Ok....now this is really is over the top. How can you even think about fishing without a trolling motor .

Icon got beat up pretty good on avweb reporting today, for not answering questions and not allowing certain questions? Either hiding something or micro management from the top.

Link?

Here.

http://www.avweb.com/blogs/insider/AirV ... 551-1.html

Thanks. Interesting.

Something is amiss. The smell of failure lingers in the air.

Paul is a straight shooter, and sometimes folks like that don't get invited to cover certain companies which want to run on image rather than substance.

Paul was not a compliant reporter during the Eclipse fiasco, often exposing truths that Eclipse would prefer to remain buried. Perhaps that is remembered here.

For example:

http://www.avweb.com/blogs/insider/AVwe ... 129-1.html

It is definitely a red flag when companies start acting this way, it indicates that management has developed paranoia and that allows them to externalize the reasons for failure to outside forces rather than actually address what is going wrong on their side.

Mike C.

I just think they are control freaks. Every time I've been by their booth at OSH in the last 2 years they've had ropes up. You can look - but not too close. I'm sure that they take the ropes down some but it has just struck me that they don't really want people crawling all over their airplane like virtually every other manufacturer there. The airplane may be phenomenal but I'm not interested in anything I have to have binoculars to look at.

Is this aircraft running for President?

I like Paul B's reporting, but he might just be mad he did not get the same invite/opportunity as other members of aviation press.

I checked it out at Osh. Booth was pretty well packed, good marketing with a slick booth and booming sound/video. The price is up to $247k and they are taking orders for 2018 delivery. Cockpit looked way too small to me. It's a toy for a small segment of rich guys. I wish them luck but I'm not optimistic. I was way more impressed with Tecnam.

I wouldn't read into this too much. Brand identity is all about perception, it's important to control your message and that is all Icon is doing. The most important thing to understand here is that the aviation media world is a pay-to-play game.

I'm personally glad to hear that the prices are increasing however I was told that delivery would be 4 years and that was in 2013 (I'm number 1187 and not a rich guy) so I doubt that they'll make that 2018 delivery for current buyers. They just started to deliver their first last month. I do wish them luck though.

The question is not whether Paul gets mad, the question is why Icon feels the need to exclude him, one of the few trustworthy and honest aviation reporters left.

Mike C.

$250k? No thanks. I can buy a POS SeaRey that will do everything the ICON will do and have enough money left over for a killer Baron. 1/4 Million for a toy like this is insane.