From Pine View Farm

Droning On 1

So now it’s an industry already?

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1 comment

  1. George Smith

    March 30, 2013 at 12:50 pm

    Hmm, AeronVironment is near me. Classic defense contracting business that’s been around forever that wants to move into the domestic market with little models of marginal benefit. They also make a flying assassin that’s man portable for the military.
    Pasadena has successfully employed a helicopter for years. They provide better service. It’s difficult to imagine how drone use would help in traffic monitoring. You can’t change the facts on the ground on the highways at rush hour here just by observation. The only selling point would be an insistence that it’s cheaper than running helicopters. But the mark I eyeballs works better than soda straw drone optics.
    They’re a victim of their own success. Having had a free go of it and maximum publicity for the war on terror, public perceptions are in the tank, as they should be. Their best hope is corporate capture of government and bribery, which they are adept at.
    A bit of it reminds me of the arms manufacturer campaign to sell red light cameras as safety-enhancing and money-raisers. Here, everyone has a hangover from it. Pasadena got rid of them as they only made money for the manufacturer and furnished no demonstrable benefit. In LA, they’re shot, too, for similar reasons. The courts no longer wanted to prosecute the automated traffic tickets they issued because people fought them.