That is one great response.After a long and fairly silly life I have come to the conclusion that politicians,the military top brass and concerned businesssmen should never be allowed in the same room together; because never mind how many of them there are clustered together like chickens on a roosting stick, they still cannot generate enough brainpower to form even one coherent thought or sensible response to any given situation. This data business is the example here, but there will be many more in coming years and our children and their children beyond them will continue writing about the idiocy of politicians and the greed of businessmen. It is the Human Condition. Imho.

Mike TGreat post!!War is Peace!Ignorance is Strength!BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU!!Or should that be Big George, or in my case Big Tony?:-)Gavin

Hey, You know, I read this on the AVSIM Front Page - and the first thing that came to my head? "You are taking the utter pi$$"NAVDATA would be useless for another 9/11-Style attack, if there will ever be one. It's great for high-altitude flying, and approaches to airport - but as far as precision flying into buildings? Useless! Furthermore, say Mr Terrorist still intends on using an aircraft, the aircraft is going to have the latest NAVDATA onboard.Call me skeptical, but the way I see it - a bit more scare-mongering, and bit extra profit! That is really why they have done it...Matthew Murray,[bR]British Airways Maintainence Glasgow.

"In that way the terrorists have won."Amen, Peter.But this isn't about terrorism or making any country safer. This is all about commerce... and nothing else. Those guys cowering in the mountains of southeast Afghanistan must be laughing themselves silly over this one. Greed destroying a free society in ways they never could have hoped to accomplish.Hell, they don't have to beat us... we'll beat ourselves for them.Greg

I agree with you Peter ,I mean,do they (Us gov) really think they will stop terrorist acts with this kind of measures??I just don

Bwahaha! Now that was right on! -Daniel

Let me make something clear here, lest people get the wrong idea even more than they have already...The only data that is being affected (as far as I can see) is DoD-issued material, i.e. the FLIP and DAFIF. Data which is currently available online from the NACO at FAA will remain available, and (as far as I am concerned) there will be no effect on the vast majority of RW or sim pilots -- you'll still be able to obtain up-to-date charts from your FBO or places like Sporty's, you'll still be able to use the NACO website to grab procedures, sites like myairplane.com or similar will still exist.The main thing that this is likely to hurt (from our point of view) is FMS data within FS. The DAFIF is the only real source of worldwide data most FMS authors have -- it's a worldwide datafile, unlike the data which FAA produces (the stuff out of the NACO, and the ATA-100 data).Having read the FR notice, I think the security issue is indeed hyperbole -- the real issue here is that they want less access to the data for more $$$.While this is absolutely a step back for the hobby -- the folks providing FMS updates like Richard Stefan, the various payware organizations and possibly VATSIM will need to find new sources for this data -- this is not the 'disaster' that some are making it out to be.--M

GregI totally agree! I am afraid I am a very cynical person when it comes to politicians of all political leanings.95% have little or no brains but a huge capacity to use the massive hole below their noses.Our Government passed a load of taxes under the pretence banner of "the invironment".They could introduce taxes while claiming to do so to save the world.Really the truth was to save their bank balance.In the same way prevention of terrorism is a politically acceptable way of pushing through revenue earning methods or bringing in laws which infringe human liberty.Normally these would not be acceptable but become so with the claim that they are really doing this to save us!Frankly we are all going to die some day and terrorism or any other fear invoking occurence never stops me doing anything.Ok it would be a foolish man who did anything without minimising calculated risks but that has to be within reason.I would never set foot into an aircraft if i wasnt prepared to accept those risks.If I die in the process then so be it because i would rather have a full life that I enjoy rather than one dictated to by fears and meaningless restrictions.Peter

FLIP, FLOP and DAFFY are surely the names of politicians involved in this exercise in door-closing-after-the-horse-has-bolted.

Are we absolutely positive this is only the DAFIF data and not everything currently published for free? (PDF charts etc) I would not be surprised in the least if it was everything.The more I think about this the more I realize that the people making these decisions surely can't believe that they're actually making people safer with this - it HAS to be about money for private navdata companies like Jeppessen that lobbied for this.As I said in another thread, this is one of the primary ideologies of the neoconservative whackjobs we have running this country right now - they want NOTHING publically owned - privatize it all to big companies... I still can't believe a majority voted for this a few weeks ago.

>FLIP, FLOP and DAFFY are surely the names of politicians>involved in this exercise in>door-closing-after-the-horse-has-bolted. However, can you imagine the uproar if any government (outside of Israel) had decided to take any of these post-9/11 security measures BEFORE 9/11? People say, "we should have done this, we should have done that...", but they would never have stood for the inconvenience...

>>>>>this is not the 'disaster' that some are making it out to be<<<

I guess if someone uses a motor vehicle for the next attack, that you won't be able to buy any road maps anymore.

well, this mesure was put in practice by a government democraticaly elected, so its the will of the majority..... Don't like them ( as I don't) then don't vote for them.Politics aside (it's not even my contry), the question is where will MS get the new NAVDATA for new versions of FS. Keeping the actual one is "fine" for a couple more years, but its getting more and more outdated... unless we fly FS 200X with 90's navdata allround (FMC's, procedures...)

They didn't,a year or so after 9/11 the powers to be decided in all their anti-terra wisdom to not allow winter wheat to be grown inside the fences of KICT--Wichita because a terrorist could hide in it and explode our airport!!! Well...if anyone is familiar with hybrid wheat it only grows about 12-16" at best and it only reaches that height in the last growing stages before its cut in mid June. When planted in the fall it only reaches a height of about 3-5" and remains at that height until next spring. Can anyone say "knee jerk reaction"?? So...now instead of making money off unused land we spend it right and left constantly mowing hundreds of acres. Get a wet spring and warm temps and those mowing crews can't get done before they have to start over.David