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A protester landed a one-man gyrocopter on the Capitol lawn in Washington D.C. to deliver letters to Congress urging real campaign finance reform:
A 61-year-old Florida mailman was arrested Wednesday after he landed a gyrocopter on the US Capitol west lawn. The gyrocopter was carrying the pilot and 535 stamped letters for members of Congress urging "real reform" to campaign finance laws.
Doug Hughes told the Tampa Bay Times ahead of the afternoon stunt that he notified authorities "well over an hour in advance of getting to the no-fly zone, so they know who I am and what I'm doing."
Bloomberg has this analysis of the aftermath, and Tampa Bay Times has video of the incident from multiple angles. Hughes live streamed his flight on a blog entitled The Democracy Club. Ben Montgomery, a reporter from the Tampa Bay Times, knew about the planned flight for months and traveled to D.C. to witness it, but only informed the Capitol Police and Secret Service after Hughes was in the air. Hughes contacted Montgomery after Secret Service questioned him in 2014. The FAA is investigating the incident.
How long before copycats start doing the same at the personal addresses of Congressmen, Supreme Court Justices, and others?
Update: Doug Hughes has been charged with knowingly operating an unregistered aircraft (a felony punishable by up to three years in prison) and violating national defense airspace (punishable by up to one year in prison).
Hughes was released after the hearing, on condition that he observe home detention until his next court date in the capital city, on 8 May.
He was ordered to surrender his passport and banned from flying any aircraft, and must report to the authorities once a week. He was also charged with operating an unregistered aircraft.
(Score: 2) by NCommander on Friday April 17 2015, @01:19AM
I'm open to suggestions from the editoral staff on how to better flag these items.
Still always moving
(Score: 3, Insightful) by takyon on Friday April 17 2015, @01:24AM
Compare this to the Slashdot story, which started from the same submission link.
It was a breaking news story yesterday, but today it is a fully fleshed out story with much more intriguing detail (the Tampa Bay Times reporter's involvement) and finally the charges filed about 4 hours ago.
If it had been submitted as is yesterday, most users would not notice the new information unless it was posted as a new story.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by NCommander on Friday April 17 2015, @01:30AM
IMHO, posting followup articles isn't an uncommon practice w/ most websites. Granted, it would require someone to *post* a followup, but maybe make it clear on the submission guidelines that's acceptable, and just to include a link to the original.
Still always moving
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Common Joe on Friday April 17 2015, @02:58AM
I think the follow up post is fine idea, but don't get too worked up about needing to get breaking news out there. If I want breaking news, I go to Google News. I come here for relevant and interesting technical news, the discussion, and the community. (It is a relief to know that there are other sane people in this world.) Some anonymous cowards tend to forget that this site is volunteer and we all have lives.
Actually, I tend to like my news "a little stale". That way, more facts come out so I'm not constantly digesting bad news and political news. News wise, 9/11 was one of the worst days of my life. The information came in at a trickle and I constantly surrounded myself with those images. 9/11/2001 was the last time I ever watched the news on a regular basis. Now, I read the news on a partial schedule so I'm not constantly bombarded with it.
But I'm only one data point.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Ryuugami on Friday April 17 2015, @06:26AM
Add another data point.
There is a bazillion places on the net where you can engage in the kind of speculation and hyperbole that is inevitable in a "breaking news" fact-free stories.
When something requires swift action, e.g. a large security hole is detected in common software and such, break it ASAP. Then post a follow-up story a few days/weeks later, as a recap, so we can discuss it properly :)
I'd like SN to be a place where I can relax and read some funny and insightful comments from smart people, and that's easier to have when you leave a few days to see the facts and think about them :)
If a shit storm's on the horizon, it's good to know far enough ahead you can at least bring along an umbrella. - D.Weber
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday April 17 2015, @06:04PM
I pretty much stopped watching "regular" news, because they seem to peddle misery with the Occasional bit of great / funny / good news. I see plenty of misery in life just by looking around. No need to be bombarded with everyone's problems every day.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by Common Joe on Saturday April 18 2015, @04:37AM
Yeah. For me, it was everything you said plus commercials. For a while before I went online for everything, I recorded the news and fast forwarded through it. (I condensed 60 minutes down to 15 or 20.) I was always unhappy with the quality of the news and then it sunk to a new low when one of the news anchors delivered "news" about how the McRib was coming back to McDonalds. I had heard they were being paid to deliver advertisements as news articles, but that was so overtly blatent, it was one of the defining moments that caused me to go online for my news.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 17 2015, @09:55AM
Perhaps the problem is that it just takes a lot of time between submission and publication?
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Friday April 17 2015, @01:43PM
If there's an editor that notices the submission right away, of course they can send the story to the top pretty quickly, but news comes in 24/7, and we only have ~5 active editors.
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 17 2015, @02:14PM
Perhaps it's the amount of editing that is the problem? Some basic fact checking all input has to be subject to of course. The level can be debated otoh.
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Saturday April 18 2015, @05:24PM
That's basically my point, we only have so many editors, and so much time per person.
(Score:1^½, Radical)