VATUSA Forums
General => General Discussion => Topic started by: Ryan Geckler on November 14, 2011, 10:20:07 AM
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http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/FAA_T...s_205722-1.html (http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/FAA_To_Charge_For_Online_Charts_205722-1.html)
That's not good.
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Hmmm,
If this happens to go through, I'd assume that AirNav would be mainly out of business, Flightaware would probably cease giving out charts as well unless they happen to make enough from Advertising.
Skyvector may be in serious trouble after paying out to FlightPrep for licensing those patents.
AirCharts will most definitely lose US charts should the following go through.
(And those are just a few sites that make use of the free charts)
Of course, all of the above is only if the pricing structure is reasonable for smaller companies / websites.
And the VATSIM community, especially in the US will suffer should there not be a reliable free source of US charts.
Thanks FAA (if this happens, but then again, it's worth the question, aren't these charting costs already paid for by taxes, and they seem to have been doing fine so far...).
Cheers!
Rahul
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This makes no sense. For 50 years the FAA has provided charts for free (except for the cost of shipping), and all of a sudden they terminate that service, switch to an all-online distribution, and then decide to start charging for it? What is this? There are so many online distributors who get the charts, house them on their own servers, and allow users to access them for free, which reduces the burden on the FAA servers. The more sensible thing would be to simply distribute the charts to such companies as Airnav, FlightAware, etc. and let them continue with their service (OH, and keep people employed at those locations, too). This is clearly another tax/fee hike that somebody in the DoT wants because they're completely incapable of doing any sort of budget management. Totally inexcusable!
Might be time for another petition just like we did with the AIRAC commercialization several years ago.
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Harold, that is a great idea. I would be HIGHLY interested in a petition. This angers and frightens me greatly that I might struggle to be able to continue to be a part of this great hobby. If skyvector goes down, I'm in real trouble, as I currently can't afford any paid subscriptions.
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Guys, much more effective than petitions is to write your senators and congresscritters. This site is one of many that helps you identify their contact information pretty quickly: http://www.contactingthecongress.org (http://www.contactingthecongress.org) I have already written mine; I urge you to write yours as well. As an AOPA member, I have also written AOPA ([email protected]). And, I also wrote to the FAA at [email protected]
Though I didn't specifically mention VATSIM, I spoke to using the data for nonprofit safety work. While I'm sure you can't all claim to be FAA Safety reps, many/most you can still modify my letter and refer to providing public presentations of safety-related data where you use the FAA information. Heck, you do this every time you train a student and/or help a pilot understand their charts.
[!--quoteo--][div class=\\\'quotetop\\\']QUOTE [/div][div class=\\\'quotemain\\\'][!--quotec--]Hello,
Dear Senator xxx,
Dear Representative xxx,
I just read a news article that the FAA will be discontinuing access to online charts for individuals, and will begin charging for this data, beginning April 5, 2012.
I currently use this data in several ways, all nonprofit. I use FAA chart data in the development and deployment of aviation safety training as an FAA FAASTeam Lead, and I also use it to give local training presentations on flight and air traffic control in the community.
Though I certainly understand the FAA's need to recoup some of the cost of producing and hosting the data, I know that the data is required to be produced, so it exists (notwithstanding any argument to reduce the amount of data/products available).
I would just sincerely ask that the FAA consider simply allowing free access to either individuals, or at the very least, folks who register with the FAA and demonstrate a legitimate nonprofit and/or safety and/or education related benefit, and allow the costs to be borne by the commercial enterprises that profit from the data.
[do not include the following if you are writing to the FAA] Would you help me influence the FAA to consider a proposal such as this?
Kind regards,
Don Desfosse[/quote]
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Well, holding the phone here...
Isn't "everything" (Using the term lightly) from the government "Including Charts as they are created by a subdivision of the FAA which is a government organization" public domain, therefore making us able to FOIA the charts should they become a "pay for item"
(Should have thought of this before)
Cheers!
Rahul
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Well, holding the phone here...
Isn't "everything" (Using the term lightly) from the government "Including Charts as they are created by a subdivision of the FAA which is a government organization" public domain, therefore making us able to FOIA the charts should they become a "pay for item"
(Should have thought of this before)
Cheers!
Rahul
Technical speaking, I believe yes. Will it happen, probably not. Also, do you know how long it takes to get a FOIA especially for charts that change often?
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My FOIA's (Done through those who live in the US) usually come through within 1-2 weeks.
Cheers!
Rahul
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Do you get them as electronic attachments? I wonder how "the system" will deal with an extra 200,000 FOIA requests a week!
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My people get them as CDs,
And we could limit it to one per ARTCC which is then sent out and uploaded to a central location by said ARTCC, note that not all charts change every 28 days too.
The system will probably crash, you do remember it is a government system
Cheers!
Rahul
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Or just make a schedule.. each ARTCC requests the charts on a rotating basis.
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Weird, all requests that I've heard of took 1+ month to get. But... if we crash the system, they either get a better system (probably won't happen), release the charts, or some other third option. XD
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What I meant by petition was to petition Congress members, not necessarily sign a huge email or anything. Had to make it quick because I was on a mobile .
Somebody can correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought at one time you could get the charts directly from the FAA for the cost of shipping. Am I wrong or...?
I was also thinking about the FOIA requirement for these plates. I guess the real question is "Can a government bureaucracy can charge for products it creates using taxpayer dollars? It's almost like they're double taxing us.
Does DoT charge for anything else? Road maps? Waterways? I don't know how those systems work. I can't think of anything I have to buy from our government bureaucracies, though.
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Well we wouldn't be buying them.
They wouldn't be sold for individual access according to the article.
Cheers!
Rahul
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Could some sort of educational deal be reached between VATSIM/VATUSA and FAA? Of course, it'd have to be on a regulated website, but it'd be better than nothing.
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How about we stop talking like this is a done deal and hope that like most governmental things, this falls through?
Cheers!
Rahul
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Hope is futile -- action is necessary to change a decision that has already been made.
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Could some sort of educational deal be reached between VATSIM/VATUSA and FAA? Of course, it'd have to be on a regulated website, but it'd be better than nothing.
Great idea Ryan. I would think this to be a great way to approach a resolution to the matter, otherwise writing our Congressman may be the next step. Maybe Vatsim could get the FAA to let Vatsim use the charts with the agreement the charts would be visible only to Vatsim members.
Third step - Fire up the copy machine
Government Failures -
Postal Service (broke)
Amtrak (broke)
Medicare (broke)
Social Security (broke - backed by Treasury bills, no cash)
Healthcare (on the verge of chaos)
Fannie Mae (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
Freddie Mac (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
...and now it appears the FAA may not be far behind.
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Great idea Ryan. I would think this to be a great way to approach a resolution to the matter, otherwise writing our Congressman may be the next step. Maybe Vatsim could get the FAA to let Vatsim use the charts with the agreement the charts would be visible only to Vatsim members.
Third step - Fire up the copy machine
Government Failures -
Postal Service (broke)
Amtrak (broke)
Medicare (broke)
Social Security (broke - backed by Treasury bills, no cash)
Healthcare (on the verge of chaos)
Fannie Mae (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
Freddie Mac (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
...and now it appears the FAA may not be far behind.
This is America. After all of these breakdowns and shut downs, there is no more "free" is "dom". "The Home of Brave" is now "Home of The Dependence".
No more free country. This country is unfortunately going sour... day by day.
Say good-bye to "Freedom" and "Brave" if you want to survive here anymore..
I hope some lawmaker can come to the rescue... :/
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Rahul,
The problem is that when it comes to fees, proposals for them rarely disappear unless there is a very vigorous opposition to them. User fees in both the Bush and Obama administration are a prime example of that, and we have AOPA and EAA to thank for their lobbying against that issue. I feel the same way about the chart fees; in a way, it's almost like because user fees are no longer on the table, they want to collect funds from chart distribution, which to me is unacceptable.
Also, I feel that 3rd parties will start subscription services as a means of surviving this. Individuals will have access via those parties.
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Postal Service (broke)
Amtrak (broke)
Medicare (broke)
Social Security (broke - backed by Treasury bills, no cash)
Healthcare (on the verge of chaos)
Fannie Mae (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
Freddie Mac (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
...and now it appears the FAA may not be far behind.
And amen to that!
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If this were to go through as planned, I don't think VATSIM approaching the FAA would render any results. But it's been my experience working with the government... things rarely happen when/as planned. With all the bureaucracy and politics, things (details, timelines, etc) change all the time. I'm not trying to downplay the situation, but let's not hit the PANIC button here. Also take care not to jump to conclusions... they haven't even announced a price yet!
For those who have not seen it, the power of a congressman is incredible (when they don't have to agree on budgets). I plan on writing my representative with a letter similar to the template above and I highly encourage everyone else to do the same. Let's just contact our congressmen, take this in stride, and wait... the only things that we can really do.
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From the Avweb discussion of the article:
[!--quoteo--][div class=\\\'quotetop\\\']QUOTE [/div][div class=\\\'quotemain\\\'][!--quotec--]Aeronav services are not currently funded by the FAA through the general fund, they raise their costs (only! no profit) of operation through charging for distributing chart data. When they produced paper, this was easy as each chart had some percentage of the price include the cost of collection, etc. But paper is going away rapidly.[/quote]
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First off, let me say that I think it's absolutely silly.
That said. Pilots need charts to fly. That being the case, I don't see them making the cost prohibitively expensive for individuals. Of course I'm just speculating.
What would stop one person from getting an account and just sharing the details with everyone else, or even just downloading all the charts and distributing them? Are they going to copyright the charts now and have distribution clauses? Who the hell knows, but I'm sure there will always be cost-effective ways of getting the charts.
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Seems to me that Harold has really hit the core problem square on the head. The rest is really just drivel.
For anyone who pays taxes to the U.S. Government, this new program will be a double taxation on a service we already pay for. I am vehemently against this. We should not be concerning ourselves with ensuring we receive the charts, but more so the idea that our government can impose a tax or "user fee" on top of what we already pay.
The FAA (and the rest of GOVT) needs to learn how to live within it's means, not continually force the citizens/taxpayers to hand over their lunch money.
Write your representatives, AOPA, FAA, NBAA, local airport authorities, EAA etc etc.
Fight this tooth and nail.
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Great idea Ryan. I would think this to be a great way to approach a resolution to the matter, otherwise writing our Congressman may be the next step. Maybe Vatsim could get the FAA to let Vatsim use the charts with the agreement the charts would be visible only to Vatsim members.
Third step - Fire up the copy machine
Government Failures -
Postal Service (broke)
Amtrak (broke)
Medicare (broke)
Social Security (broke - backed by Treasury bills, no cash)
Healthcare (on the verge of chaos)
Fannie Mae (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
Freddie Mac (bailed out with stimulus money and still asking for more)
...and now it appears the FAA may not be far behind.
Soon you'll see Occupy VATSIM on the news! Haha
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Soon you'll see Occupy VATSIM on the news! Haha
This made me laugh. I could see it now.
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Petition
http://www.change.org/petitions/federal-av...r-online-charts (http://www.change.org/petitions/federal-aviation-administration-dont-charge-for-online-charts)
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I'm not signing a petition; this is a real world issue with real world consequences. One poster says "I fly online with MSFS and not having charts would very much ruin the exprience. Also, what about real pilots who use laptops to bring up charts? Come on FAA, this isn't cool." How does that at all substantiate the importance of the issues? It doesn't, and there are many others like it on that petition. Write Congress. Here's why:
Congress has actually authorized the FAA to do this under this law: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/usc...21----000-.html (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode49/usc_sec_49_00044721----000-.html) According to the law, the FAA cannot make a profit, though I suppose the numbers could be skewed (and then reported later by the inspector general or something).
There are many different solutions they could take in reducing operating expenses that do not include initiating a fee. They could switch to all paper charts again, and then let websites digitize and distribute for free. They could limit their own digital distribution service to third party companies. In combination or separately, Congress could get rid of the provision that allows us to be double-taxed.
One other major concern I have is that VFR pilots will no longer care to look up information on IFR approaches that are being conducted at airports. Free distribution especially contributes to safety of flight in this instance.
I'm still wondering if anyone knows about any other federal government services that require fees. Just curious.
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Skyvector will be okay. They posted on their forum that they intend to keep it running, and access for us will continue to be free. Finally, a break in the clouds.
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https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/%21/p...mpaign=shorturl (https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/%21/petition/ask-faa-reversal-charge-government-approach-data-downloads-and-not-allowing-individuals-access-them/Hg1nqTJy?utm_source=wh.gov&utm_medium=shorturl&utm_campaign=shorturl)