together from a particular event (Christmas morning, say). If you put them together in a little flipbook, you could almost see the day progress. You can also tell when my family lost their obsession with the newfangled Polaroid, because photos drop off sharply after that, then pick back up at random stages. A thousand pictures of a random campground; two badly-lit photos of my grandparents' 50th anniversary.

The digital era has allowed us, if nothing else, to become more consistent with our photo documentation. Most of us take photos nearly every day now, even if it's just a cameraphone picture. But imagine a video made from footage shot every week for 12 solid years—one that captures a child's life in startling detail.