Should Small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Be Part Of Journalism’s Toolset?

Video screengrab of initial construction of the Graton Casino in Rohnert Park in 2012 - taken from amateur suas footage.

Video screengrab of initial construction of the Graton Casino in Rohnert Park in 2012 – taken from amateur suas footage.

A great deal of reporting is being done lately on the value of “drone journalism”. Coupled with the FAA’s legal wrangling over the actual legality of such newsgathering, we’ve got ourselves a First Amendment issue, folks.

This video was gathered by yours truly in June 2012 to document the progress of SMART working on improving our local railroad infrastructure:

The FAA thinks this should be illegal.

They also think this should be illegal:

What do you think? Do you have archival or newsworthy “suas” (small unmanned aerial systems) video to share with a larger audience?

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