131–140 of 326 posts
Chemicals are maybe the smallest cost of agriculture. Used to be > So saving even 95% is maybe not a compelling economical argument to use this.
When I see stuff like this sometimes I get depressed that I'm building apps that just move little bits of information around the web and don't have any real demonstrable value to the world. How hard is the jump into the realm of computer vision/AI/robotics for someone with strong skills and experience building web applications? Is the coding much different? Is a company like this employing math/theroy-heavy people to…
If you are willing to make the jump. It's possible. You have an advantage.
> Is the coding much different?
Not as much as they have marketed you to believe.
> Is a company like this employing math/theroy-heavy people to develop new types of AI or are they working higher up the stack and just need people who can pipe data around?
No. They are not making academic thesis. You'd be surprised how primitive and "basic" many of these companies are (comparing to their marketing videos, which are click/eye baits). You can definitively make a difference there.
Of course, as other comments have mentioned, these companies still need front-end, databases, backend, and you know, normal basic automation scripts like everyone else.
I am waiting for this kind of tech to become viable for smaller 'hobby' type farms. you know, under 100 acres. To get the spraying done by firing up a few drones would be excellent. Particularly with weeds that are in hard to reach places on the farm.
This is an improvement within the current paradigm of "big ag", but IMHO tech is opening the possibility of a completely different way of doing things. For example, this comment which is below the linked video imagines a robot-maintained food forest, I think it's on point because I, too, believe that the future is swarms of small robots rather than a few big tractors: > Imagine, a few years down the line, applying th…
This is an incredible idea and as others have mentioned below, there are other companies with products like this. In fact, John Deere released an AI controlled pesticide sprayer a little while back. It's supposed to be amazing : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEbjcqIuvi0 https://www.deere.com/en/sprayers/see-spray-ultimate/ But, am sure having multiple players in the market is a good idea. Yeah, John Deere is obviou…
> pesticide sprayer
Says all about the company.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Also I think maintenance of 1000 tiny drones is going to be a lot more difficult than that of one big tractor
This isn't intuitive to me. If one big tractor has a failure, the whole operation shuts down. If 1/1000 drones breaks, swap in a spare and move it to some kind (potentially automate-able) repair area. If the ideal number of drones is 1000 operationally, you just need to figure out how much of a margin of extra reserves you need to keep things operating. But even with a .1% lower capacity, you'd probably not notice an…
This is an improvement within the current paradigm of "big ag", but IMHO tech is opening the possibility of a completely different way of doing things. For example, this comment which is below the linked video imagines a robot-maintained food forest, I think it's on point because I, too, believe that the future is swarms of small robots rather than a few big tractors: > Imagine, a few years down the line, applying th…
When I see stuff like this sometimes I get depressed that I'm building apps that just move little bits of information around the web and don't have any real demonstrable value to the world. How hard is the jump into the realm of computer vision/AI/robotics for someone with strong skills and experience building web applications? Is the coding much different? Is a company like this employing math/theroy-heavy people to…
> How hard is the jump into the realm of computer vision/AI/robotics for someone with strong skills and experience building web applications? If you are willing to make the jump. It's possible. You have an advantage. > Is the coding much different? Not as much as they have marketed you to believe. > Is a company like this employing math/theroy-heavy people to develop new types of AI or are they working higher up the…
I have worked for one of these companies that produces fancy AI based hardware.
Turns out the hardware is made in China and the AI is handled by third parties (amazon, etc.)
Does that mean putting it all together is trivial? Of course not. But it's not as difficult as it might seem from the outside.