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Amazon unveils Drone Delivery: Prime Air (seriously)

Kaido

Kaido

Elite Member & Kitchen Overlord
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98BIu9dpwHU

http://www.engadget.com/2013/12/01/amazon-prime-air-drones/

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos took to 60 Minutes to reveal the company's latest delivery method: drones. In what is likely a cunning reminder of the e-tailer's upcoming Cyber Monday sales, these bots will apparently be capable of delivering packages up to five pounds (86 percent of orders are apparently under that), with the aim of getting them to your house in under half an hour. The system is called Prime Air and the octo-copter drones, which wait, ready to deliver, at the end of conveyor belts, have a range of 10 miles. As Amazon puts, "Putting Prime Air into commercial use will take some number of years as we advance the technology and wait for the necessary FAA rules and regulations" and Bezos himself added in the segment that it won't be before 2015 at the very earliest. While it sounds like they''ll take their time to get here (if they ever do), we've at least got a video of the drones in action -- it's right after the break.
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Holy crap 😱 This is like the sponsor delivery system in the Hunger Games!
 
probably reposted...but it would never *fly*

I would love to see it, but it's just another excuse for a commercial organization to increase their spying nature on you and drop leaflets on your face while you are trying to enjoy the sun on a nice day off.
 
Is just fantastic an idea. I think it is very doable. Their reliability is going to have to be so damn high, though. People will not want these falling on houses or into kids at parks. Lots of challenges, too, like is it okay having a package sitting in your yard all day. Short ranged flight couriers could expand well beyond people buying a new iPad.
 
mizzou said:
probably reposted...but it would never *fly*

I would love to see it, but it's just another excuse for a commercial organization to increase their spying nature on you and drop leaflets on your face while you are trying to enjoy the sun on a nice day off.
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I liked the pizza delivery one from Domino's:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on4DRTUvst0

So many questions tho...liability, weather, people shooting them down, etc.
 
1385949215000-AmazonPrimeAir.JPG
 
Doppel said:
Is just fantastic an idea. I think it is very doable. Their reliability is going to have to be so dang high, though. People will not want these falling on houses or into kids at parks. Lots of challenges, too, like is it okay having a package sitting in your yard all day. Short ranged flight couriers could expand well beyond people buying a new iPad.
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You know, people get inspired to push the boundaries of technology into usable formats. It's a bit of magic & a bit of science. My knee-jerk reaction (as an R/C enthusiast) is "no way, too many barriers, will never work". And yet we have pacemakers, 70 MB/s 4G on our cell phones, 70" LED-backlit televisions for under a grand, etc. Heck, I bought an amazing quadcopter for like $35 not too long ago and it can even do a flip!

http://www.amazon.com/Syma-Channel-2.../dp/B00906PKQ4

Same thing with NASA - with the proper funding and a good team of engineers, you can get to the moon - something that was completely impossible until that point. This has enough potential commercial payback to make pursing it viable. Imagine deliveries from restaurants, grocery stores, pharmacies, convenience stores, etc. Imagine how it can help the disabled, elderly, and, uh, the lazy 😀 Plus, they are already developing safety technologies for the spinning blades - this $40 R/C UFO has foam rings around the propellers:

http://www.amazon.com/UDI-RC-U816A-Q...dp/B00AQOVWSY/

And this $40 R/C helicopter has a squishy ball enclosure to prevent it from breaking when you crash:

http://www.amazon.com/Helisphere-3-c...dp/B00EK6OH1S/

Where there's a profit to be made, people will find a way!
 
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luv2liv said:
i can see kids trying to shoot these down. more rewarding than those dumb knockout games
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I'd imagine they'd all be fitted with HD cameras that stream video to the cloud via 4G, along with GPS locators. Cameras are pretty small these days & all of that technology already exists. Of course, there's the privacy question of having drones recording everything as they fly overhead, but the TSA already gets to see your birthday suit, so whatever right? Haha! I mean, Google is already doing it in 2D with their Streetview cars...
 
mizzou said:
probably reposted...but it would never *fly*

I would love to see it, but it's just another excuse for a commercial organization to increase their spying nature on you and drop leaflets on your face while you are trying to enjoy the sun on a nice day off.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that would be annoying & would warrant a dogfight with my drone collection 😀 But they are getting pretty tricky with the modern drones:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQIMGV5vtd4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geqip_0Vjec

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2itwFJCgFQ
 
Everything could absolutely be done without human intervention, but I wouldn't be surprised if at least initially these things get loaded, then sent to a remote location all without human touch and then they go into a holding pattern above the landing site and are manually guided down or at least given a landing area by an operator somewhere, who would have a queue of drones waiting for his approval on landing sites, with video sent back to identify. Could be done in under a minute per drone, and would make landing safe. Otherwise to get there I think there is some FAA ceiling of 250 feet or something that RC is supposed to fly under, and it could go at the ceiling of that, thereby removing any chance of hitting trees or most buildings.
 
Doppel said:
Everything could absolutely be done without human intervention, but I wouldn't be surprised if at least initially these things get loaded, then sent to a remote location all without human touch and then they go into a holding pattern above the landing site and are manually guided down or at least given a landing area by an operator somewhere, who would have a queue of drones waiting for his approval on landing sites, with video sent back to identify. Could be done in under a minute per drone, and would make landing safe. Otherwise to get there I think there is some FAA ceiling of 250 feet or something that RC is supposed to fly under, and it could go at the ceiling of that, thereby removing any chance of hitting trees or most buildings.
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Yep. They will be flown.
 
Doppel said:
Everything could absolutely be done without human intervention, but I wouldn't be surprised if at least initially these things get loaded, then sent to a remote location all without human touch and then they go into a holding pattern above the landing site and are manually guided down or at least given a landing area by an operator somewhere, who would have a queue of drones waiting for his approval on landing sites, with video sent back to identify. Could be done in under a minute per drone, and would make landing safe. Otherwise to get there I think there is some FAA ceiling of 250 feet or something that RC is supposed to fly under, and it could go at the ceiling of that, thereby removing any chance of hitting trees or most buildings.
Click to expand...

Imagine how much of a shift there would be in life:

1. Amazon delivery via flying drones

2. Hyperloop city-to-city transportation system (NY to LA in 45 minutes)

3. Self-driving electric cars in the cities

Amazon could contract with local businesses for delivery as well - restaurants, pharmacies, etc. Nissan, Tesla, Google, and a bunch of other companies are already working on self-driving cars. Bosch has a wireless charger for the Nissan Leaf electric car and Zipcar already lets you rent a car for a short period of time in major cities. Throw in some additional self-driving technology for taxis, trains, airplanes, semi-trucks, etc. The biggest downside would probably be eliminating jobs, but the convenience would be amazing!
 
Kaido said:
I'd imagine sending a camera drone out to get photo & terrain mapping on a weekly basis over a 10-mile grid wouldn't be outside the realm of doability...
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The cost of maintenance, archiving, updating and, integration would be crazy for one location. Multiply that by how many outlets? The logistics are unsupportable. I like shiny new toys as much as anyone but, this idea has as much chance of getting off the ground as a MrFusion on a DeLorean.
 
MagnusTheBrewer said:
The cost of maintenance, archiving, updating and, integration would be crazy for one location. Multiply that by how many outlets? The logistics are unsupportable. I like shiny new toys as much as anyone but, this idea has as much chance of getting off the ground as a MrFusion on a DeLorean.
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Not only that, but the weather, landing locations, privacy, apartment & building dwellers, etc. It seems like it would be a somewhat limited market, but who knows.
 
Kaido said:
Imagine how much of a shift there would be in life:

1. Amazon delivery via flying drones

2. Hyperloop city-to-city transportation system (NY to LA in 45 minutes)

3. Self-driving electric cars in the cities

Amazon could contract with local businesses for delivery as well - restaurants, pharmacies, etc. Nissan, Tesla, Google, and a bunch of other companies are already working on self-driving cars. Bosch has a wireless charger for the Nissan Leaf electric car and Zipcar already lets you rent a car for a short period of time in major cities. Throw in some additional self-driving technology for taxis, trains, airplanes, semi-trucks, etc. The biggest downside would probably be eliminating jobs, but the convenience would be amazing!
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Self driving cars are the primary technology I want to see mature before I die. It will change the world in many ways, all for the better.
 
I can see people getting hit by dropped packages on a regular basis.

"This iPhone...it just dropped from the heavens!!!"
 
I could see christmas time being a free for all of shooting down drones...and yes, you could probably get away with it...unless we put cameras in every street corner...oh wait..
 
Doppel said:
Self driving cars are the primary technology I want to see mature before I die. It will change the world in many ways, all for the better.
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Not sure if you're into the Garage sub-forum, but we have a good thread going on it:

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2339155&highlight=nissan

Google has been doing it for years and now says their cars are safer than you:

http://www.autoblog.com/2013/10/28/google-driverless-cars-safer-than-human-drivers/

Tesla said they'll have one within 3 years and Nissan said they'll have one by 2020. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. My commute is usually around an hour a day, which sucks up about 20 hours a month that I could otherwise be sleeping, eating, neffing, etc. in my car if I didn't have to drive. I'm all for it! Plus, there are plenty of people who just plain shouldn't drive, so an automated car would be a good way for them to get where they are going safely 😉
 
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