commercial license

[Vic Moss]

And he's wrong.
Information from Youtube presenters is just as likely to be incorrect as opinions of forum members and some individual FAA personnel.
At 9:47 he says: If you say I'm going to fly out there to put my footage on Youtube so that everybody can see it, then all of a sudden you are no longer flying for fun.
Now your intent is to put the footage on social media, it's no longer recreational flying.
... now you need to have a Part 107 certificate.
His opinion about this is incorrect.

Here's the official position of the FAA (not misguided opinions that some FAA staff occasionaly give)

FAA: Home

fsims.faa.gov

Note the part I highlighted in red.

B. Aviation-Related Videos or Other Electronic Media on the Internet. UAS videos, in particular, are increasingly appearing on the internet. UAS videos may depict aircraft being flown in a variety of classes of airspace and at varying altitudes. Inspectors are to follow the protocol below when receiving notification of videos with potentially noncompliant UAS operations posted to the Internet.​

C. Evidence. In all cases, the FAA must have acceptable evidence in support of all alleged facts in order to take legal enforcement action. Inspectors are reminded that:​

1) Electronic media posted on the Internet is only one form of evidence which may be used to support an enforcement action and it must be authenticated.​

2) Electronic media posted on the Internet is ordinarily not sufficient evidence alone to determine that an operation is not in compliance with 14 CFR. However, electronic media may serve as evidence of possible violations and may be retained for future enforcement action.​

3) Inspectors have no authority to direct or suggest that electronic media posted on the Internet must be removed.​

NOTE: Electronic media posted on a video website does not automatically constitute a commercial operation or commercial purpose, or other non-hobby or non-recreational use.

Greg is going off of what "Steve" said in an email earlier last week. That email came from Steve when someone reached out and asked a question at [email protected]. And Steve was wrong.

I have an interview with Greg on Wednesday. I'll mention this.

Steve also leaked some (possibly) incorrect information in another email on Thursday. When I reached back out to my FAA contacts about that email, they were not happy (they hadn't seen it yet), and later both told me Steve was being dealt with "internally".

You are most definitely correct in that what comes from [email protected] cannot always be taken as fact. Especially when it sounds counterintuitive.

The UASHelp email address is much, much better than it was at the beginning, but it's still not perfect. And for the most part the answers they give out are correct.

"Steve" was having a very bad week at work last week.

 

[DanMan32]

Nice.

Think of NPS as someone's private property. You can't trespass and fly from that property, or even if you are invited to be on the property, you still can't fly from there if the property owner says you can't. FAA has no control over that.

However despite the owner's feelings about drones, they can't prohibit overflight. Only FAA can rule on that.

 

[DanMan32]

Yes. It’s highly recommended for several reasons. If your video goes viral, you may be compensated and at that point, you will have to be licensed to cover the requirements of the FAA. Second, if you unknowingly break a rule, the FAA has your own self incriminating evidence on file online and within their reach at any point after you may decide to take the video down. If you’re licensed, you may know how to defend any questions or questionable actions in better defense if an inquiry is made by the FAA.

Actually qualifications for being recreational can't be changed retroactively. If the flight was legally recreational, it stays recreational regardless of what gain comes with the video at a later time. It's about intent at the time of flight.

But I would agree you're safer having a 107, especially if you frequent posting videos from your flights. After a while you'll know you're gaining from those flights at the time of those flights even if you don't want to admit it.

 

[Meta4]

Did you watch the video?

Yes ... but it seems you didn't read and understand my post.