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Comment by barefoot | Hacker News Reader

In case anyone is reading from NBC, would you mind using the term "UAV" or "RPA" over "drone"? When we throw around the word "drone" here on reddit and hacker news I feel like it's okay because many of us know the key differences between what we're flying and the hellfire raining completely terrifying semi-automated flying death machines deployed in war-zones around the world.

However, many people who read your articles might not be so well informed. Many people have an incorrect and confused understanding of them and to them the word "drone" carries that jumbled mess of an associations. It would be helpful to everyone involved to use more precise modern language. You may argue - as the ACLU has - that the word "drone" is the most direct way to talk about unmanned aerial vehicles to the broad public. It may be easy to use and direct, but it's far from accurate. As Edward Murrow famously said "We cannot make good news out of bad practice."

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> However, many people who read your articles might not be so well informed. Many people have an incorrect and confused understanding of them and to them the word "drone" carries that jumbled mess of an associations.

Do you actually know anyone who has made this mistake? I've heard scores of people online claim this, but I've never met anyone who has actually met someone with this confusion. Who reads this article and thinks that the US government is preparing to announce that large privately-owned unmanned airplanes armed with missiles are going to require registration? I find it incredibly hard to believe that anyone who isn't mentally ill would make this mistake.

In my experience, everyone in the US is quite capable of determining the meaning of "drone" from context. I've flown drones in parks and had dozens of people ask me about them. They may call them "drones," but there's no confusion. Not only that, but there's no fear or apprehension. People think they're cool, which they are.

Somewhat humorously, I think most of the FUD about public perception of consumer drones actually comes from the RC model aircraft community (of which I am a part, I suppose). I do not think it is based in reality.

Yes, I make UAVs as my day job and I run into this confusion regularly. People are very confused about the meaning of the term drone. For some people 'drone' definitively means military drone. For others, 'drone' definitively means a quad-rotor. In the news it's a catch-all term that could mean anything.

When I describe that I make 1,200 pound unmanned helicopters, the first question is always, "Is that like a drone?". In their minds it is neither a quad-rotor, nor carrying missiles, so they're not sure what to call it.

I expect most people will think this registration applies directly to what you describe as using in parks. I have no idea whether it's supposed to apply the likes of the Parrot drones, including or not the Bebop or Spider.

We don't know what this is supposed to cover, especially with the news stories of people using your "drones in parks" types to observe neighboring teenagers sunbathing or to report on mass anti government protests.

Heck yeah there's confusion.

In these circles, a "drone" is usually the little ones you might attach a Go Pro to or control with your iPhone, not a UAV similar to what the military uses. I'd go so far as when someone says "drone" to the general public, they think of the guy at the park before the military version.

If NBC wanted to clarify, they could add a line like "drone - anything with a wingspan over X feet - would have to be registered" and completely dispel any confusion.

>Do you actually know anyone who has made this mistake?

If it helps, I initially did. That was my initial reaction after reading the headline, that it had something to do with military UAV's. After a second of thought and on clicking the article, I found out it was about private UAV's.

Whenever the word "drone" is brought up, the first image that pops into my head is that "Drone Warrior" cover for the Atlantic. I should note that I am not too familiar with UAV's--other than a small handsized drone a colleague bought me as a present, I have little experience with them. This might be a "hunter's association with the word gun vs. a non-hunters'" sort of thing.

> I think most of the FUD about public perception of consumer drones actually comes from the RC model aircraft community

Can you clarify this? What is the RCMA community contrubuting to FUD?

I disagree that drone is wrong here. It's not clear to me that UAV or RPA is any clearer - certainly I expect a lot fewer people are familiar with RPA as a term, and I'm not convinced that UAV has any fewer connotations. I think the term 'civilian drone' might give the right impression.

The manufacturers are widely using the term "drone". Examples:

http://www.parrot.com/usa/

http://axisdrones.com

http://www.dji.com

http://www.bladehelis.com/Drones/

http://store.3drobotics.com/t/drones

I don't think you have much chance of getting the press to use a different term if the manufacturers aren't on board.

I'm with you, but at some point the battle is lost, and you're throwing good effort after bad.

People can be pretty stubborn about that, look at the title of this website. :-)

The battle about the meaning of hacker (vs. cracker) was lost in the 80ies, yet some communities continue to use it in the old sense of the word to set themselves apart.

>The battle about the meaning of hacker (vs. cracker) was lost in the 80ies, yet some communities continue to use it in the old sense of the word to set themselves apart.

Part of the reason for that is the hacker community made up a word that no self respecting person would use to describe themselves. The modern 'computer hacking' culture came out of the phreaker community and IMO is the proper description for this activity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phreaking

Rereading this hours later, I realize that the way I wrote it makes it sound like I'm talking about the word hacker. I'm actually talking about the word cracker, which was essentially a made up term that I'm fairly sure no 'hacker' ever used to describe themselves. The actual 'cracking' community broke DRM schemes and was affiliated with but basically orthogonal to the hacker/phreaker community.

I agree that it's a waste of effort, and that the battle is lost even if you had a solid argument, but you don't. "Drone" has been used to refer to unmanned aircraft since at least as far back as World War 2.

This article is a good summary:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014241278873241104045786258...

What about these:

Historical argument: Model R/C aircraft have been around for longer (including a video downlink and limited autonomous flight like return-to-home) than the term drone has been applied to them, even if it existed before as you said. Since the capabilities of these R/C aircraft didn't change, it is logical that their name doesn't change either.

Usefulness of the definition: Aircraft which are the size of a van and shooting rockets at brown people in the middle east are also called drone. Since capabilities, dangers and use case differ so radically from a 600g aicraft crashing into trees because it's fun, it is logical that they have a different name.

Political argument: Because drone is associated with the aforementioned military aircraft, it makes it easier to call for more regulation of hobbyists by playing on the public's fears.

> Usefulness of the definition: Aircraft which are the size of a van and shooting rockets at brown people in the middle east are also called drone. Since capabilities, dangers and use case

And yet, in that very argument you used the word "aircraft" to refer to military UAVs. That word "aircraft" is also used to describe vehicles of vastly different designs, sizes, and capabilities, but I don't think there's much confusion caused by this term.

It's okay to have words that describe large groups of things, along with words which describe more specific subsets of groups of things.

For what it's worth, the people actually using these, namely the US Air Force doesn't call them drones in any official capacity - but alternatively UAS, RPV, RPA and very rarely UAV. In fact when I was a briefer, just as they were becoming ubiquitous, there was quite a bit of debate about calling them RPAs vs UAVs, which was the most used term at the time.

The DoD nor USG has never officially associated "Drone" with any specific flying operations.

Unfortunately the media inadvertently establishes terminology in a permanent and unavoidable way. The word drone is easy to say, widely recognized, and best of all has 20% more drama than the other terms. Drama is the lifeblood of the news business.

More likely they're saying "The term 'drone' is becoming too ordinary, how can we spice it up a bit? The drone menace? drone threat?"

I'm really not kidding.

There seems to be an obvious need for a classification system that is clear enough for the general public to understand. I have no personal interest in aircraft, but I understand that model airplanes aren't the same as military drones. It would be useful if there were some clear regulatory standards.

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