Going to Vlogger Fair in a few weeks. Sorry, no new Preflight TV episodes. Many are in the works, and some have been filmed and not edited. I know… I’m a slouch.
Truth be told, we’ve been hard at work getting ready for the next phase. There are lots of things in motion, and hopefully things will work in a favorable direction.
Preflight TV will return. 🙂
Oh, and if you’re in Seattle, sign up for Vlogger Fair on June 8th and/or 9th. It’s only $30. http://www.vloggerfair.com
There are many things that are good to know as a pilot which are not necessarily rules. Sometimes these are practical pieces of advice. Most often they are lessons learned from practical experiences. Here are a few pieces of advice, all having to do with FBOs, and rental aircraft:
People/corporations are hoping to “eliminate piracy”. The concept is to make laws so tough and the punishment so great that supporting piracy becomes a huge liability. Nobody pirates, and corporations make loads of money.
The real issue they’re having is that many companies can no longer do “business as usual”. Their distribution chain has been broken. They can no longer count on advertisements pushing the songs or movies they want up-front. They can no longer rely on the system they’ve set up. To industry – it’s anarchy, and they hate it – it’s unpredictable. Don’t get me wrong: They love anarchy when it works in their favor (like when their content goes viral), but when they spend money on a advertising campaign and they can’t figure out why it didn’t make them money – they become attack dogs.
Corporations are looking at the money they aren’t making from pirates and thinking, “I want my content to go viral, and I want every single person to pay me something.”
Problem is: They can’t have it both ways. The open architecture of the internet is fundamental in why it works. Once you take openness away – you’re left with a managed stream of data, were every byte of content must be paid for by someone. Inevitably this leads to a “pay network” and a “side chained (free)” network. As always, the corporation will do everything in their power to reduce the viability of the free network as it doesn’t serve them except as an advertising stream.
In the end, SOPA and PIPA are not about piracy – they are about control. The internet was designed to have no head and no governing body. It is the purest form of anarchy possible. However, with regulations, with layers of control, we loose what was good about the internet. The internet becomes AOL – boring, stiff, bloated, slow, and monitored. At best it would be a paid gateway to pay content, and the free stuff would merely be allowed. Even then, “free” in the minds of corporations is monitizable. So, in the new order… nothing is free. But who gets paid? Do you think you’ll get paid for the content you create? Not without corporations getting a piece – that is the game they’re playing. This isn’t about piracy at all. It’s about the control of the internet, and inevitably deciding who gets to own the monitizaton of the internet.
SOPA and PIPA (or initiatives like them) will not kill the internet, but they will fracture it. Those of us who are technical will form our own side-chaned network, and we will try to make it as free as possible, but it will be a mere shadow of what the internet could have been. The network that corporations design will shelter themselves a little… but really, they’re buying time in leu of having to change their business models. Inevitably they will not make more money from all the pirates who no are no longer viable (if that’s even possible). What will happen is that corporations will have a toehold into tweaking the internet to fit their business model.
… and that’s my issue with SOPA and PIPA. If their business models don’t work… they need to change them to fit our needs. We shouldn’t be changing our infrastructure to fit their needs.
This is a letter I wrote to AOPA in response to an article Dan Namowitz wrote about “Plane Talk”, a show about GA flying…
Dan Namowitz,
We are here. Many have been here for years. We’re making video, audio, putting on contests, taking people up in the air for acrobatic lessons, and disseminating information on blogs, and every other way we can imagine.
My show, “PreFlight.TV” currently has over 10,000 downloads a month (12k downloads last month). “Airplaneista“, an on-line magazine, and “Airpigz“, an airplane blog, get 30,000 to 1,000,000 page views a month. Shows like “Other People’s Airplanes“, and “Plane Crazy Down Under“, have very strong audiences, and I have no idea how well “Airspeed” is doing, but they’ve got to be doing as well, or better, than everyone else.
Point is, though I applaud “Plane Talk” – we’re all here. We’re the “new” media. Some of us have a small budget, but no time (me), and others have no budget but are prolific in the number of shows they do. They (and hopefully myself) are all doing a job to onboard new pilots, entertain, and keep long-time pilots interested. I can tell you straight-up, the decline of people getting into aviation is not due to a lack of interest. It has nothing to do with the computer industry, or the types of jobs people do. The number one reason there is a decline of pilots is because learning to fly is expensive and time consuming. When the market is down, and people are holding multiple jobs to get-by, flying an airplane seems completely out of reach. I make good money (from my day job), and I’ve cut back the number of hours I fly. If I want any kind of savings – I must.
I would/should list all the aviation podcasts/shows/blogs. There are many shows, but it is a finite list. We are doing our part. We are getting great response. People listen/watch/read regularly. The audience is there. People want to fly and be entertained when they are not flying. We’ve been filling some of that void all this time. Don’t count us out.
Marc Newman
https://preflight.tv
Last month I attended AirVenture in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. I brought back some video. This is the first of the series.
During the week of AirVenture, Oshkosh Wisconsin boasts the busiest airport in the world. After being there for a week, I don’t doubt it. Every moment of the day there was two or three aircraft landing or taking off – very often, at the same time. Then, every afternoon there is an air show overhead.
While everyone was looking at the cool airplanes, I spent my time wondering the floor of the hangers on the lookout for cool stuff.
In this episode I take talked with a few vendors. Many of them were much shyer than you would think, and I had to improvise reporting on their products. When the vendor didn’t want to talk to the camera I’d hold the camera and do the voice-over right there. This worked for the most part, but this technique did capture a bit of background noise.
These are the vendors in this episode:
Marc discusses hand held, air-band transceivers, and has some options about them as well.
I was really hoping to get excited about all the features that exist on the latest and greatest transceivers. Unfortunately, I was sorely disappointed. They really haven’t improved much over the years. With the advent of smartphone’s, GPS’s, satellite weather, and products like the iPad, I was thinking that the modern transceiver would have extra bells and whistles. I would have even settled for something that had extended power or range.
Unfortunately, they’ve stagnated. There is no GPS integration, no internet connection, no dynamic frequency mapping… absolutely nothing to get excited about. The modern transceiver could easily have been made 15 years ago. They have frequency/memory positions and the big feature is that text names can be assigned to a frequency… but don’t go over the number of allowed characters! You don’t have many.
Didn’t we live through the same thing with cellphones years ago? I remember running out of memory on my cellphone back in 1995 when I input everyone I knew into the memory. Now days consumers expect their phones to be able to store not only every phone number of everyone they know, but their birthdate, their email addresses, the physical address, and random personal notes about them, not to mention a bunch of other fields. What is it about the scanner/transceiver industry that hasn’t caught up with the times? Memory shouldn’t be an issue. Memory is cheap!
Another feature we should have, is the ability to take a course from a flight plan and have the software figure out all the frequencies we might need for the trip. But, alas… transceivers are not that exciting. You get to transmit, receive, program in the frequencies you think you might need – that’s it. They’re boring.
All air-band, hand-held transceivers have the ability to scan, transmit with 5 watts of power, and all have a 121.5 emergency button. Even the battery life is about the same with all of them. The only real difference is the look and feel. Even that isn’t really all that different.
I own an IC-6. but if I were to buy a new transceiver I’d get the VXA-710 because it has two additional frequency ranges which could be useful for times I am not flying. I don’t see that loosing 40 positions from memory is really that big of a loss. As I said, the number of memory positions is limited – nothing like what we have in the cellphone market today.
Vertex is very proud of being water resistant to 3′ for 30 minutes. Where this is good, it’s not a huge selling point. ICOM does not claim that their transceivers are as water resistant, but honestly… submerge any electronic gizmo, don’t turn it on, and dry it out thoroughly, and it will be fine. ICOM transceivers are okay in the rain. Mine has gotten wet (from rain) several times, and I never gave it a second thought. The Vertex may be able to go to three feet for a half hour, but I’ve never had any electronic gizmo fail because it got wet, but I’m not one of those people who talk on the cell phone in the restroom.
| Transceivers | Functional | Body | Aditional Information | |||||||||||||
|
Manufacture
|
Model
|
Price
|
Frequnecy Memory
|
Standard FM Reciever
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Business Radio Service
|
VOR Navigation
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Weather Channels
|
PC Programming
|
Weight (oz)
|
Width (inches)
|
Height (inches)
|
Depth (inches)
|
External Headset Adapter
|
Water Restance
|
Battery Life (hours)
|
|
| ICOM | IC-6 / IC-24 | $274 | 200 | N | N | IC-24 | Y | N | 15.2 | 2.13 | 5.09 | 1.41 | Y | Splash resistant | 6 to 26 | IC-24 model is $45 more. The only benifit is the VOR naviagation, which there is no point to having. |
| IC-A14S / IC-A14 | $210 | 100/(200 IC-A14) | N | N | IC-A14 | IC-A14 | N | 12.3 | 2.09 | 4.72 | 1.44 | +$50 | Spash resistant | 4 to 40 | IC-A14 model is the same price as the ‘S’ (Simple Keyboard) version. There is no reason to get the S model! | |
| Vertex | VXA-220 | $190 | 250 | N | N | Y | Y | +$85 | 12.7 | 2.36 | 4.09 | 1.2 | +$15 | 30 min @ 3′ | 7 to 23 | The biggest differance between the VXA-220 and VXA-300 are the buttons. The VXA-300 buttons are easier to use. This is mostly becasue the unit is sliglty larger than the VXA-220. Also, the volume buttons have been removed from the front of the VXA-300, and volume is controled by a dial.. This makes for a cleaner, be it larger, unit. |
| VXA-300 | $220 | 250 | N | N | Y | Y | +$85 | 13.7 | 2.4 | 4.7 | 1.2 | +$15 | 30 min @ 3′ | 7 to 22 | ||
| VXA-710 | $297 | 160 | Y | Y | Y | Y | +$85 | 9.9 | 2.36 | 3.78 | 1.12 | +$15 | 30 min @ 3′ | 7 to 23 | ||
Marc checks out the Northwest Aviation Conference & Trade Show at the Puyallup Fair grounds. This video was taken on February 27, 2011.
In order of appearance:
Cirrus:
I started off the day at the Cirrus booth but didn’t talk about it. The intention of PreFlight TV is to explore things that every pilot (or prospective pilot) can use, buy, or get some benefit from knowing. Discussing aircraft is great, and I’ll do it all day long, but it doesn’t help any of us actually fly. So, at PreFlight TV we’ll certainly mention cool, “no way can we afford this” type-things when we see them, but the goal is to keep things in reality.
Boeing Employees Flying Association:
I didn’t talk about BEFA, but their booth is in the background of the New Generation Video segment, and thought I’d mention them. BEFA is the organization that I fly with. Though it has “Boeing Employees” in the name, anyone can join.
New Generation Video:
Shot Mapper is pretty cool little product. Though I didn’t show it, the product is really just two parts – a cable, and software. For $100 you can add GPS coordinates to your videos. The only catch is that your camera must have an audio input.
Rescue Tape:
Out in the middle of nowhere and a hose breaks, something non-structural just came off, or a wire become exposed? I’m not saying you’d want to do a major repair, but let’s say you land away from your home base and figure out that your scratchy mic is because the connector is loose. Rescue Tape would work in a pinch.
I can think of 1000 things that are completely fixable if you/I had the right tool. Rescue Tape won’t fix everything, but it’s a small thing to throw in your survival kit.
CSC DUATS:
Honestly, they are a little behind the times. However, they are good and reliable. I used to use CSC DUATS before moving almost almost exclusively to Foreflight and the AOPA Flight Planning tools.
Bose:
I actually didn’t really check out the A20. I was afraid I’d like it, and I can’t afford to buy a new $1000 headset every year.
… they really are nice headsets.
Desert Air
I didn’t film their booth, but they are in the background of the Bose segment.
Desert Air is community in Eastern Washington with a private airport.
Avian Avionics inc.
They build engines. I’d look at engines, but I’ve no use for them, as I don’t have an aircraft. I can’t find their website easily. Sorry.
FAA
The FAA was here to talk with people.
Silverwing at Sandpoint
I love the idea of living right off a a private runway, and drive my aircraft out to go to leave the house. I envy anyone who lives this life, as I probably will never be able to afford any of it.
FAAST
I’ve heard about the portable airport that the FAAST team has put together, but didn’t see it until today. They used to build it by putting tape on the floor, but that took hours of work. They now have heavy-duty plastic pieces that they tape down, and the process of constructing the airport is much faster.
I think they asked me to join in the traffic pattern 3 times. Nobody needs to see me cause an accident, so I didn’t do it.
http://www.barbarossabooks.com/
Barbarossa Books is a used bookstore with lots of titles. Of course, to a aviation trade show – they’re going to bring the aviation books.
Marc discusses some of the pro’s and cons of electronic logbooks.
We were prepared to film this video several weeks ago, but haven’t had the time to put it together. But, finally – it’s here.
We’ve already published the corresponding spreadsheet, comparing several logbooks. You can find the spreadsheet and comparison here.
We decided to cover the pro’s and con’s of electronic logbooks, rather than do a review because the market is changing very quickly. We’d be required to review electronic logbooks every month or two to keep up. With the advent of the iPad and other newer Android tablet devices, consumers are now able to afford touch screens on mobile computers. Where this may not seem like a major turing point, it is:
Small touch screens allow for electronic signatures, and the portable nature allows these devices to be realistically carried into the cockpit. Then, with applications like ForeFlight it may be that future logbook applications are combined with the planing process. These devices are the first step to having a completely paperless cockpit.
Though, we aren’t there yet, the future is very exciting.
Allot of work went into this one, but most of the work was to make filming PreFlight TV easier and quicker to film. We’ll see if our efforts pay off.
Over the last couple days I’ve been testing some electronic logbooks, and the episode covering them is here. Here is a comparison (my notes) about some electronic logbooks.
The most important feature of an electronic logbook is “export” if it has nothing else, a logbook must have this! You don’t know if you will keep this service/application for your entire career as a pilot. You want to be able to change to another service whenever you want. Importing is also important, but it’s really up to you if you carry over your old data into the new system, or just start from scratch.
Still, the whole point of even considering an electronic logbook is to track your “currency” automatically. I wouldn’t consider a logbook that didn’t make this easy. For some people a customizable spreadsheet is all they need. I like something that tells me “X days left on VFR Day Currency”. “Medicals and Certificates“, “Flight Reviews“, and “Flight Limits” fall into the same category. It’s just a question as to what you’re comfortable with.
Reports handle viewing your data, but what about other things you want to track? “Configurable Fields” are important to allow you to track stats which not typical. Also, custom field ordering is important to see and understand your stats at a glance. Remember, the application must to work for you. There’s no point in using an electronic logbook if you are a slave to it, so I feel that custom fields are very important.
“Inflight Timers” are simply cool. I don’t know how useful they are in practice, but if it means that all you have to do is tap a button to start and stop a timer to calculate your day and night portions of a flight, and not have to do any math – I’m for it!
“Airport” and “Aircraft” databases are simply nice. It’s not a “must have”, but being able to look up an airport and have consistency is great. Also, some logbooks will calculate the distance flown based on the airport locations and way points – This is cool (a feature of LogTen).
if you’re a student (we all are on some level) then tracking “Practical FAA Requirements” can be useful. Very few logbooks do this. Some applications have reports which accomplish the same thing, but SafeLog actually has a specialized feature that tells you exactly what minimum requirements must be met for your certification. This is pretty cool, but not a “must have”.
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| Finally, if you’re going to store your logbook in byte form you’ll need a backup solution. Yes, this is a plug for a sponsor Mozy, but I really do believe in them, and it’s extremely important to have a backup solution. Use our coupon codes “PFT“, or “PFT15” for the pro version. You will save 15% on the price of a backup subscription. |
Now, to the electronic logbook feature comparison:
| Logbook Software | Platforms | Web | Mobile | Features | Additional Information | |||||||||||||
|
Windows
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OS X
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Web (monthly cost)
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iPhone / iPod
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iPad
|
Droid
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Windows Mobile
|
PDA
|
Import & Export
|
Configurable Fields
|
Inflight Timers
|
Currency
|
Medicals / Certificates
|
Flight Reviews
|
Flight Limits
|
Airport DB / Aircraft DB
|
Practical FAA Requirements
|
Notes
|
|
| Logbook Pro | $70 | $1.67 for backup | +$30 | +$30 | +$30 | Y | Y | |||||||||||
| Safelog | $80 | $3.80 | soon | free | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Comprehensive, though a bit clunky. Trial version avail. | ||||||
| Airlog | $90 | palm | Y | Y | Y | Y | P | Build your own airport and aircraft DB – implementation is nice. | ||||||||||
| Logten | $100 | +$30 | +$60 | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | OSX software free for 40 flight hours. Froze once during testing. Fairly logical, and convenient. More automation would be nice. | |||||||
| Climb! | $35 | +$5 | Y | P | Y | Y | Y | Y | Missing "holds" column, but you could use "other" column instead. Is very spreadsheet-like. | |||||||||
| AVJournal | $3.33 | Y | Y | Y | No export. No aircraft templates. | |||||||||||||
| intelliPilot | $15 | Y | Y | P | P | Y | Create reports by date | |||||||||||
| ZuluLog | Free for basic / $8 a month for platnum | Y | P | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Must pay to get import, unlimited export, and custom currency reports. Free 3 month upgrade. | |||||||||
| FreePilotLog | Free | Y | Y | Y | Does not support Safari. Doesn’t automate calculatable data. Doesn’t query for currency, better than nothing. | |||||||||||||
| PilotPal | Free | Y | P | Y | Okay, but limited. Best feature is the journal. | |||||||||||||
| LogShare | Free | P | Y | Y | Y | Y | Can’t import. Has email reminders. Limited and simple, but has all the basics. | |||||||||||
| mcc pilotlog | Free | free | free | free | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Euopean. Reports defined by queries. Clunky | |||||||
| MyFlightbook | Free | Free dual app | Y | Y | Y | Y | ipad Crashed once during testing. | |||||||||||
| FlightBox | Free | Free | Costs more for additional non-logbook features. Very simple logbook. No better than a paper logbook. | |||||||||||||||
| FlightLog | $5 | Y | Y | Configurable queries for reports | ||||||||||||||
We’re not going to do this “get to know your host” type-show very often. The only reason we decided to do this one was because several people I met wanted to know more about Amy. Maybe they just wanted to know if she was single….
Regardless, We thought having an episode highlighting her flight experiences made sense.
I promise that the next episode will be back on-track. 🙂
