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The political and ideological discussion in the USA about gun control laws and the 2nd Amendment has been a hot topic for decades. Usually, the topic remains in a glowing, hot-ember state. The heat and light emanating from this hot-ember pulses and intensifies when fanned by the news of mass murder involving guns. As drones become more prevalent in society, I fear the hot-embers of this age-old debate will fan into flames. While one must have a license to operate either machine, that legal requirement will not deter those with harmful intent.
Putting aside the political and ideological debates, how would soylentils implement a no-fly zone for drones - especially ones with harmful payloads or in areas containing volatile substances?
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innovate, v.:
To annoy people.
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Wednesday December 02 2015, @12:26PM
Putting aside the political and ideological debates, how would soylentils implement a no-fly zone for drones
Some manufacturers already have implemented exclusion zones baked into the device firmware. DJI for instance loads up the Phantom with airports and other high profile things like the White House (after a drone landed on the lawn) and when approaching the exclusion zones they'll smack against a virtual wall and refuse to move closer to the zone. I don't recall what happens if the craft finds itself inside the zone through a surprise - it might just elect to decrease power, descend, and hope it does not land on anything but it has no sensors for detecting objects. It knows it has landed when it no longer descends. My NAZA controller (not on a Phantom) will touch the ground twice to double check it is on something firm before it'll cut the power to the motors. I know its behavior because I perform lost signal tests to make sure my craft will return to a known point if my transmitter dies instead of something like cutting the motors and just plummet out of the air.
The FAA currently publishes temporary flying exclusion zones depending on where the President of the United States and other high profile areas. These are spread through announcements and when POTUS visits a city no one can fly any r/c craft anywhere near the city. Violations are enforced with cops and at the Federal level. Getting wind of these temporary exclusion zones takes paying attention and is a pain in the butt. I believe now FAA has a phone app that pilots can use to validate the temporary no fly zones that exist around them and that is a good step in the right direction.
When it comes to automatically telling a drone that it can't be in a spot the problem is not easy. You will find that the things that can be done will decrease the safety that exists when flown by a competent pilot and in a way where a competent pilot can't do anything about it. If making a device where the competent pilots can be overruled by a nefarious actor is improving safety because the average pilot is so dangerous that is a sad state of affairs.
I realize that most pilots can't get their drone to do anything like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pki4TzdGDPY [youtube.com] but I can. The DJI Phantom can do it too with a good pilot at the controls. If pilots would learn how to actually fly the things instead of point and crash there would not be a problem.
How would I implement an exclusion zone? Through punishing people who risk injury to others and damage to property. Aka - enforce laws that already restrict the behavior.
Oh another exclusion zone technology is the psycho bitch bot: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/06/quadrocopter-pilot-gets-attacked-by-drone-hating-woman/ [arstechnica.com]. No I don't think the psycho bitch is a good technology but it does go to show that knowing exactly where you can safely fly also benefits drone pilots because the public is dumb, not just the pilots in the news.
(Score: 2) by jmoschner on Wednesday December 02 2015, @02:30PM
"No fly zones" would probably be enforced like most areas, either built in software with gps, or simply through fines if/when a drone is caught in an area it shouldn't be. Much like with any other moving vehicle.
For example, one may not be allowed to drive their car through a playground or their our neighbor's yard but they could physically do so and if caught would face punishment.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Knowledge Troll on Wednesday December 02 2015, @02:52PM
or simply through fines if/when a drone is caught in an area it shouldn't be. Much like with any other moving vehicle.
For example, one may not be allowed to drive their car through a playground or their our neighbor's yard but they could physically do so and if caught would face punishment.
I concur that this would probably be sufficient. There is an issue in that cars have people in them and r/c craft can be operated semi-anonymously. Being members of the Internet it should be obvious what anonymity can do to a human. I'm not yet sure if r/c aircraft are different enough to a car that this becomes a major factor but I know from experience the risks are not immediately obvious as a pilot. One has to learn to recognize dangerous activity then cease to do it again. There is learning from mistakes that happens and close calls - I suspect these pilots in the news are not backing off and learning from mistakes. This might make them different than cars as the threat of injury to the pilot is nearly non-existent.
It definitely looks like r/c aircraft are having their Eternal September [wikipedia.org] right now. Except that unlike AOL, DJI makes a cutting edge technology product that is leader in the pack in terms of quality and features. As a serious hobbyist some of my best quality and well engineered gear came from DJI though I have assembled my stuff from a kit instead of buying a turnkey product like the Phantom.