Dashcams can reveal so much, but they rarely lure U.S. drivers

A driver adjusts his dashboard-mounted camera in Illinois on June 19, 2014.

Image: John J. Kim, Chicago Tribune, MCT

By Adario Strange3 hours ago

We use them to take millions of Instagram selfies every day. They've made it almost too easy to post unending streams of videos and images on YouTube and Twitter. But when it comes to documenting our car trips in the U.S., cameras mysteriously disappear from the digital scrapbooking landscape.
And on those rare occasions that we do catch video footage from the road, it's usually thanks to a piece of equipment most of us have never touched: a dashcam. The usually cheap, inconspicuous dashboard-mounted cameras, which automatically record video of the road in front of the driver, have often provided a vital piece of visual evidence in automobile accidents and controversial police stops when eyewitness testimony wasn't enough.