A Courtesy

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by boiler

It doesn't kill anybody to take 3.5 seconds to ask "Hey, do you mind if I take a quick picture?" It's the neighborly thing to do.
Be polite. That's all he's asking.

The thing is, "polite" is relative. In some contexts, it's considered rude to interrupt just to say "excuse me", and it's considered polite to quietly do something that doesn't interfere with what others are doing. If someone just wants to take a picture, I would be much happier if they just went ahead and did it than if they had to take my attention away from what I was doing at the time in order to ask for permission.

I still want to know why asking for permission to photograph a robot is something worth worrying about in the first place.