Court strikes down rule forcing hobbyist drone registration

@medz Just use a telescope like a normal person, geez.

@medz Oh good. Now more of us get to have target practice without having to buy clay pigeons. Now I just need a gun. LOL

@Kidsandliz
/giphy see you in court

@medz Ha! See? Even the internet agrees with me. Basketball court so let the target practice begin (if and only if one shows up outside your window or in your yard with a camera on it) LOL

@Kidsandliz I told The Spouse that if I find one hovering in our yard or looking in a window it’ll be a dead drone as soon as I can unsnap the holster.

BTW, you have email on another address.

@medz You’re so cute when you’re all naive like that.

@medz
Around there, the gun owner is gonna win out over a drone operator legally, just about every time, unless the gun owner is unusually idiotic.

Esp if the gun owner is charged with something and requests a jury trial. Or if there is a lawsuit with a jury empaneled.

@f00l small claims court have no jury.

@magic_cave Which address? Kidsandliz? I see nothing on that nor the one that notifications come through.

@medz

You don’t live in a deep red state do you? There’s the law, which might favor drones less than one might suppose … and then there’s the way things are done.

Sometimes that’s good. Often enough, not so good.

Ok small claims - doesn’t use juries. But the party making a claim against the gun owner still has to win there.

If the party making a claim against the gun owner was being some sort of nuisance, as a local might see it, how sure is a win? Judges do have some discretion. And local judges are elected. I’m sure you can guess the common local politics on gun rights.

Let me point out that the majority of local liberal and progressives I know (who have so little power that they can’t win elections) strongly support commonplace red state gun rights. They just don’t support gun rights to the degree of the further edges of the NRA positions. Everyone else local is pretty much more pro-gun-rights than that.

Ok, presume for the sake of argument that the drone owner manages to win in small claims…
But also assume the gun owner is not, as locally defined, a nutcase, and many local persons would see the drone operator as the nuisance, not the gun owner.

So the gun owner countersues. In regular court. A jury case. (There will be zero worries about funding the lawsuit. A number of lawyers would take it pro bono. Local gun clubs might fund it.)

Ok, now what happens next? How much a sure thing is this outcome likely to be finalized in favor of the drone operator?

If the gun owner is seen to be somewhat irresponsible and/or a nutcase by the standards of the local community, the drone owner might prevail.
If the gun owner is seen to be a “decent citizen” by local standards, and the drone operator is viewed as possibly annoying, well …

“See you in court” is an easy line for anyone to toss off. Doing it, affording it, and winning, are other matters, unless you are a lawyer yourself.

Obviously, much about how an incident might turn out depends on particulars. The law and courts would not favor someone who just went out shooting at drones for fun.

@f00l Good articles on restrictions of drone use in Texas. From my inexpert reading it appears that flying a drone over private property while taking photos or video is not permitted.
https://www.versustexas.com/criminal/drone-laws-in-texas/
http://www.tiltingthescales.com/2015/08/17/declaring-war-on-drones-is-it-a-crime-to-shoot-down-a-drone-over-your-property/

I guess the general laws will change in regards to free use on public property if they: fail or are mishandled and crash on or into someone or something of value (55lbs falling out of the sky can do a lot of damage), cause accidents (how long before some idiot starts buzzing traffic with one), or generally cause tge kind of trouble that annoys or embarasses lawmakers.

There needs to be a realistic clarification on property owners’ right to the airspace immediately over their property. Right now in Texas it seems to be as much as you are “using”, so arguably the tallest building or tree on your property caps your ownership of your sky. Time to shop for a really really tall flagpole.

@moondrake

I suspect that, practically speaking, court cases and local laws will strongly favor property-rights-holders who choose to go to court, or to take any sort of action locally viewed as “reasonable” over drone operators.

@moondrake I’m a liberal gun owner who lives in a red state and my only drown is like 2" square.

I am not a fanatic gun owner nor a fanatic drone operator.

@medz
Ok. I just wouldn’t be too confident that courts would favor a drone operator. Here, I have my doubts.

@moondrake 55 pounds is the FAA legal limit; however, the vast majority of consumer drones weigh less than a quarter of that. (For a given size, the lighter the drone itself is, the better it will perform.)

@PooltoyWolf I expected that would be the case. But 15-20lbs falling from a height of 20+ feet is plenty enough to kill. 150 people are killed every year by falling coconuts, which generally weigh under 2lbs. A 6lb brick falling 11ft generates over 3,000lbs of impact, according to hazardcontrol.com.

@magic_cave I have looked in junk mail also just now (7:30pm on the 21st) and see nothing. Kidsandliz with yahoo and where this comes through to me with notifications are the two places I have looked.

@moondrake perhaps the FAA should create a brick registry

@medz the worst way to spy on anyone is from a platform that sounds like a million furious bees in a leaf blower, with the operator standing in the middle of the nearest field with a controller that says to all “HUGE NERD HERE”

@Kidsandliz I’ll resend to both addresses.

@zippyus I’m perfectly happy they are not registered with the FAA. But I think they should be registered with local government. We have to register our pets with local government so if they wander off and get into trouble they can be linked back to us. If someone is flying a drone on my property and taking photos or video without my permission, they are in violation of the law and subject to fines. But if the drone isn’t registered anywhere and can’t be traced to an owner, how do I pursue my legal rights? It seems to me that I would have two options. I could try to find the drone operator and call the police, hoping they get there before he leaves (not a very good bet in my neighborhood). Or I could capture the drone (in the least destructive manner possible) and turn it over to the police. Making these things anonymous means homeowners have no choice but to be proactive when their rights are being violated.

@moondrake You don’t own the sky. Satellites and airplanes take photos of your property without your permission all the time. I can drive by and photograph your house from the street and that’s totally legal. Google street view is another example. If the drown flies into your house or barn (or maybe hovering just outside the window) then you might have a case. Otherwise, if you’re out in the open, you may not have a reasonable expectation of privacy.
I agree, though.These things aren’t toys. They have a lot of capabilities that warrant them to be registered to people. If a car is used in a crime, they can track it to the owner. It should be the same for a drone.

@zippyus Brick can’t be operated anonymously from a considerable distance.

@medz "Texas has restrictions on making recordings on privately owned property. The Texas Privacy Act (Government Code Chapter 423) also sets out areas where drones may used to make recordings. Specifically, Texas Government Code Section 423.002(a) provides it is lawful to capture recordings:

of public real property or a person on public property;
with the consent of the owner or legal resident of private property;
for educational purposes;
in FAA-designated test sites or ranges;
by any branch of the military;
for mapping by satellite;
if the image is captured by or for an electric of natural gas utility for maintenance, assessment, routing, and inspections;
with the consent of the individual who owns or lawfully occupies the real property;
pursuant to a valid search warrant;
by law enforcement in immediate pursuit of someone they have reasonable suspicion to believe has committed a felony offense, or to document a felony crime scene, and a list of other instances when law enforcement might want to use aerial photography;
at hazardous material spills;
for fire suppression;
to rescue an individual;
by a real estate broker so long as no individuals are depicted;
of real property or of a person on real property that is within 25 miles of the US border;
at a height of no more than 8 feet off the ground in a public place, if the image was captured without amplification;
pipeline inspections; and
for port security.

Civil Consequences of Improper Drone Use in Texas

Owners and tenants of private property can file lawsuits to recover civil penalties and attorney’s fees from individuals who illegally use drones to make recordings. They can also file an action to stop an existing violation or prevent an imminent violation. Civil penalties of $5,000 for all materials from a single recording episode, and $10,000 for disclosure, display, distribution or other of all materials from a single recording episode apply. Additionally, if it is shown that the recording were disclosed, displayed or distributed with malice, the owner or tenant may recover actual damages."

https://www.versustexas.com/criminal/drone-laws-in-texas/
http://www.hse-uav.com/texas_hb_912.htm

Drone operators don’t own the sky either.

@Ignorant I registered as a commercial user under the previous process, but FAA nullified those credentials when they enacted the new rules in late 2015. I stopped flying then. And then my drones were stolen, so my brother gave me a Phantom 4 for Christmas. It’s still sitting in the sealed box. I guess I can fly it now.

@Ignorant Right there with you.

@Ignorant I never registered, I just grounded my meh dji phantom 1 waiting for this rule to be overturned. Going to test it out next weekend, maybe finally add FPV to it.

@Ignorant same here

@f00l destruction of property and unlawful discharge of the firearm

@medz

What is this “unlawful” you speak of?

And suppose the drone is brought down by a boomerang or slingshot or something?

/giphy javelin

@f00l brutal.

@medz @f00l or flies low enough a cat or dog gets it

@apLundell So if your neighbor was hanging over the fence videotaping you or your kids you’d be entirely cool with that?

I’m not personally worried about a drone on my property, my back yard is almost fully canopied by trees, in a year or two it will be fully covered (the hackberry actually owns the sky at my house). But I have pretty strong feelings about privacy on personal property. I do believe that if your yard is not visible from the street and you have put up opaque fencing and taken whatever measures are appropriate to secure your yard from casual observation you should have a legal expectation of privacy. I don’t believe your neighbors should be allowed to hang over the fence, or climb on their roof, or fly a drone onto your property for the purpose of taking unauthorized photos or video of you or your family on your own property. I don’t care if the purpose is simple amusement or something darker, I believe your desire for privacy on your own property should legally trump anyone’s desire to invade that privacy. Increasing population pushes us ever closer to one another, and the absolute minimum requirement for peace is a basic respect for one another’s personal space.

@moondrake
I think you’ve missed my point. Let me try again.

Nobody cares about you. Nobody is spying on you.

There’s a crazy moral panic that if we don’t do something right away, the kids these days are going to have drones everywhere! Spying on us!!!

The fact that you’ve even devised some kind of plan for what to do to combat people who “desire to invade your privacy” is crazy.

It’s like worrying that people are buying parabolic listening devices and pointing them at your windows to listen to what’s happening in your living-room.

Here in the real world, If someone is flying a drone, they’re not doing it because of you.

@apLundell I think you missed my point. I don’t think anyone is spying on me. Technology is advancing faster that the law and privacy is suffering as a result.

@moondrake People say that every generation.

People said that when the camera was invented, and again when the 35mm camera was invented. They said it when the portable tape recorder was invented. They said it gods knows how many other times. And every time the republic has managed to survive without crisis.

“This time it’s different!”, they always cry, not realizing that the only thing that’s different is that all those other advances happened before they grew up, and therefore seem normal.

And that nicely brings us back to why I called it a “absurd disproportionate moral panic” and advised people to shake their canes in impotent fury.

@apLundell also google glass