Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 204 posts

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#91

Post by elahd »

jonknee wrote: post #57
51Cards wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From everyone else in your building? What's top stop the guy in 5B going "Hey... package... thanks" I see a huge uptick in stolen packages. Heck the drones themselves would make a nice parts source flying free over the city. Just have to pick off a couple of them now and then. I think the point when this becomes in any way practical is really really far off. Interesting demo for sure but pretty sure I'll never have s…

A lot of buildings already do that with packages that are delivered to the front door, I doubt in building neighbors stealing your stuff will be an issue.

Yeah, this. UPS/FedEx/USPS just leave packages in the lobby of non-doorman buildings. People tend to respect other people's packages and security cameras help enforce honesty. In years of living in Manhattan I've only had one package go missing -- turned out that it was stolen by the UPS driver (new iPhone on release day in a Verizon branded box).

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#92

Post by plandis »

stevecalifornia wrote: post #20

Vacations are already being soiled by people flying loud drones in areas of natural beauty, now we get to have our day-to-day skies soiled by fleets of drones delivering popcorn. Am I the only one who doesn't want this specifically because of the noise nuisance?

How loud is a drone at 400 ft? Louder than cars driving down a road?

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#94

Post by frahs »

Why does the drone have to be wheeled out on tracks so far away from the shop for takeoff? It looks like this center may have been used for early testing where they were less confident in the drone's ability to takeoff

Also, it's interesting that they rely on fiducials placed on the ground to track the drop off point. I'd expect them to be using GPS + vision to figure out a dropoff point. Humans are really good at that, you'd think some algorithm would be good enough for 99% of the cases and save the customer time (with fiducials as a decent fallback for tricky buildings/houses)

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#95

Post by wehadfun »

wehadfun wrote: post #61
hellogoodbyeeee wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many UPS trucks are on the road on any given day? How does that number compare to your five news stories over the last five years?

You know that more than 5 UPS trucks have been hijacked in the last 5 years so I don't know why you are asking me for such a silly comparison. I have no proof but I would guess amount of people that will [Hijack a UPS truck] < [Shoot down a drone].

@lighybyte I think UPS truck hijackers are motivated, violent criminals. A couple of dumb teenagers, armed with a potato gun would probably shoot at a drone just for the hell of it + criminals + overly protective property owners

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#96

Post by ProAm »

FroshKiller wrote: post #87
tqkxzugoaupvwqr wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Delivery trucks are way more quiet for each ton of goods they deliver. I’d rather have two trucks filled to the top on the road once a day instead of dozens of delivery drones delivering goods around the clock. It means the customer won’t get his toothbrush 30 minutes after ordering but at least the rest can live in peace.

To be clear, I don't really give a damn about the noise either way. I care about reducing the risk of loss of life in automobile accidents.

So more lives saved and less jobs to go around sounds like a wonderful future existence.

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#97

Post by elahd »

tantalor wrote: post #47
elahd wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>so won't work in a city, since the payload is unsecured after the drones drop it off My building's roof is at least as secure as its lobby.

Generally you are prohibited from accessing your building's roof unless it has a patio.

If drone delivery becomes an actual thing, roof access for package pickup will be offered as an amenity. Services like Fresh Direct have prompted doorman buildings in NYC to start offering cold storage rooms to keep produce fresh until pickup.

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#98

Post by repo001 »

Neliquat wrote: post #18

Not exactly making history here. Wake me up when anyone can order from a drone, not just another PR stunt. And I see legitimate questions downvoted already. The amazon shill is real.

This is what bothered me too. "Hey everyone, we delivered to our first real customer!"

Then shows the "customer" with a full camera crew, obvious UI mocks, and great looking warehouse workers I have a hard time believing aren't paid actors. Like most things these days, it's probably a paid for PR article lightly disguised as authentic.

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#99

Post by mabbo »

anton_tarasenko wrote: post #35

That's a last mile solution. Comparing to human costs of Amazon's preferred shipping method: USPS's subsidized parcel injection. The last mile belongs to USPS. In the urban environment, that's about 15 minute per parcel at $20 per hour (labor plus trucks). I.e., $5 per parcel. For FedEx, the cost of the entire expedition process is roughly $6.6 per parcel ($43bn cost of revenue for 6.5bn deliveries), so the last mile…

> it'd have to stop outsourcing delivery to postal services and build a lot of physical infrastructure

What do you think Amazon has spent the last couple years doing? Amazon Flex isn't just some gimmick, it's part of a huge push into adding last-mile capabilities.

Re: Amazon has made its first drone delivery to an actual customer

#100

Post by truth_sentinell »

hellogoodbyeeee wrote: post #7
pinkrooftop wrote: post #3

I can't see this becoming a regular activity. They'll be people waiting near the distribution center treating it like skeet shooting range

Right, the same number of people who are hijacking ups trucks.

I think the comparison between robbing a truck and a drone is naive at best.

Would you consider the same robbing a truck, probably threatening the driver at gun point, being seen by him, to grabbing a package from the claps of a drone?

Post reply on HN