Hey init4fun!

I agree (to an extent). And unfortunately I think there's a very good chance there's going to be an accident eventually, new regulations or not. I've personally heard an urgent PIREP in an area that I thought would be far removed from any threat. Turns out it wasn't the first, either.

What I'm hoping will happen now that the regs are in place (and rest assured, Canada will follow :() is that the ones actually causing the problems will be properly persecuted. I doubt that someone flying through an ILS glide path is going to have registered their craft, but hey, at least there's some ground rules in place to persecute them on an individual basis and with some clearer federal laws.

I see it similar to the gun control debate. Obviously with so many FPV ready multirotors or fixed wing machines out there, and the ease as which you can get such a system airborne, banning the object outright isn't going to work, and really just opens the door to more cases of AMA club fliers or balsa bashers to get unfairly targeted.

I'm guessing many more think they can do it the same, but probably could not. This club president and his board have set two great examples for not only dealing with the "drone" issue, but just as importantly nurturing, building, and maintaining a relationship with the community their club is based in. Although I'm not a fan of banning MR/Drones outright just because of what they are, this club did so because it made the most sense to do so, and fortunately the AMA isn't dictating to all clubs what they have to do. Although there is national oversight on some issues, many of the day to day issues are left to the local club, and their membership to deal with.

The AMA oversees some pretty wild activities. If you ever get the chance to watch control line speed, c/l combat, c/l racing, high powered free flight and all the classes of RC pylon racing...you'll see that our $75 is buying quite a lot.
[All this stuff is shown on Utoob, but it's not the same as seeing it live].
Multi-rotor racing and MR "all out speed" are natural fits with what we do.

Second clip is fixed wing, not "drone"...last clip is hilarious, for all the wrong reasons of course.

The same to you! Every club operates under a different set of circumstances. For some it's the size of the runway, noise or like us, operating so near people and full scale aircraft. From day one we have worked to have a good relationship with our neighbors. This past August at our annual air show, our Town gave out 1100 hot dogs and we put up over 100 kids and adults on the buddy box. We have many local politicians attend as well, which helped our cause when the County drew up "drone legislation." Because of our relationship we were able to meet with the legislator and county sheriff that put the law together. We reminded them that we hobbyists operate under the AMA Safety Code and are not the people peeping in windows and dropping contraband over the county jail. As a result, at each public hearing that was held the person who penned the law was a great cheerleader for our club and air show.

With the amount of "drones" that have been sold for Christmas this year, it's inevitable that there will be more incidents in the news. What we need to do is get the public to our flying fields and show them responsible behavior. If your club allows FPV show people the way it's done, with a spotter keeping it line of sight and not flying over people. People shouldn't just worry about the FAA, but their local municipalities that write laws to ban R/C flying. Albany County was a good example of that.

First clip:

AMA/FAA will have to enact a + 2 tee shirt distance rule..........for the drones' protection.

Ha!

The mass banning of things for the citizens of a country never works out to well

You are so absolutely correct. In rare instances perhaps, but for the most part banning something is rarely the solution, just the easy way out of dealing with the bigger picture. The most disappointing thing for me to see here and elsewhere are fellow members of the AMA actually advocating for the banning of something, most of which never flew or were part of the AMA when it came into being, and didn't go through all the changes and advancements in technology that the AMA did embrace.

Next they will want to ban assault rifles!