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The U.S. Department of Transportation is set to announce plans to require registration for every drone sold:
Have a drone? You're going to have to register it with the U.S. Department of Transportation, according to NBC News.
The federal government will announce a plan within days that will require anyone who buys a drone to register it with the Department of Transportation, NBC reported Friday evening.
A Department of Transportation spokesperson told MarketWatch that U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx and Administrator Michael Huerta of the Federal Aviation Administration will release more details on Monday at 12:30 p.m. Eastern time.
"The hobbyist drone community has self-regulated itself for decades," said Lisa Ellman, co-chair of the unmanned aircraft systems practice at Hogan Lovells, a New York–based law firm. "But with the technology getting so cheap and improving so much, we have more and more drones."
FAA official Rich Swayze said last month that the agency expects that a million drones could be sold this holiday season.
"A lot of people are buying them and thinking they are toys," Ellman said. "They are not toys."
Florida lawyer Jonathan Rupprecht, author of a book on drone law, said he believes any plan centered around drone registration is a necessary first step toward regulating drones but is curious how the regulation will play out and whether the rule will apply to hobbyists with small drones.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 20 2015, @09:48PM
And that programmed route capability kicks in at about $1500 the last time I checked. Probably less now.
You can program them to fly to a certain spot and altitude, hover and take the video or stills, then return when battery gets to a certain level. You don't even have to maintain contact with them from your controller. (Its tricky to maintain manual control once they are out of clear line of sight anyway. Even live video down-link is).
You seem to care, I hope my words go to good use. I'm an r/c flight hobbyist and take it pretty seriously, I have a number of craft in fixed and rotating wing configuration (airplane and helicopter) including the modern fully stabilized and autonomous multirotor (what most people call a quadcopter). The whole thread has been thinking along the right lines but there is some practical information that is missing that would come only from some experience in this domain.
First off you are right, turnkey quadcopter autonomous flight systems can be had for probably $999 and a trip to a hobby or photography store, right now. In 2 hours out of box the things will be flying around, and if you are stupid, crashing into things and causing problems for those around you. They are a big problem in the hands of a dumb individual - it does not mater if the thing is operated in an autonomous mode or not. The real designation is the stabilization of the craft itself. If it can perform wing leveling (return to a stable position with out any operator input) the barrier to entry to operate the thing is reduced to very little; it goes down even more if a GPS hold function is provided, which will exist in the autonomous capable variants. In the hands of people with a brain this is a great way to learn to fly with less hassle and money spent on parts. In the hands of idiots this results in people having to run away from a crashing piece of plastic being operated by an operator who has no understanding of the limits of their skill.
It is the understanding of the limits of their skill, appropriate use of the machine, and barrier to entry that make the problem. This doesn't have anything to do with autonomous operating modes. In fact in the same way that a newbie with one of these things is far more of a threat to their quadcopter and people around them than a useful spy machine, so is the autonomous flight modes. These units have no navigation sensors and very little, if any, emergency handling logic. They will fly straight paths as programed between the way points and don't take into account things like structures, mission flight time and total stored energy, payload, wind, etc. While the platform itself may be turnkey operating an autonomous vehicle is not!
In fact, out of all the times these things have been in the news, what is the observed ratio of remote control to autonomous flight? I have never heard of any report of a high profile crash involving autonomous flight. All the reports I hear are from operators who claim the device either malfunctioned or was hacked. It is a total dismissal of responsibility because even if it malfunctioned or was hacked it shouldn't be in a position where any fault that occurs can risk people!
tl;dr: Autonomous mission planning is really hard. Morons will fly their crafts into trees and the ground because of insufficient planning more than anything else.
Look at the barrier of entry as the solution! If it takes thousands of dollars of parts to learn how to do something or it takes being smart and thinking about stuff up front, either way it does at least limit the damage done by people who wont invest effort. And that handles almost all of the public.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday October 21 2015, @01:10PM
After all the nay-sayers who have no skin in the game, it's nice to see support from someone who does have skin in the game.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @02:15PM
After all the nay-sayers who have no skin in the game, it's nice to see support from someone who does have skin in the game.
I see a lot of stuff being argued about that is obviously a bad idea. It doesn't take very long to realize that operating r/c aircraft of any kind in public isn't something that should really be done with only one person around or with out the consent of others who are not involved at all. It gets down to stuff as basic as every time an r/c helicopter lands if any toddlers are around they are guaranteed to run at it as fast as they can, with their heads leading, and aiming themselves right at the helicopter blades. The dangers go up from there.
I don't want to see blanket registration requirements but I would like for everyone to understand what it is really like being a competent r/c pilot because we are about to get caught up in a lot of muck.