Smartphone cameras have a filter against 900nm infrared light, which is used in rangefinders. The issue is that many newer automotive LIDAR systems use 1550nm infrared lasers. At my last company (which I won’t name), frying smartphone cameras was a known problem. We replaced phones for a few journalists and a few employees. But previous company’s LIDAR is eye safe.

I work for money and job satisfaction. I've been doing this in Silicon Valley since 1998. This is a newsflash to some people??

We've had this functionality since ~2007 with several generations of Tivo boxes. Yes, you have to rent a cablecard from Comcast, but it's about $1.50 a month per cablecard, times two cablecards. We can afford that. Yes, you have to pay monthly or yearly for Tivo service, but that funds guides and software upgrades and doesn't go into Comcast's pocket. With the 2nd-to-newest Tivo generation (Roamio), we get all our Comcast channels, Comcast on demand, Amazon, Netflix, Vudo, etc. etc., all from our Tivo. The only Comcast equipment in our home is the two cablecards. This is a solved problem. Buy a Tivo!

We just switched the 2nd of our 2 smartphones from Verizon to AT&T. Want to inject a tracking supercookie into our web traffic, Verizon? Good luck now that we are no longer your customers, assholes.

The submitter has this all wrong. It's very unlikely that Crown Castle is interested in TV over cell phones. It's far more likely that they're interested in deploying iBurst, a wireless internet service, in the US. They have already deployed this service commercially in Australia.

http://www.arraycomm.com/gpm/australia.htm

http://www.arraycomm.com/news/pr_detail.htm?id=82

http://www.iburst.com.au/site/news/newsview.php?id =27

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%2Barraycomm+ %2B%22crown+castle%22

Disclaimer: I'm a former employee of Arraycomm who worked on iBurst hardware. I own stock in Arraycomm.