Papa Pineapples grounded
 

Anyone know why the Youtuber Papa Pineapples was grounded? Assume it is something by The Villages?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2NO42bj2Vxc

Don't know the reason but ONLY the FAA has the authority to ground him. He is a licensed remote pilot so they do have that authority. This is usually done when pilots fly in restricted zones or do not follow the Remote Pilot rules. Example, you can not fly over people/cars/etc, you must keep the drone in your site at all times, etc. I know the Villages could have their legal team stop him from giving "false" information (Papa Pineapple speculates quite often with limited facts) or maybe even trespassing if he takes off or lands in a "no Trespassing" area but they do not have the authority to stop him from flying over the area! The Villages does not and can not control the sky!

In the Video he states that it is NOT the FAA.

Dang, crushed pineapple!

Hopefully it gets cleared up. I don’t watch his videos regularly anymore but it’s a shame that a seemingly harmless activity is being clamped down on.

I do know that the Villages a couple of years ago tried to stop Don Wiley. They did this by filing a complaint with the FAA listing all the "violations" to the drone rules they "thought" he had done. Don responded to the FAA and after some time was cleared of any wrongdoing. Had he been found in violation, he could have been grounded. The FAA is the only organization that has the power to control the sky. The Village Developer could have file a lawsuit stopping his videos but not to "ground" him.

I agree! I also think that Papas Pineapple is AGAIN stretching it a little when he says "He is Grounded" unless the FAA has something against him. I have seen more than once misinformation on his videos. He should not be guessing in his commentary! I would not be surprised if there was a Cease and Desist order from the developer for putting out videos about The Villages that were not totally accurate. However, the Villages cannot "GROUND" him. He has the right to FLY in any non-restricted area until the FAA pulls his unmanned aircraft license.

I did notice in a Villages construction update video a couple of weeks ago they had a sign with “construction site , no trespassing , violators may be prosecuted. drones, cameras or filming prohibited in this area”

Yeah, but a sign is just that. A sign. I have a neighbor up north that doesn't like boats and jet skis near his dock and boat. He put out an official looking "No Wake Zone" buoy about 100 feet off his property. Guess what? Not a real or enforceable buoy. I do donuts on the Jetski between the buoy and his house all summer just to let him know I know it can't be enforced.

Now there are others that have a "Please No Wake within 100 feet" on their docks. I respect the request and give their property a wide berth. Why? Because they play by the rules and made a reasonable request. No Wake Zone buoy guy is just a loud mouthed bully well known in the community as a PIP. That's a retired CEO or some other "Previously Important Person." They're so used to employees or staff jumping at their every demand, they just carry that over into retired life and realize no one really cares about their previous professional status.

You can put a "No parking" sign on your lawn to try to keep people from parking along the curb in front of you house. In fact, more than once I have seen news articles or in-person people that painted the curb in front of their house red. Guess what? Totally unenforceable. If my neighbor did that, I would park there all day every day.

Now, I'm not going to go onto Villages property until they open it up to the public. If their signs are requests or put up on their private property, that is totally reasonable and I will absolutely respect them. If they are put up by people trying to privatize public lands or waters as their own, I will ignore them every time.

As for the Villages sign quoted above, they have the right to demand and seek prosecution for trespassing on their privately owned lands. They do not, however, have the legal authority to restrict filming or drone flights. I would obey the first part of the sign and totally ignore the second part of the sign if I were to have a hankering to videotape or fly a drone from a place I have a legal right to be, such as the parking lot of an open neighborhood rec center or public street.

Agree. I stopped watching him for that reason.

According to several comments on YT, this is not the only drone videographer getting letters.

I received word today, my letter is also in the mail. As a "repeat offender" I guess mine took a little longer. One the bright side, the letters are coming from a lawyer not the FAA. If there was merit a complaint would have been filed with the FAA or FDLE, but since it hasn't been (I am assuming) then this is little more that an attempt to intimidate. A common tactic.

The first time this happened to me I was hit with a fine for $7,100 from the FAA. It nearly put me out of business. But as had been previously said in this thread, I beat them and the charges were dropped by the FAA and the fine rescinded. They wasted a lot of money on having a lawyer file a 130+ page complaint with the FAA.

Until the FAA or FDLE is involved it is little more than saber rattling by a bunch of out of town lawyers in my opinion. This has little to do with drones and everything to do with controlling the flow of information.

True but he clearly said it wasn’t the FAA.

Wives DO have the power to ground anyone anytime!

Keep fighting the good fight Don! The information and videos you provide go above and beyond and are tremondously helpful.

Cindy

Despite my lengthy post regarding signage and enforceability being completely deleted and the thread posts re-numbered, I agree with Don here - until FAA says something, nothing matters. Polite requests not to trespass will be heeded. Unlawful demands will not. This has everything to do with PR. In fact, with the longterm rumors regarding loofahs and STDs, etc., I am surprised that The Family hasn't engaged a very high powered PR firm to run counter-marketing a long time ago. Expensive? Yes! But so is the value of their investment and the value of protecting it.

By the way, for those interested, the crime of trespassing generally has three elements - all of which MUST be met for it to actually be a crime:

Firstly, a person must be in a place they do not have the legal right to be;
Secondly, a person in authority of said place must request/demand they leave;
Thirdly, the offending person must refuse to do so.

If I'm inside your house and, having taken nothing, you demand I leave and I do so, you have NO crime. None. Not trespassing, not burglary, not breaking and entering (same thing as burglary under Florida law), nothing. Unless you can develop evidence to indicate reasonably that I intended to take something or commit a felony inside, I cannot be arrested.

Since it is a misdemeanor, it generally has to be committed in the presence of a police officer. A private person (like the owner) can pursue a private person's arrest but be VERY careful of going down this road. The liability attached to false arrest is very high and can cost you a lot of money. Plus, do not show up for a single one of the many hearings (oft rescheduled) and the entire case is dropped.

So if I go walking down the middle of Eastport today, and no one demands I leave, there is no crime. If someone does demand it, and I leave, there is no crime. If someone does demand it, and I do not leave but eventually do so before law enforcement arrives, there is no crime (absent you signing a private person's arrest form and opening yourself up to gads of civil liability).

I would never do so - and I certainly won't advocate anyone else do so either, but the law is what the law is regardless of scare tactics and threats.

We know T.V. doesn’t own and/or control the airspace above anything here so doesn’t this then become a matter of “free speech”? Oh wait. Nevermind. :censored: Maybe they are simply trying to “legal cost” the h3ll out of you which seems to be the trend nowadays.

I don’t know, the Developer has to know many of Don’s viewers are people who haven’t moved down yet, who are learning about the Villages and will buy. He is the best marketing they have.
How many owners have shared Don’s vide with a friend.

Another one shut down.
 

Here's another trying to be channel shut down.


https://youtu.be/10fPHd38JN8

Not so sure about claims you can trespass on a building site without consequences.

c) The offender commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084, if the property trespassed is a construction site that is:
1. Greater than 1 acre in area and is legally posted and identified in substantially the following manner: “THIS AREA IS A DESIGNATED CONSTRUCTION SITE, AND ANYONE WHO TRESPASSES ON THIS PROPERTY COMMITS A FELONY.”; or

If you don't have the right to be on the posted building site you can be arrested. Technically, all the owners visiting their homes on the weekends are trespassing on a building site unless the Builder gave them permission to be on the site. Florida law is pretty clear (and strict) on this.

The Builder usually doesn't mind but if somebody is going into homes under construction and taking photos and publishing online examples of perceived "bad" building practices I bet the Builder is going to get involved pretty quickly. Keep in mind--until the building is sold to you it is somebody else's private property.

Private property owners make the rules--even when the business is open to the public. That is why Disney can deny you entry to Magic Kingdom if you have a drone, knife, can of beer or even a bluetooth speaker. Those are all legal items--but Disney owns the property and does not allow them.

If you are someplace you are not authorized to be you can be charged with trespass. If cops catch you inside the Home Depot at 2AM when the business is closed they are not going to wait for a manager to drive down to tell you to leave (and then afford you the opportunity to do so) before they arrest you.

When the cops chase a burglar, and he jumps fences into someone's backyard they can also stack charges of trespass for every fenced yard he/she jumped into. There is no "you have to be told to leave" defense. If the property owner wants to press the issue the culprit can be charged.

But the FAA has no dog in the building site fight. So long as you have permission to be on the private property (for launch and recovery), maintain line-of-sight of your UAV and abide by the rules you are legal to fly.

They are simply using the power of the dollar knowing that this will cost all these folks big bucks to fight it and hope they will crawl away. Lawyers ain’t cheap even if you are in the right. This is how the big guys fight the little guys when they do or say or write something they don’t like. They lawyer them to death. It’s the trend nowadays especially within the “upper echelons”. I wonder if the drone club got the same C&D.

Years ago when we considered moving to the Villages we didn’t know if we wanted to live nearby, move to the villages, or what part of the villages we wanted to move to.

We came across Don Wiley and his Gold Wingnut channel and started watching it every time he released a video as well as his previous videos so we could better understand The Villages.

Because of Don and his great information, we chose The Villages. If it wasn’t for his video we would likely not have purchased here.

I think The Villages is doing a huge disservice to potential homeowners, business owners as well as to themselves by bullying Don and the other people making these videos.

I think it’s wrong and they should be ashamed of themselves. It’s not a good look for them.

Can you provide more information?
Who is objecting?
What is their objection?
What are the grounds for their objections?

Why not take this situation it to the public via a news story in Orlando media and broadcast the restrictions that are being threatened? If all the drone operators got together and approached WESH or another channel, perhaps they could have this conundrum clarified and relief may be provided. Just my humble opinion.

This would be the correct answer. It's a variation of the Golden Rule: He who has the gold, makes the rules.

Agree - very sad to see these veterans who have given back to the community and our country treated this way.

Florida drone laws.

Drone Laws in Florida (2025) - UAV Coach

Who is objecting? Answer: Mark Morse has numerous times complained about drones flying over The Villages.
What is their objection? Answer: When flyers say things like "The restaurant looks like it has a roof-top bar, first in The Villages..." when he hasn't announced it yet in the Daily Sun or on YouTube.
What are the grounds for their objections? Answer: None. You can't stop drone pilots from using the airspace over anything. No one owns the airspace except the government over specified areas.

Skip

A bit out of date, most current laws are:
Florida Statutes & Constitution FS330.41
Florida Statutes & Constitution FS330.411
Florida Statutes & Constitution FS935.50
eCFR :: 14 CFR Part 107 -- Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (FAR Part 107)

There are a couple of other minor administrative codes and local (non-Sumter county) code but none relevant to the issue at hand. 330.41(3)(b) prohibits most local interventions.

In the letters they pick and choose select sections and fail to notice the others that of course void any validity of their comments.

Looks like I picked a bad month to buy a drone

I know nothing about drones or the applicable laws other than the fact that I love watching drone videos. Since I can’t comment on this with any real knowledge, I will just offer my opinion that these YouTube videos are very positive and informative for this development. I knew nothing about this place until YouTube started placing videos in my feed. I suspect their algorithm knew how old I was. Skip Smith was the first YouTuber I watched and then came Jerry and Linda. The reason we came down here to check it out was 100% because of these videos. Jerry and Linda in particular because they produced a show that reliably posted every Monday and Thursday.

Two years after buying, I still watch virtually every YouTuber. I enjoy not only Papa’s drone videos, but the ones with driveway parties and interviews with residents.

Good luck to all.

This is 100% about controlling a message. You don't tell people to remove all existing content from YouTube if you only care about drones flying around.

What is the basis of demanding the channels be removed? Copyright infringement? Has The Developer tried complaining to YouTube?

Maybe The Developer will go after Skip Smith next for saying things they don't like.

I hope a GoFundMe is set up for legal expenses and the parties involved can counter sue for legal costs & damages. Maybe everyone who contributes to GoFundMe could get a piece of the settlement.

This would not surprise me. There was a very good band who used to play here. I heard that after the pandemic he announced they were coming back before TV did and they have not been back at all.

Some years back, the head of golf in The Villages wrote to all the ("Lighter Than Air") Hot Air Balloon pilots in the 3 counties and demanded that they not fly over the golf courses in The Villages. The reaction of these guys was LOL. They wondered if he also wrote to American, United, Delta, etc. and told them the same thing. Any Balloon Pilots out there remember that?
[Veterans discussion: Please stay on topic, TU.]

Skip

The Villages is unhappy because they have lost control of the narrative. They slipped and fell behind because they were not proactive enough (i.e. investing in, hiring, for, budgeting for, etc.) in their P.R. and marketing. They probably figured since they owned the media (trademarked name, the radio station WVLG, the daily newspaper, all the glossy quarterly updates, etc.) that they controlled the message.

Nope, not any longer. In this day and age, they needed a young, savvy marketing team and give them free rein to run the message - no micromanaging. If you want to control the timing, release, and content of information then YOU need to make that happen. The best (social) media marketing team is arguably that of Wendy's fast food restaurants. Their rapid, playful, humorous jabs at competitors and their marketing savvy is renown and often viral. They do not run things up the slow and cumbersome flag pole for approval before posting. In this instant-media age, timing is everything. Or at least it is a lot of it.

So what typically happens when there exists both a demand for information and a vacuum of information? The niche gets filled. Someone else who is more responsive and motivated steps in. In our case, several someones.

If The Villages were truly interested in beneficial damage control of this narrative loss, they would either go full force investment on P.R. and marketing (they already lost the loofah and STD messaging years ago) OR less expensively, get behind and support / promote the very active contributions their active lifestyle residents are making to their sales and positive image. Residents like Don and Mario and Papa are demonstrably living the active and involved lifestyle The Villages strives to promote and sell. They are the epitome of actual residents doing the things The Villages hires actors to do in their commercials.

Don is always objective (except when he says he doesn't care for activity X or restaurant chain Y). More often than not he does break the news of developments. These "YouTubers" help stir-up and build excitement and interest for The Villages. I'm not so sure that without this free and timely marketing that The Villages would have enough potential buyers to sell 10 homes a day.

Don also is quick to share that as an educated and experienced construction management observer, The Villages does amazing work and high quality work. He doesn't bad mouth the cookie-cutter shotgun nature of the floor plans, or the predictable nature of the neighborhoods or the construction methodologies and materials used. He is usually quick to point out and admire The Villages and their remarkable achievements.

Me thinks The Morse Family may be biting the hand that helps feed.

There’s something to this.
Messaging has changed and speed at which messaging is delivered has changed - and it has changed fast in the last 5 years.
TikTok, YouTube, drones, Insta, etc - the potential customers of Villages homes are all using them (the buyer isn’t someone watching the 12:00 news in Illinois waiting for The Villages commercial to come on) and want information on their schedule, not on the schedule of the developer.

The Villages just made a huge PR mistake. Not only are they dead wrong legally but they have created a backlash that will spread throughout the world through social media. The potential damages to future sales could be huge. And they will lose in court. Gary Morse must be rolling in his grave.

Update here

NOTE (for newer users): There is an online news source which shall not be named on ToTV. Apparently, filters are active which immediately replace the name of the news source with the "*****" you see in the link above. It's not you, it's the filters.

I think there were 2 or 3 big developments that came out of the drone group recently that pi$$ed off the developer - losing control of the narrative
1) the piping under the turnpike
2) the drone video of the brownwood theatre getting cleaned out
3) the most recent information about the work being done on the turnpike bridge.

“It’s an attempt to control the narrative and flow of information in the community,” said Wiley. No it isn't! It is a legal & invasion-of-privacy issue, not some evil conspiracy concocted by the developer. Aside from a legal standpoint, the drones are just plain annoying & intrusive. I don't want them flying over my property. "Boys & their toys"...grow up already!