With the emergence of websites such as DIYDrones.com, and the creation of technological equipment like 3D printers, more Americans now have the ability to create their own unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) or drones.
Take Derrick Slopey of the Maine Hacker Club, who built a drone using a 3D printer and electronic parts he purchased off eBay after he found a design on the Internet. Altogether the entire drone cost Slopey between $300 – $400, and he says the price will only go down once drones become more mainstream.
Although drones are most commonly viewed as a government tool used in war zones to kill terrorists and spy on Americans in their homes, the technology could be used for a plethora of other non-police purposes, such as agriculture, tracking weather and animals, traffic, journalism, finding missing children and pets.
Slopey said he attached a GoPro camera on his drone, which allows video to be transmitted back to him on the ground. He said his plan is to eventually use his drone during traffic jams to determine whether it would be faster for him to get off on the next exit.
While the average American may still struggle to build their own drone, more and more Americans have begun to accept that the technology is not going away, and have decided to use it themselves. Even Americans who were concerned that the widespread use of drones would lead to an invasion of their privacy have begun to accept civilian use of drones, especially after Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt said the technology was no more invasive than smartphones, Facebook or Google, which most Americans use daily.
But in an interview with the Guardian, former moderator of DIY Drones and self-described “UAV addict” Anish Mohammed said drones pose “much less of a threat than Google or Facebook,” and added that “if some action needs to be taken, it should be aimed at them first.”
Henry Fletcher, co-founder of Universal Air agreed with Mohammad, saying, “One of the critical reasons for trying to drive a change in the way [drones are] viewed – even a change in what they’re called – is to make people understand these things aren’t roaming around trying to spy on their personal privacy.
“The amusing thing is that the state and the police department have every recipe in the book for getting information about people right now. Something like this may well reduce the amount of prying and intervening they do because they can just spot-check rather than following people around.”
Although drones were introduced as a law enforcement and government tool, many Americans like Slopey argue that “If anybody has the right to own something, it’s the people — not the government.”
Mohammad agreed, explaining that the media’s classification of drones as spybots and targeted killing machines has made it more difficult for the public to understand the other purposes for the technology. In particular, he pointed to the work of the startup Matternet, which delivered chocolate via a fleet of drones to children in Haiti last year.
“The association of drones with military use is a bit of a disservice, in my view,” Mohammad said. “Given I’m Muslim, I’m not going to be in favor of drones being used to kill people in the Middle East. Drones could provide eyes and ears for all situations where it’s risky for humans – which could be anything from delivering food to medicine or providing the internet.”
Still, drone opponents argue that civilian use of drones comes with risks, specifically threats to the public’s safety and privacy, which was stated in an op-ed in the Digital Journal, explaining that drones could potentially be used to blackmail, murder, kidnap, coerce, and rape, which is why the editorial board called for legislation of drone uses.