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Paris night drone mystery deepens

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Paris night drone mystery deepens

#31

Post by logfromblammo »

When writing offenses into the law that are malum prohibitum, it would be wise to expend a bit of effort in deciding whether such laws are practically enforceable.

Parisian authorities would probably have done better to mandate an amateur radio operator's license, identification requirements, and liability insurance.

When it's equally illegal for an otherwise innocent hobbyist and for a malevolent bogeyman, it becomes much harder to impute motives to the unseen operator.

Though in reality, the authorities are likely far more concerned about unauthorized, copyright-violating photographs ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eiffel_Tower#Image_copyright_cl... ) than about terrorism.

Re: Paris night drone mystery deepens

#32

Post by CamperBob2 »

engendered wrote: post #10
TeMPOraL wrote: post #6

Drones drones drones. What drones? Did someone flew a Predator, or was it just a Phantom bought from the "Accessories for GoPro cameras" shelf of the local RadioShack equivalent? There is an important difference between the two, and I don't really like how media and people in general conflate together the whole spectrum of UAVs and RC copters.

Radio controlled quadcopters, whether navigating automatically or not, fall under the definition of "drone". The terminology is fine, and the attempt at redefinition is a losing battle.

No, it's not even remotely "fine." Would you consider it "fine" if the media couldn't distinguish between an Airsoft gun and a bazooka? That's exactly what's happening when the term "drone" is applied to everything in the air that doesn't have a pilot on board.

Re: Paris night drone mystery deepens

#33

Post by engendered »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #32
engendered wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Radio controlled quadcopters, whether navigating automatically or not, fall under the definition of "drone". The terminology is fine, and the attempt at redefinition is a losing battle.

No, it's not even remotely "fine." Would you consider it "fine" if the media couldn't distinguish between an Airsoft gun and a bazooka? That's exactly what's happening when the term "drone" is applied to everything in the air that doesn't have a pilot on board.

They clarified specifically what they meant. Zero reasonable readers came out of that article confused to any degree.

This is classic HN autism, and this "hurr durrr drone" bullshit appears in each and every thread that mentions "drones", even if every single participant knows what they're talking about, without specifically declaring that it's an XYZ.

Don't be the problem. Don't be the noise. Don't be the stupidity.

Re: Paris night drone mystery deepens

#34

Post by TeMPOraL »

engendered wrote: post #33
CamperBob2 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not even remotely "fine." Would you consider it "fine" if the media couldn't distinguish between an Airsoft gun and a bazooka? That's exactly what's happening when the term "drone" is applied to everything in the air that doesn't have a pilot on board.

They clarified specifically what they meant. Zero reasonable readers came out of that article confused to any degree. This is classic HN autism, and this "hurr durrr drone" bullshit appears in each and every thread that mentions "drones", even if every single participant knows what they're talking about, without specifically declaring that it's an XYZ. Don't be the problem. Don't be the noise. Don't be the stupidity…

Since I'm apparently not a reasonable reader, please correct me and answer the questions I seek answers to that I mentioned elsewhere in the thread[0].

[0] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9107812

Re: Paris night drone mystery deepens

#35

Post by engendered »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #23
engendered wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you really read this article and think "Oh, they might be talking about a missile-equipped military drone"? Of course you don't. This is pedantry nonsense that, while becoming common, is really that someone wants to argue, in utter futility, about the definition of a word. For years HN was caught up naval gazing about the difference between hacker and cracker. Now it is this drone garbage.

It is important, because it shines light on the seriousness and meaningfulness of the issue. Of course I wasn't thinking about an armed Predator (I mentioned it only to highlight the high end of the scope of things that people call "drones"). But here are some questions I'd like the article to answer: - Was it a helicopter or a fixed-wing aircraft? - Was it something small or the kind of fixed-wing that companies use…

You know it wasn't fixed wing. You know it wasn't a helicopter. These are both absurd misdirections to try to justify the nonsensical demands for specificity.

Reading this article, I can't really be sure if that "mysterious drone" was any of the above, or if someone just strapped few LEDs to a pidgeon.

99.9% of readers read the article and knew it was quadcoptors. The 0.1% knew it was quadcopters, but want to engage in a ridiculous bit of nonsense on HN, playing to the crowd.

much in the same way as calling a tank "a car"

Hardly, and that analogy is absurd. More like if a bomb went off in a cafe you would be declaring that "IS IT A NUCLEAR BOMB? WAS IT A PLASTIC BOMB? A TNT BOMB? A BLACK POWDER BOMB? A REPURPOSED ARTILLERY SHELL WARHEAD? A...."

It's just noise. Noisy bullshit that is ruining HN.

Re: Paris night drone mystery deepens

#36

Post by TeMPOraL »

engendered wrote: post #35
TeMPOraL wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is important, because it shines light on the seriousness and meaningfulness of the issue. Of course I wasn't thinking about an armed Predator (I mentioned it only to highlight the high end of the scope of things that people call "drones"). But here are some questions I'd like the article to answer: - Was it a helicopter or a fixed-wing aircraft? - Was it something small or the kind of fixed-wing that companies use…

You know it wasn't fixed wing. You know it wasn't a helicopter. These are both absurd misdirections to try to justify the nonsensical demands for specificity. Reading this article, I can't really be sure if that "mysterious drone" was any of the above, or if someone just strapped few LEDs to a pidgeon. 99.9% of readers read the article and knew it was quadcoptors. The 0.1% knew it was quadcopters, but want to engage…

> You know it wasn't fixed wing. You know it wasn't a helicopter. These are both absurd misdirections to try to justify the nonsensical demands for specificity.

I really don't know. It's nowhere in the article - neither stated nor implied.

> 99.9% of readers read the article and knew it was quadcoptors.

[citation needed]

> The 0.1% knew it was quadcopters, but want to engage in a ridiculous bit of nonsense on HN, playing to the crowd.

Excuse me for trying to get a coherent picture out of that article. Also, you realize that contemporary journalism is mostly misleading mixed with blatant lies? I'd be wary of accepting as a fact whatever is not stated but what you're led to implicitly belive.

> "IS IT A NUCLEAR BOMB? WAS IT A PLASTIC BOMB? A TNT BOMB? A BLACK POWDER BOMB? A REPURPOSED ARTILLERY SHELL WARHEAD? A...."

Nope. Try a headline "a mysterious explosion occured, no one got hurt" and me asking whether it was a gas explosion, a conventional explosive, or just some random kid who discovered that mixing potassium nitrate with sugar leads to fun things happening.

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