Originally Posted by init4fun

As to the public fear of drones , I'm certain their fear of Drones has nothing to do with fixed wing because every time anyone not model aviation related sees one of my models of actual airplanes , their reaction is overwhelmingly positive . "Does it run on gas ?" "How high/fast can it fly ?" "Do they cost a lot ?" are some of the typical friendly questions I get . Invariably if the conversation lasts long enough some of folks will come out in a quiet voice with "You got any Drones ?" and when I say no their reaction is usually relief and the next thing they say is something about being afraid of one spying on them through their windows ! Yes sir when the flying camera first became mass market they were being fitted to fixed wing because MRs didn't exist , but even at that the fixed wing FPVers were not hovering outside folk's windows to be salacious fodder for the 5:00 news . Now while I can believe the flying camera caught the FAA's interest back when they were still being fitted to fixed wing , the public fear of the flying camera didn't come along till cameras were being caught hovering outside folk's windows once the MR came along and allowed that type of accurate hovering where such window peeping became possible .

In a way , the MRs did fixed wing a world of good by being perfected , in my opinion . It gave the flying camera people a platform to fly their cameras from that's different enough from my P-51 Mustang that even the average guy on the street with no aviation knowledge whatsoever has no trouble discerning between the two . Show em my DR 1, they start talking about "Snoopy & the Red Baron" . Show em an MR and they express the universal , media driven fear that it's gonna spy on them . And ya know what , there is no way that fear can be blamed on my Piper Cub !