FPV Central is looking for RC FPV enthusiasts

Hello there, Josef here. I’m adressing you in person in a kind of editorial to ask for your help.

You may have noticed a distinct lack of articles and reviews in recent past. That’s mostly due to lack of time and other constraints. fpvcentral.net is a hobby endeavour, and I’ve always tried my best to provide objective reviews in a time when most RC publications are either determined by sponsors, or focus more on providing entertainment rather than actual information. As of now, if you pick up an RC magazine and look for reviews on, for example, RTF multicopter products, chances are good that any article you find will either be influenced by the magazine’s need for free review samples, or a lack of experience by the reviewer, or both. How often have we read reviews that mentioned that a plane flies “straight and true, with just one or two clicks of trim”. Or read multicopter reviews by a writer whose only prior experience was a DJI Phantom. Or reviews where the text reads more like an afterthought, written against a deadline without the model ever having actually flown.

Reviewing FPV gear is difficult. You need some experience, and preferably a solid background in the field of electronics and radio transmissions. Reviewing multicopters isn’t something anyone can do either – most RC journalists started only one or two years ago, and are basically following the mainstream. I’m a licensed radio amateur, I hold a degree in electronics and I’m building systems for flight, air traffic control and space for a living. I’m running this site because I enjoy the hobby – not to rake in money from sponsors or advertisers.

I won’t claim that this site is the best available resource, as there’s plenty of great sites that provide a lot of valuable information to hobbyists. However, I hope that fpvcentral.net adds to that – and judging from the popularity of articles such as our $120 high power quadcopter howto, or our KK 2.0 flight controller review, I like to think that this site is indeed a valuable resource to RC modelers around the world.

Over the past year, I’ve had less time available for FPVCentral than I’d wanted. In addition, there’s been a disturbing trend of commercially run and sponsored RC “review sites” taking crops of our review photos, and in a few cases, even copying complete reviews from fpvcentral.net. In one instance the review was copied verbatim, in another it was translated to french. In all of these cases, the content was presented as their original work, without attributing fpvcentral.net. And I have to admit, it is a bit demotivating to see certain sites grow using blatantly stolen content.

I’m running this site out of my own pocket, in my spare time, and all the review hardware was bought by myself. I’m certainly going to continue, and there’s a number of articles lined up that will go online over the holidays.

However, I’d love to get more people involved. I’m looking for enthusiasts who love to write reviews, post news, even editorials about any aspect of RC flight. For FPVCentral to grow, there needs to be more variety. If you are interested in joining up, please let me know via the contact form.