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Stanford's Francis Fukuyama Builds Personal Surveillance Drone

Posted by timothy on from the who-is-this-fukuyama-guy? dept.

HerbieTMac writes "Political science professor Francis Fukuyama builds and flies his own personal surveillance drones. His current model requires ground visibility but he is working on the HAM license that would allow fully remote operation. His YouTube videos (video 1 , video 2) are particularly impressive." I had no idea that Francis Fukuyama had such technical interests.

4 of 92 comments (clear)

  1. Ham license by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    A ham license might let him operate on different frequencies and with longer range. However the FAA does not allow a radio-control aircraft to operate out of view of the controller under current guidelines.

  2. Cool but not all that impressive by Bretski · · Score: 5, Informative

    Beside the fact that people have been doing this for years, he built this on a multi-rotor heli platform. Flight times for these are usually under 10 minutes, given the power needed to keep them in the air. If he really wants surveillance with long range, he should try a fixed-wing setup, where flight times can be 30-45 minutes. DIYDRONES.COM is a good place to start.

  3. No worries... by msauve · · Score: 5, Informative
    The summary was written by Timothy, which means it's only peripherally related to reality.

    The license is so he can do more sophisticated telemetry. FTA:

    I've bought the package that includes a real time video transmitter and receiver, camera, and telemetry system that will send back GPS data on the drone's location, heading, airspeed, etc. This requires, among other things, a ham radio license.

    --
    "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
  4. Re:You will all be watched ! Question here. by captainpanic · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I prefer the situation where everybody is watching everybody, with nobody in command, to the situation where a powerful government is watching everybody with only a handful in command.

    We cannot stop technology. Cameras are getting too small, and computers too fast and both get too cheap to realistically think they won't be applied on a massive scale. The big question is who controls the data, and what happens to it.