This one is the DJI Phantom Aerial UAV Drone Quadcopter for GoPro,
to be exact. In the interest of full
disclosure, the product and the company are not a client. I first learned of this from a Twitter post I received a few days ago when a journalism professor from
Syracuse University had posted a photo of this interesting little four-prop device that could
serve as a catalyst for newsgathering of the future.
Dan Pacheco is the Peter A. Horvitz Chair in Journalism Innovation at the S.I. Newhouse
School at Syracuse University, but enough of the formalities.
Dan posted to Twitter a photo of a drone with a camera
mounted on it with the caption: “Hmm,
I wonder where our new dji Phantom with GoPro mount will fly on this rainy
day?”
Hmm, I wonder where our new dji Phantom with GoPro mount will fly on this rainy day? pic.twitter.com/ruwBNG22pi
— Dan Pacheco (@pachecod) November 7, 2013
The question and
the photo certainly got my attention. I haven’t really thought about the use of
drone technology for other than military or law enforcement applications.
But this is for
personal/private use and it’s the real thing.
And the fact that it can be used with a camera mount for newsgathering
opens the door to a million possibilities.
According to the
drone’s descriptor on Amazon, it arrives “ready to fly.” All you need to do is unpack it, attach the
propellers, charge the “LiPo” (I’m assuming that’s a power source) and install
the transmitter batteries. I’m also
guessing that however you’d like to outfit you’re drone, that’s on you as
well. So if you want to mount a camera,
you have to purchase a compatible device and install that.
Thanks to some recent news features, I’ve seen how these
types of drones operate. They aren’t toys.
They tend to fly very stable and agile.
I’m not sure about this one, but they can be disarmingly quiet. Each of these features make drones highly
efficient tools for surveillance and information-gathering.
Just thinking about the drone and its potential took me back
to my own early reporting days in and how such technology might have changed
the way we covered news.
Once I hid behind a patrol car as the police negotiated with
a hostage-taker in a residential neighborhood.
If I had a drone, I could have flown the thing over the house or even
near the house to see what was going on, though I’m sure the police commander
would have had something to say about that.
Then I thought about my role as a PR person. How will a drone affect my work in PR?
No doubt, I would have to take into account that news
reporters could and would gain access to places we’d prefer they not, such as
near power wires, and plant and company employees, to name a few. Would we be within our rights to “take down”
the drone if it flies into our private space?
I don’t know. I do know that such
acts of surveillance and retaliation would not come without significant
controversy.
What about our own use as PR professionals? Can we use drones to access areas that before
may have been logistically impossible to access? I would think drone technology would come in
handy for capturing visuals of everything from a complex or vast manufacturing
process to a store grand opening.
WATCH: First time students fly newsgathering drone prototype October 4, 2013 in Syracuse University's Manley Field House.
Dan Pacheco first started using drones on campus almost a year
ago. His purpose was to experiment with
aerial footage for journalism. Of course
this is not without its challenges.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ordered a couple of state-funded
journalism schools to shut down outdoor use of drones. So Syracuse uses its indoor athletic facilities to
serve as laboratories for drone navigation.
From a timing standpoint, the FAA is supposed to issue a method to
certify commercial drone flights by September 30, 2015.
My apologies in advance for this (pun intended), but clearly when it
comes to newsgathering drones and the possibilities, the
sky’s the limit.
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