WELCOME
Thanks for coming to visit my website. I write about science, technology, foreign affairs, and other subjects.
Follow me on Twitter: @kkakaesDrones and Aerial Observation
I edited and wrote part of a short book published by New America in July 2015 and freely available online, about how drones are being used in new ways around the world. It's meant to be useful to people who want to fly drones.The Pioneer Detectives
I published a short book with The Millions.
It's the story of the Pioneer Anomaly, a long-standing mystery. The book is short and fun—the length of a novella—but also, in the words of Amazon's reviewer, "powerful and sad". If you've got any curiosity about how NASA works behind the scenes or why scientists believe what they do, I think you'll enjoy the book.
It is available on Amazon as a Kindle Single and also on Apple's iBooks.Drone Wars
I wrote a chapter on the long history of drone technology going back to the early 20th century in this edited Cambridge University Press volume.
Robots at the Front
26 June 2018
“Army of None” Review
Autonomous weapons are becoming a common feature of modern war, raising practical and philosophical issues that remain to be solved. This book doesn’t do much to help solve them.
[Wall Street Journal]
Drone-based film-making
16 November 2015
Why good drone art is necessary
A review of the New York Drone Film Festival.
[The Economist]
Drone strikes and international law
22 April 2015
Fallout reaches the ivory tower
NYU law school students react to Harold Koh’s support for targeted killings.
[The Economist]
Civil disobedience in the air
15 April 2015
A man landed a gyrocopter on the Capitol lawn
Some thoughts on why this sort of thing shouldn’t be prevented by computer software.
[Washington Post]
Regulating Persistence
19 March 2015
Why persistent surveillance must be regulated
A brief response to Obama’s call for comment on drones and privacy.
[The Economist]
clips, Drones
tags: drones, FAA, NTIA, persistence, privacy, small drones, The Economist
The FAA’s new rules on Small Drones
16 February 2015
A quick reaction to the FAA’s notice of proposed rulemaking
The new rules are tardy and incomplete but could have been much worse.
[Quartz]
clips, Drones
tags: FAA, Quartz, small drones
Alibaba’s Teabag Stunt Doesn’t Prove That Drone Delivery Works
4 February 2015
Another drone PR stunt
A Chinese companies scheme to deliver tea doesn’t mean the logistics or economics of delivery via drone will be real anytime soon.
[Slate]
clips, Drones
tags: Alibaba, Drone delivery, Slate
Why Are Drone-Makers Helping Governments Crack Down on Drones?
28 January 2015
DJI’s brute force regulation through software
The dangers of users lacking control over the devices they use, as illustrated by one drone-maker’s reaction when one of its aircraft crashed on the White House grounds.
[Slate]
clips, Drones
tags: DJI, drones, Lawrence Lessig, Phantom, Slate, software, UAVs, White House Drone
PR Stunts
2 December 2013
Amazon Prime Drone Delivery? It’s Hot Air
Why Amazon won’t be delivering packages with drones by 2015.
[Slate]
Eyes in the sky
3 May 2013
What the rise of the helicopter tells us about the future of domestic drones.
How to think carefully about the spread of drones.
[Slate]
Rand Paul’s Drone Delusion
7 March 2013
Many reasons to worry about drones, but killing Americans in America is not one of them
Why Rand Paul’s filibuster focused on the wrong points.
[Foreign Policy]
clips, Drones
tags: drones, Foreign Policy, Rand Paul, Targeted Killing