If there's no other services presented to the world, yes. But a simple port scan will tell you it's up and that doesn't take long to do.

For some reason, disabling ping is considered a security feature, so a lot of places block it at the firewall. Cloud services (I'm looking at you, Azure) also either doesn't allow it or can't do it.

If by long term you mean 50 years, I'm fine with that. And as a "hey, if we had to replace TCP/IP today, what could we do?" thought experiment.

But to think that we're going to replace TCP/IP when we can't even replace IPv4, don't for a second think this will happen during our lifetime (well, I might make it another 50 years, but I'll be in my 90s then).

Well that and all the vending machines and coin slots that would have to be replaced to handle dollar coins. IIRC only the USPS can handle dollar coins.

This. There's likely trillions of dollars invested in IPv4 that is going to be around for decades. Consider the Internet like highways and train track widths - we're stuck with it for a very long time.

Android is pretty good about knowing when I'm on a bike vs. in my car.

Coding is computer science, but computer science is not just coding. I got my CS degree 20+ years ago, I've been in the field ever since, and I only spent a few years doing actual coding. The rest is all sysadmin/hardware design/architecture.

From the namecheap link:

There's plenty of other low-cost embedded systems that use Linux.

Here's what one person said about it:
 

Someone is new to open source/designs I see. Arduino has a bazillion knockoffs that are compatible yet they still seem to be doing okay. Unless RPi isn't an open architecture - in which case, why do we advocate its use?

You can likely do some of that, though some of what you describe (following specific people) would fall under anti-stalking laws. As noted elsewhere in this thread, repo companies are already doing this and businesses have cameras set up on their property and within the store recording your every move. Get writing! You only need a bunch of people willing to do this and a lot of license plate reading equipment.

Seems reasonable to me.

The supreme court and EFF disagree with you. While you have the right to travel freely, you have no right of privacy when in public and collecting information about you and your travels does not impede you traveling. You also have the option of not traveling by your own car - you can rent a car, borrow one from a friend, walk, bike, or take public transit.

As for your last statement I completely agree that collected data should be deleted after some period of time - enough time that if it's needed as evidence it can be used, but not so long that your entire travel history is available for perusal at any time by any person.

What constitutional right? Privacy? Let's see what the EFF says about that:

https://ssd.eff.org/your-compu...

That means the police can follow you around in public and observe your activities, see what you are carrying or to whom you are talking, sit next to you or behind you and listen to your conversations — all without a warrant.

Again, fine. So long as it's not considered a public record.

I'd be fine with that result. So long as we don't start thinking that these kinds of videos are public records that can be searched without a court order.