Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#31

Post by schiffern » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:42 PM UTC

mapt wrote: post #22

Here's what I think is more likely: A small regional airport is taken over by Amazon. They build hangars and warehouses onsite. It's ramped up to land and fly a big turbine-powered mothership every five minutes. The warehouse dispatches packages to stacks of delivery drones like the one pictured in the video. The mothership loads the delivery drones in order. The motherships take off regularly, and then as the mother…

>Because very small planes are only a small multiple (2-5x) more efficient than VTOL flight.

Seems like a longer wingspan is the simple answer, no?

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#32

Post by logicallee » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:45 PM UTC

people in the 60's thought we would have flying cars in the 21st century.

in reality we'll never need to go anywhere anymore, not for work, not for meetings, not for a movie, and not for groceries. what's a city for anyway? Oh, nightclubs I guess...

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#33

Post by zeisss » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:46 PM UTC

so, assuming this works: Won't they get a lot of problems with wind / bad weather regions? I guess they won't be happy if they can do this only half of a year, and the other half the drones are sitting around.

So, if this takes off (phun intended) will Amazon try weather control next?

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#34

Post by ck2 » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:49 PM UTC

They are going to have to go back and update all the movies that attempt to guess the future.

Apparently there are going to be a bunch of drones flying around delivering to people in the suburbs.

Looks very cool but in the real world so many things can go wrong, I am sure people are going to intercept and either damage or steal the drones.

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#35

Post by smackfu » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:49 PM UTC

petersouth wrote: post #21

I think there's gonna be alot of teenage pranks and destruction. People setting the landing spot in the water or people stealing them with nets. Not sure if much recourse unless there camera footage or gps locator.

OTOH, I feel like if people today proposed that trucks leave unattended packages outside people's door, it would be dismissed as unworkable. But it happens constantly with minimal problems. There aren't as many bad people in the world as some people think.

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#36

Post by _xnmw » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:50 PM UTC

petersouth wrote: post #21

I think there's gonna be alot of teenage pranks and destruction. People setting the landing spot in the water or people stealing them with nets. Not sure if much recourse unless there camera footage or gps locator.

This is the standard fear response to new technologies. Uber: how can you get in a car with a stranger? Airbnb: Even Paul Graham said "are you nuts?". Self driving cars: but what if people take advantage of it's collision avoidance abilities to walk in front? etc. etc. The fact is, most people are not malicious, life goes on anyway, and the risk of vandalism is quantifiable and included in the cost of doing business.

And in this case vandals can easily be prosecuted, since a drone is already hooked up with remote control, GPS tracking, cameras and monitoring.

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#37

Post by krschultz » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:50 PM UTC

Cue Amazon's PR firm trying to win 'cyber-monday'.

Whether or not Amazon ever delivers packages with drones, the ROI on the drone R&D is massive simply based on how much attention it draws each year on cyber monday.

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#38

Post by anon4this1 » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:54 PM UTC

Does anyone else think that underground tunnels are a superior way to solve the last few miles problem? Tunnels about 1 foot in diameter with little wheeled vehicles pushing around payloads of takeaway food, groceries , parcels at reasonable speed with control computers determining routing and stopping collisions. A functioning network of this type would be more valuable than power or cable utility networks, and horizontal tunnel drilling tech means that you dont have to dig up huge swathes of road to put tunnels in.

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#39

Post by axiak » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:55 PM UTC

anon4this1 wrote: post #38

Does anyone else think that underground tunnels are a superior way to solve the last few miles problem? Tunnels about 1 foot in diameter with little wheeled vehicles pushing around payloads of takeaway food, groceries , parcels at reasonable speed with control computers determining routing and stopping collisions. A functioning network of this type would be more valuable than power or cable utility networks, and hori…

More likely than not, these drones are for the rural last mile problem, where drivers aren't worth the cost. In that case tunnels wouldn't be worth the cost.

Re: Amazon Shows Off New Prime Air Drone with Hybrid Design

#40

Post by kzhahou » Sun, Nov 29, 2015, 10:56 PM UTC

mayneack wrote: post #5

pinkunicorn wrote: post #3

Shit, I thought this was a marketing gimmick. Looks like they might actually be delivering. And it looks quite awesome to be honest. And development in Israel? Wow!

It still could be. They did it right after thanksgiving last time too.

Yup, right before Cyber Monday.