Also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10406261 .
That article was rumor/speculation a couple of days before this (the actual announcement). Good discussion in both places, but this one has the better info - thanks for keeping this one up.
US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
31–40 of 59 posts
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would assume that registration would be free, but now that I think about it I wonder if it will be that way (or stay that way). It seems like this may be less about the "protection" of people and just another revenue source for the government.
Registration might be free, but the cost of insurance if required would probably depend on the capabilities of the drone. I might imagine an insurance market in which there is a discount for flying under the control of open source software.
The more likely scenario is a penalty for flying under the control of open source software.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, we should regulate drones. Thing is, no one really flies "drones". People are just flying RC helicopters. But we call them drones and associate them with flying death machines and suddenly everyone is scared. RC has been around for the better part of 60 years and it's never caused a major problem. The only difference between then and now is that now they are much more controllable and a little cheaper, and so m…
Why would this make people turn to DIY kits? DIY drones also have to be registered.
I think GP meant that registration will make people much less willing to get into the hobby, which will dry out the revenue for quadcopter-making companies, making them raise prices or close shop altogether. The few people who really want to play with those machines will prefer to order cheaper DIY kits, and since you can't effectively regulate the components they'll be flying whatever they could get assembled instead of tested constructions with proper safety measures. Also almost no one will bother to register DIY drones, since FAA won't fund an army of inspectors to check for license every time someone takes a quadcopter to the park.
That's how I understood the comment.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#34Drones should be licensed and/or registered, much the same way as cars are. There are places where you can drive an unregistered car without a driver's license. And that will be true of drones as well. There will be places where you can fly them unlimited. Just not in the common space defined by the government as such. That's what the government is for. "Drone ranch" here we come. I am a private pilot, so I appreciat…
Yeah, we should regulate drones. Thing is, no one really flies "drones". People are just flying RC helicopters. But we call them drones and associate them with flying death machines and suddenly everyone is scared. RC has been around for the better part of 60 years and it's never caused a major problem. The only difference between then and now is that now they are much more controllable and a little cheaper, and so m…
Half-humorously: maybe guns can save quadcopters? Let's encourage people to make flying handguns and thus turning the drone debate into gun control issue, at which point we can rest safe that it won't be resolved for the next couple of decades.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, we should regulate drones. Thing is, no one really flies "drones". People are just flying RC helicopters. But we call them drones and associate them with flying death machines and suddenly everyone is scared. RC has been around for the better part of 60 years and it's never caused a major problem. The only difference between then and now is that now they are much more controllable and a little cheaper, and so m…
>RC has been around for the better part of 60 years and it's never caused a major problem. Its not true that RC has been problem-less - there have been malicious uses of the technology, and fatalities, since the day it was possible to rig up a plane and fly it around. Flight systems, of any variety, are easy to weaponize. Regulation is a good thing because it requires a more responsible response from civil society. T…
> That's not a bad thing, imho, because - especially in the RC world - the DIY crowd have always driven progress in the technology.
That's true in many fields and particularly quadcopters are, as far as I can tell, just like 3D printers - the entire industry exists because some hobbyists started making DIY models accessible to general public, and someone saw a new market in that.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#36Drones should be licensed and/or registered, much the same way as cars are. There are places where you can drive an unregistered car without a driver's license. And that will be true of drones as well. There will be places where you can fly them unlimited. Just not in the common space defined by the government as such. That's what the government is for. "Drone ranch" here we come. I am a private pilot, so I appreciat…
> Also I think drones are super cool and access to them should be easy. But not free. Why not free? Surely their use should be regulated on the basis of scope and competency rather than cost. Use of drones in personal airspace ( a few metres above one's land ) within the boundaries of one's property should not be the concern of the Government. This would be the equivalent of driving an unlicensed car on one's propert…
I suppose the cost argument is meant to present a minimum barrier to entry to get rid of out completely random participants. However I've observed that usually the more irresponsible/douchier people have disproportionally more resources available for "tech toys" whereas actual hobbyists are often poorer, so I see cost barriers as driving out exactly the wrong part of the userbase.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#37Drones should be licensed and/or registered, much the same way as cars are. There are places where you can drive an unregistered car without a driver's license. And that will be true of drones as well. There will be places where you can fly them unlimited. Just not in the common space defined by the government as such. That's what the government is for. "Drone ranch" here we come. I am a private pilot, so I appreciat…
I am not a pilot (although the right $$ would have me there in a an instant... wishful thinking), but I have been flying various remote control aircraft (including so-called "drones", now) for nearly 20 years. A sensible system seems like it would be three tiered: Very small stuff would remain unregulated - obviously there is no concern with things like the CX-10, right? I can't imagine a "drone" of anything near tha…
> Mid-tier stuff would be a world like Amateur Radio - modernized to be online or something as you've suggested.
I generally agree with you, but I want to vent out about that amateur radio bit. Going on-line is something that makes it meaningless. Doing radio over real radio waves is playing with the limits physics throws at you. Doing it over the Internet is just throwing logs under your own feet because Skype isn't cool enough. It's like going outside vs. playing a video game in which your character goes outside.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
FWIW, 100g is over 30% of the all-up weight of two of my quadcopters. I think very carefully about tens of grams of additional weight for better GPS or FPV antennas...
Sure, which is why I suggested this only for the mid-to-large "classes". I have flown several myself, all the way from the CX-10 ( 3kg range). The high end of that could handle an extra 100g without much fuss. The high end of that is also what the airlines are most worried about. Granted there is some grey area in the 300-500 size copters, where they are large enough to possibly cause some minor damage to an aircraft…
How about requiring a POV (persistence of vision) display on such a drone? At a cost of few additional LEDs (or even not, if you reuse onboard ones) and some CPU cycles you could have the drone flash its serial number in a way visible on cameras as the drone moves around.
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#39What describes a drone? Do I need to register my $50 "drone"?
Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, we should regulate drones. Thing is, no one really flies "drones". People are just flying RC helicopters. But we call them drones and associate them with flying death machines and suddenly everyone is scared. RC has been around for the better part of 60 years and it's never caused a major problem. The only difference between then and now is that now they are much more controllable and a little cheaper, and so m…
Half-humorously: maybe guns can save quadcopters? Let's encourage people to make flying handguns and thus turning the drone debate into gun control issue, at which point we can rest safe that it won't be resolved for the next couple of decades.
As far as I can tell, gun owners are no more thrilled about irresponsible drone operators as we are about irresponsible gun owners.
We also tolerate, more or less, licencing to carry loaded guns outside our dwellings, which this sort of drone licencing could resemble (same generally goes for cars and other motor vehicles). The increasing spread of "constitutional carry", no license required, with Maine just being added a day or two ago, is based on a lack of problems with licensed concealed carry. Which is the opposite of the drone situation, with problems steadily increasing.
And while I recognize the humor you're applying here, your short description of the situation with gun control doesn't really capture the reality. We've been fighting this since right after the Civil War, restrictions on freedmen a large part of the reason for the subsequently judicially nullified 14th Amendment. Ignoring a lot of anti-immigrant state level legislation, FDR then tried to license all handguns with a $3,500 in 2015 dollars transfer "tax", and since, oh, the '50s-'60s, the fundamental argument has been over whether we'd be allowed to possess any guns, with Obama and Hillary! just now calling for mass confiscation of all handguns and semi-auto long guns. I'm not aware of confiscations being on the table with drones, although that could quickly change if/when one brings down an airliner.
And from the view of the FAA, it makes only so much difference if a jet engine injects a big drone vs. a big drone carrying a dense gun.
But I am continuely amused by perceptions of our political power, which comes from at least two things: there are a zillion of us and we vote, and we have been motivated by a lot of government atrocities starting in the early '70s, plus, as noted above, a clear existential threat. The drone situation today currently lacks every single element of our history, but I can imagine murderous enforcement of these coming regulations changing some of that.