How to Make UAVs More Socially Acceptable

(Source: blog.supasympa.com)  

Most people are scared of things falling out of the sky, understandably, and we don’t generally like being spied on. So UAVs, or drones as the media likes to refer to them, equipped with cameras are easy targets when it comes to negative press and scare tactics. The almost overnight increase in press interest in drones, in the UK (and Europe?), started in mid October 2014 when a drone was used to fly a flag over the Serbia vs Albania Euro 2016 qualifier, starting mass brawls and chair throwing! This has prompted several examples of similar stories:

• “Football stadium drones put ‘lives at risk”
• “Just imagine that a drone carrying a bomb instead of a flag comes to a ground,” Platini said on French television. “What can we do?”
• and “The use of drones in the UK will rise over the next 20 years, raising “significant safety, security, and privacy concerns”, a report has said.

These examples paint a pretty scary picture for Joe Bloggs on the high-street! People want to feel safe and these stories about drones (okay lets go with it) don’t make people feel very safe. It’s like we’re all headed towards a “Runaway like tomorrow”:

Having read with interest about UAV technology and it’s uses for a while and then starting to fly them, I’ve found out just how positive this technology really is. Only this week I was having a conversation with someone about how their friend is building drones to help deliver vital medical supplies and this is one of the countless positive stories I’ve heard. Think of almost any situation where a human being is in danger but needs to “monitor” something or take action and you could replace them with a UAV, that’s got to be good, right?

I think that some consumer and enthusiast UAV technology is currently immature and can be dangerous in irresponsible (human) hands. The majority of pilots will fly responsibly however and abide by the laws of their territory and we’ll never hear about them but bad things will happen and the press will report those stories. In turn law makers will feel pressure to make laws to fight the bad press and the cycle will continue until some kind of balance occurs. What I hope doesn’t happen along the way is that the general public becomes so scared of UAVs that we start seeing protests on high streets or ridiculous laws banning their use for no good reason and ultimately slowing down the evolution of this useful technology.

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