I spy with my little eye ...

... in the sky! The newsmedia have discovered Drones (the “Unmanned Aerial Vehicle” or UAV, form) in a big way.

First out of the blocks at the beginning of the year was the Southland Times with a piece on aerial surveying by UAV. 


Then at the end of last month news that the Fuzz are looking at an unmanned eye-in-the-sky in the neverending quest to get ahead of the bad guys.

Then just recently a mad flurry of everyone climbing on to the bandwagon;


 a bunch of Welly techies get all puffed up about their UAV needing/having a trained commercial pilot and “ Civil Aviation Authority pilotless aircraft authorisation”; this will be news to thousands of hobbyists and their radio control model planes.
17/9/12

Then the Pilots Association, sensing a tidal wave of technology substitution is about to break over them, climb into the fray, declaiming the need for all sorts of rules and regulations.

Not to be outdone , the privacy commissioner wonders if aerial peeping toms are really a good idea.
(average bloke's response: f.. yeah!)

The funny bit about it all is that it has been going on for years, and the local r/c clubs are a bit bemused by all the fuss. 

 It was inevitable that the boys with their r/c planes and helicopters would catch on to the idea of onboard wireless cameras pretty quickly. They soon realised that with real-time video, it was just like sitting in your model plane flying the thing yourself!  And the r/c FPV (First Person View) juggernaut began to roll. Seeing some of these videos, I'm not surprised – I want one too! (do a youtube search on “FPV” - you'll be mesmerised)

Quite frankly I think they are trying to close the stable door when the horse has well and truly bolted – next thing you know the guys selling those little r/c toy helicopters you see buzzing around the malls will have an FPV model talking to your Google glasses!