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I don't think we need a tag, because this is a site about drones, so it's kind of unneccessary in my opinion.

For model-agnostic questions, I'd suggest to have a tag called instead (such as: Why are most drones built with an even number of rotors?).

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I don't think we need that granular a tag, but [drone] may indeed be too generic.

Drone generically means

  • A quadcopter (most common)
  • A large UAV like the Air Force flies

The FAA calls them drones

I would suggest we do the following: make [drone] a synonym of [copter-drone], as this is likely going to be the vast majority of the usage

Instead of a generic tag, just tag the relevant parts. I made the [rotors] tag for that question

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  • $\begingroup$ Still, technically a drone is any UAV, so equating this tag to just multirotors would be incorrect. Also, we have a multirotor tag specifically for this. While this may indeed be the most common usage, we should make this tag be substituted for another one if someone does use it, maybe? otherwise it would be misleading. $\endgroup$
    – FlashCactus
    Apr 17, 2020 at 13:29
  • $\begingroup$ I also think "drone" is much more expansive. Anything which flies with a degree of autonomy is a "drone". The multirotor-specific nature of the word will quickly disintegrate when "drone delivery" takes off. $\endgroup$
    – Kenn Sebesta
    Apr 19, 2020 at 12:56
  • $\begingroup$ Normally we'd blacklist it - we have a special blacklist type for inherent tags that we use ... generally for the name of the site. $\endgroup$
    – Catija
    May 1, 2020 at 12:44
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As you sugest, drone (and similar terms like UAV) are probably too generic for a tag based on their common usage; however, tags relating to specific types of drone - such as fixed-wing, multirotor and helicoptor - could be useful.

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Not all UAVs are drones.
And not every question is about drones.
Therefore the drone tag appears appropriate.

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    $\begingroup$ No, but all UAVs >250g and <55kg are. $\endgroup$
    – Kenn Sebesta
    Apr 19, 2020 at 12:56
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I believe that every question or discussion here in this group is about drones and the tag 'drone' is confusing or at least ambiguous. A model aircraft could be spit further into two or more groups such as a fixed wing or sailplane and they are both subset of all drones just as a helicopter is a subset of all UAVs. They are all 'unmanned aerial vehicles'. A group of several related subsets of all UAVs that could be tagged 'multirotor' would help differentiate the type of control and motion that are UAVs yet not a model airplane nor a helicopter. And as I saw in a related question about underwater drones, (UUV) it is definitely a drone. So, UUV is a subset of all drones. I would vote for a synonym usage in this group that defines 'Drone'= 'UAVs of any type' or 'Unmanned vehicles of all types' (UVs).

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Yes Over on bicycles.SE we have 100% of questions about bicycles, so a bicycles tag is pointless there.

Every single question here is probably about drones or model aircraft. Thing is, while similar, these are not the same, so a tag might be appropriate.

Tags are for filtering, so its quite possible a user might only want to see drone things and not fixed-wing things.

Sub-question - are model helicopters on topic? and if so, are they [model-aircraft] because they are miniature versions of real aircraft designs, or [drones] because they fly by pushing air straight down?
Either way - the base of questions is in at least two distinct main categories, with at least one smaller "other" category.

Thus a tag for [drone] is quite reasonable.

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    $\begingroup$ Model helicopters are definitely on topic. Formally, a helicopter is an aircraft although it is not an airplane. $\endgroup$
    – Kenn Sebesta
    May 7, 2020 at 19:14

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