I think the real reason people are frustrated with Amazon's announcement is because Amazon is getting/will get the credit for the drone delivery idea despite the fact that numerous hackers/engineers/companies have been working on (and presenting) this idea for years.
First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
51–60 of 200 posts
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#52In all of the criticism, I haven't seen anything remarking on the energy cost for this. I can hear a strawman in the audience saying "But drones are tiny/electric/cheap!" Not at these scales. Consider the (lack of) efficiency of quadcopters, the weights and distances involved, and the total sales volume for this service in even a small test market. I'd buy that flight itself is a viable option over wheeled vehicles w…
I don't know if fixed-wings would help much with a box hanging beneath the drone. But i agree the final version will be a lot more aerodynamic and probably have a horizontal and vertical flight mode. Amazon does stuff for long term profitability. They will do it if they know that it will eventually become cost effective with time and scale. Plus they will rationalize not having any margins (or even negative margins) by increased customer happiness and loyalty.
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#53In all of the criticism, I haven't seen anything remarking on the energy cost for this. I can hear a strawman in the audience saying "But drones are tiny/electric/cheap!" Not at these scales. Consider the (lack of) efficiency of quadcopters, the weights and distances involved, and the total sales volume for this service in even a small test market. I'd buy that flight itself is a viable option over wheeled vehicles w…
A $1 surcharge gives them an awful lot of electricity to work with, so the efficiency using it might not matter a whole lot.
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#54People say that there's usually about a 10 year lag before tech from the military enters civilian use. Since drones showed up roughly 2003, it stands to reason that 2013 is when we should first starting seeing the tech become civilian viable. In fact that seems to be true, there's a whole lot of DIY material out there, and that's from people who don't have real world experience. I wouldn't be surprised if as military…
You're confusing huge ridiculously expensive military drones, which are essentially small planes, with what Amazon is showing us, which are essentially small helicopters. There's no way in the world these tiny drones can fly 10 miles each way, carry 5lbs of payload, deliver the package perfectly on the driveway/doorstep, and cost low enough to not be a financial nightmare. That's not even accounting for dealing with…
The military has a much wider range of drones than you seem to be aware of. Just for a sampling of some (admittedly fixed wing): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Group_photo_of_aerial_demo...
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#55In the UK, Waterstones (equivalent to Barnes and Noble) have announced a competing product: http://blog.waterstones.com/?p=15525
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#56People say that there's usually about a 10 year lag before tech from the military enters civilian use. Since drones showed up roughly 2003, it stands to reason that 2013 is when we should first starting seeing the tech become civilian viable. In fact that seems to be true, there's a whole lot of DIY material out there, and that's from people who don't have real world experience. I wouldn't be surprised if as military…
Surely the cost of military drones (and the personnel to operate them) is many magnitudes more than Amazon is willing or able to spend on delivery drones.
Surely the costs of flying a plane through a war zone with unreliable infrastructure with attached bombs is more than that of flying a plane with an ipad through suburbia with a reliable infrastructure.
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#57I haven't seen anyone mention another key PR benefit of announcing this early: to take the wind out of Google announcing delivery via self-driving car.
Google is probably more threatening to Amazon than any other company, and they have a clear interest in attacking physical good delivery in a manner that is deflationary relative to Amazon - almost certainly by using self-driving vehicles to provide local delivery to existing retailers, gaining access to the inventory databases in the process.
Google likes to do PR stunts to project an image of futuristic technological leadership. It looks like they have a competitor.
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
What worries me is that whatever regulations the FAA come up with will suit Amazon just fine, but will put drones out of reach of hobbyists.
I would be surprised. Amazon has a history of developing tech for its own purposes, and then selling the tech. Their SOA architecture is now the backbone for one of the largest cloud services platform on the internet. They might be the go to supplier for commercial drones in the not to distant future, so when they work with the FAA to get them approved (which i'm sure they're doing), i'd bet they are keeping alternat…
Remember the "at Amazon, everything is a platform" Google+ post?
Drones as a Service.
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're confusing huge ridiculously expensive military drones, which are essentially small planes, with what Amazon is showing us, which are essentially small helicopters. There's no way in the world these tiny drones can fly 10 miles each way, carry 5lbs of payload, deliver the package perfectly on the driveway/doorstep, and cost low enough to not be a financial nightmare. That's not even accounting for dealing with…
Sorry, but who are you? Who are you to stand up and call Amazon's idea unviable? Why is their idea unviable? Because they have no proof? Well you certainly proved how unviable the idea is with your lack of proof. Quite frankly, when it comes to Bezos vs "ye", I have to say that the billionaire owner of one of the most successful stores in our world is SLIGHTLY more credible than "ye", random commenter who has no doma…
It's a simple question of weight ratios! A five ounce bird could not carry a one pound coconut.
Re: First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're confusing huge ridiculously expensive military drones, which are essentially small planes, with what Amazon is showing us, which are essentially small helicopters. There's no way in the world these tiny drones can fly 10 miles each way, carry 5lbs of payload, deliver the package perfectly on the driveway/doorstep, and cost low enough to not be a financial nightmare. That's not even accounting for dealing with…
Sorry, but who are you? Who are you to stand up and call Amazon's idea unviable? Why is their idea unviable? Because they have no proof? Well you certainly proved how unviable the idea is with your lack of proof. Quite frankly, when it comes to Bezos vs "ye", I have to say that the billionaire owner of one of the most successful stores in our world is SLIGHTLY more credible than "ye", random commenter who has no doma…
Sorry, but who are you?
WTF is this? I'd love to see these things flying in SF bay (windspeed:25 knts) or SoCal during the Santa Anas (30kts sustained). That doesn't mean its likely to happen with a quick and dirty solution, at least on the tech side. But who knows, maybe on the people-org side you can have a real-time delivery window that just side-steps the problem. But the appeal to "authority" here is just BS and gets in the way of a real discussion. Synchophants vs Naysayers is not a debate.