Marty Shapiro wrote:

There is no problem with you giving a friend a ride as long as
their is commonality of purpose to the trip. The problem arises
when there is no commonality of purpose.

Find a case which says that where no compensation is paid. The
Carter case you cited involved transporting a friend's sick
father for medical treatment, and who promised to reimburse the
full cost. Without common purpose, not even cost-sharing (1/2)
is permissible. It is implied that the pilot didn't get paid,
perhaps because the man passed on. Made no difference; it was
the promise which was the compensation.

I'm referring only to the logging of time in your own plane on
your own fuel as compensation. Find the case where that's
prohibited on such narrow grounds. As per another poster, I used
to pick up and return Mom/Dad to the big Class airport when they
visited. Look then to how the Carter case discusses the pax
expectation of the skills of a comm'l pilot. So let's see. If I
fly them to an apt restaurant and return, they don't expect me to
have comm'l skills. If I drop them off at said apt, they do.

Fred F.