Some very clever people are trying to develop an app to warn people if they are being really stupid when they take a selfie. Like "standing on the edge of a cliff" stupid.
Unfortunately, I'm unconvinced that they will get enough true positives to help people actually be safer, esp. since the incidence of death-by-selfie (or deaths attributed to unsafe behavior taking a selfie) seems to be a lot lower than one would imagine, so even the "Hey, warning, this is a dangerous area" stuff in the app (vs. posted signs) isn't likely to be helpful.
As well, even outside the realm of selfies, I've seen plenty of conventional photography (taken by someone else) that made me cringe at the danger. (Victoria Falls definitely comes to mind.) Indeed, at least on one of the photos in the article seems to be an example.
Be careful out there, people.
A view to die for: how to prevent ‘selfie deaths’
A group of researchers from Carnegie Mellon University studied over 120 selfie deaths in the hopes of creating a system that might discourage others from putting their lives at risk.
This assumes A) people aren't aware of the danger and B) people aren't terrible at understanding risk assessment. I'm sure a lot of these people know full well they're taking a risk, but they don't think it'll happen to them.
apps cant replace instinct and common sense. stupid people do stupid shit so they die from stupid things. its like, natural
People who are dying taking selfies exhibit the lack of 'common sense' that would have caused them to die in other ways, so stopping them from dying due to selfies won't exactly keep them from vying for a Darwin Award. Selfies are just a new tool they've discovered for the purpose.
Someone will inevitably find a new way to die with new technology and new tools. Laws and warnings can help reduce those but I often find myself wondering what is wrong with their psyche to displace caution so much to the point people are dying from obvious dangers that are easy to avoid. I'd like to see a study done on this, actually, it would probably help society a good deal.
Some people are just ignorant, and they can be educated with enough time and effort. But how many of these accidental suicides are caused not by ignorance, but by stupidity? I.e. they know how dangerous it is, and do it anyway. They've already heard due to safety campaigns that doing something is a super duper bad idea but they do it anyway. They knew someone that died due to X, and they still do the same thing anyway. That is beyond ignorance, that is pure Darwinist idiocy. You can educate the ignorant, but what do you do with the stupid?