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Paparazzi

Stalking starlets? Pop singers? Politicians? Not a chance. Kim's out to get the serious money-makers-pictures capturing the desperado office worker lighting up in a no-smoking area, the furtive homeowner dumping trash illegally, the devious clerk at the corner store selling stale candy to teens.

Small crime pays big time. In one month alone his camera put more than $3,000 in his pocket, "It's good money," says Kim, a former pump jockey. "I'll never go back to pumping gas. I feel free now."

The 34-year-old and his friends belong to the new wave of South Korean paparazzi-shutterbugs who pursue, not the rich and famous, but low-grade lawbreakers getting caught on film that's sold to government officials as evidence. Officials have so far enacted more than 60 civilian "reporting" programs that offer rewards ranging from the equivalent of about $36 to $1.4 million, for reporting everything from the garden-variety petty crime to major corruption involving government officials. (No one's bagged that one yet.)

The paparazzi trend has even introduced new terms to the language:

• seon-parazzi pursue election law violators
• ssu-parazzi target the illegal acts of garbage dumpers
• seong-parazzi target illegal South Korean prostitution

South Korea's economic crisis and layoffs have left fewer government investigators to maintain public order. Officials say they must now rely more on bounty-hunter justice. To meet this demand, paparazzi schools have been popping up like crocuses in springtime. They charge $250 for three-day courses on how to edit film, tail suspected wrong doers, and operate button-sized cameras.

Paparazzi students are newly unemployed workers, bored housewives, college students, and teens, all of whom consider themselves deputized agents of the South Korean government. The schools estimate that 500 professional paparazzi are now at work, although celebrities are still relatively immune from harassment. Until now, that is. At least one paparazzi academy has introduced a course in stalking well-known people.

Arming citizens with zoom video and long-range lenses and turning them loose on each other seems to be accepted. "They don't violate any laws, so there's no reason to restrict them," said a National Tax Service official. "They don't infringe on others' private lives, do they?"

They don't? Some student paparazzi say they hate ratting out their neighbors. "It's shameful work-I'm really not proud of it," said one who preferred to remain anonymous.

"Let's put it this way," said another with the same preference." I don't want to be called a paparazzo; I'm a public servant." But then, who's walking away from all that sweet moolah?

"In Korean culture, we don't want our neighbours spying on us," said Park Heung-sik, public policy professor at Seoul's Chung-Ang University. "In elementary school, when a classmate reports on another's bad behavior, there's bad blood. A student might get beat up. It's the same with adults."

Paparazzi school administrators see things another way.

"The paparazzi critics are usually the ones who are breaking the law," said Moon Sung-ok, head of the Mismiz Report & Compensation School in Seoul. "The clean ones, the innocent citizens-they have no problems with us."

Shin Gi-woong, a former sushi bar owner, now runs the Posang Club paparazzi school. He got his start after a car accident in 2002 with a driver he says made an illegal U-turn.

That gave him the idea to document such accidents. Then, he started nailing store owners selling outdated candy to children. He collared jewelers and pharmacists who didn't give receipts (as required by law). He fingered a political candidate for taking a free meal, also a no-no.

Shin teaches that upholding the law is the important thing. "Money doesn't come first," he says.

But it does for Kim Rae-in. "People don't abide by the law any more because they know there aren't enough investigators," he says. "That's why paparazzi emerged. These crooks get what they deserve."

Kim demonstrated his camera inside a small convenience store. Later, the 27-year-old clerk said she wouldn't be angry if the handsome paparazzo busted her for not handing out a receipt. But it wouldn't lead her to the straight and narrow path either.

"It would teach me a lesson," she said. "Then I'd know I'd have to be more careful next time."

Paparazzi around the world are discovering new ways to organize and access their online pictures with Spacelocker. As well as researching suspects on the internet, submitting evidence and invoices, and receiving payment, they're learning how quickly and simply they can access and update all their online stuff anytime, from any computer with internet access.