Hacker News Reader

> They're saying that the videos, if monetized, make the drone flying a commercial activity, which is banned.

Strange, I didn't know there was any non-commercial component to the first amendment. How did newpapers and newcasts, which are also commercial activities, escape such issues?

View on HN

There's nothing illegal about posting and monetizing the video, the illegal part is flying the drone to shoot the video for commercial use.

Unless your newspaper is delivering its newspapers by drones, they would not run into this issue.

It isn't banning posting videos of flying drones, it means that if you make money off posting a video of flying a drone, it means you are operating a drone commercially, which is not allowed. It has nothing to do with speech, it is about unlawfully flying.

> It has nothing to do with speech, it is about unlawfully flying

The act of flying a plane becomes retroactively illegal because money was made from a video? Can we be adults and admit this has nothing to do with lawfulness and everything to do with money?

Of course it has to do with money, we are talking about whether or not it is a commercial activity, which is exactly what determines whether or not the flight is in violation of the FARs. I'm not sure what your point is.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com