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This chapter examines the proposition that drone technologies are a force for good and discusses a number of applications that have become prominent within this category. It investigates how drones are being used within a growing number of sectors, including leisure, research, health, journalism, and sports, and analysing the development of such pursuits and their implications. It focusses on what resides behind the desire to re-characterise drones as objects of desire – and products more generally – and as vehicles for positive social change. Central to this chapter is the claim that drones are vehicles for asserting agency and competence over technology, but that there is also a trend towards the erosion of skills required to operate such devices, which undermines their overall evaluation has sources of empowerment.

This chapter examines the utilisation of drones for creative expression, focussing on applications which span the use of drones as artistic inquiry and exploration, to their uses as political activism. It begins by discussing the common ground between art and science, proceeding to then analyse critical artistic interventions using drones. Such works function as forms of critical design and investigate the creative potential of drones, as performers and props. In sum, it characterises the emergence of drone art as a distinct new media art form, which locates collaboration at its heart and which exemplifies the value of bridging the art, science and technology divide.