<However, there must be limits, somewhere, to what you are allowed to do.>
There ARE limits, clearly defined in law both here in the UK and over in the colonies. So what we're looking at here is finding effective means of law-enforcement, not a need for new laws. I suggest that the knee-jerk populism evidenced in the FAA regulation fails to provide effective law-enforcement.
Why? The people covered in the scope of this regulation can be divided into three groups:
1. Hobbyists (both "conventional" RC model flyers and "multicopter/FPV" flyers). These people have a long-term experience of and interest in the hobby. They are mostly members of national associations (like the BMFA in the UK or the AMA in the colonies), and carry 3rd-party liability insurance. They are aware of, and generally abide by the laws, restrictions, codes-of-practice and safety procedures applicable to their hobby and present insignificant risk to the public or to man-carrying aviation. The new regulation will not change their risk in any way.
2. Commercial or pseudo-commercial (academic) operators. These people have discovered the emergent multicopter technologies and use them to perform legitimate activities. They're a varied bunch - aerial photography for estate agents ("realtors" to colonials), aerial crop survey, small-scale crop-spraying, archaeological survey, wildlife photography & study* and even search & rescue** . Heck, last year I had a roofing specialist out to quote me for repairing leaks on my rental property. It's an old 3-storey edwardian house with high, gabled rooves that need scaffolding just to get up and take a look. This guy had a multicopter with an HD video camera and accurately surveyed the job in 20 mins, saving £1,00 on the final bill. These people are useful. They are also commercially licensed both in the UK and the states. They have an approved Operations Manual (very similar to any other Air Operator) which defines their operating limits, procedures, separations etc etc and they stick to them, They carry insurance, and these chaps & chapesses aren't a threat to anyone else either, and the new regulation will have no effect on their risk.
3. The "Hooligan" element. These are the people who do crazy things to get attention on youtube. Some film themselves driving cars through city centres at 200mph in the early hours of the morning. Some film themselves strapping fireworks to cats. Some film themselves playing silly-beggers with guns, and some use multicopters to take daring or dangerous footage (like filming aircraft in the pattern at airports). You can also include the peeping tom filmers and intrusive journalists in this group. These people are basically stupid. They are dangerous, ungovernble and reprehensible, and constitute the best argument I've seen for moving the abortion limit from 28 weeks to around 70 years. They represent a significant risk to the public and to manned aviation. This new regulation will have no effect on them whatsoever, because they won't register. They will simply operate covertly - the FPV vehicles which they use can be flown from inside the back of a van with blacked-out windows. Sure, Police officers might shoot down and seize an offending multicopter, but they'll have extreme difficulty finding the owner, and the owner will just go and spend another $600 on another one.
So the regulation will place a burden on those who are NOT a problem whilst being completely irrelevant to those who ARE a problem. And at a rough guess based on observations, of the people in the scope of the regulation well over 98% fall into the first two categories. Way to go, lawmakers!!
There is, of course, an interesting observation to make when it comes to conflicting demands on lower VFR airspace. Both the UK and the colonies are democracies. If it was ever deemed that general aviation and RC hobbyists could play nicely and share airspace so it came to a straight fight over who has the right to (say) the first 2,000 feet AGL I would be willing to bet a fairly substantial sum**** that the RC hobbyists outnumber the VFR man-carrying aviation fraternity by something like 50:1 in the UK and possibly a bit less in the states. So being a democracy the only *ethical* course of action would be to ban man-carrying aircraft from the lower (say) 3,000 feet AGL anywhere outside an ATZ. Do we *really* want to go there?
€0.03 supplied,
PDR
*A friend of mine does this commercially and has taken hours of footage of migrating birds in flight in africa and the various upper layers of rainforests for academic researchers and film/TV companies
** We've had cases of multicopters being used to take water, food, pocket-warmers and survival blankets to people trapped in bad weather on the moors or on cliff ledges where the mist was far too clagged in to consider flying a helicopter to them
*** [this footnote intentionally left blank]
****Perhaps two or even three Arbies Steak Sandwiches - not something I normally risk lightly