Slog Comments
Terrifying or Awesome?: A Courier Service Based on Quadcopters
1
I do miss Kozmo. I never used it, but seeing mopeds buzzing around delivering movies, cigarettes and M&Ms was pretty amusing.
2
If the good guys don't use the scary tech, only the bad guys will have it. They had the same discussion in the early 70s, when personal computers became possible. Some people didn't want anything to do with a tool used by bad guys to do bad things. I'm glad that idea faded. Next up: homebrew nanotech and genetic engineering.
3
These things are going to replace traffic copters and DOT cameras anyway. Embrace the drone revolution!
4
I'm confused: if they "can exist six feet above a bus route" than how would they end up "cruising two or three stories above our heads?"
5
Yeah, I miss Kozmo. I was living in SF at the time in the Precidio, which had terrible/non-existant bus service in the middle of the city. But Kozmo was always there for me. Until they weren't.
6
@4 Clearly Megan means we'll all be living under an overpass. Those of us that have survived, anyway.
7
Imagine 3rd and pine where both cops and drug dealers are replaced by these drones. Kinda awesome, kinda scary.
8
@4 I don't know what I meant either, actually. Now that I re-read that I see it doesn't, mathematically, make sense. Let's go with Matt the Engineer's explanation. He's an engineer!
9
I almost wish the machines would hurry up and turn on us so that bloggers would stop making extremely tired jokes about it in every single post about robots anywhere, ever.
12
It will be much harder for both celebrities and terrorists to hide from cameras once these things are mass produced.
13
I'm working on a fleet of these that will have cameras and zoom down and snatch goodies that I find attractive -- hats, iPhones, sandwiches -- and bring them back to me.
16
@11 Actually I think the concern should be the other way around. If I know our local crows they'd fuck their shit up.
17
We can probably knock this out hardware wise at Metrix Create:Space. We've done a few quads. Someone will have to write dispatch software, plus remove the hidden supercomputer from this totally canned demo. But that's just details. The snacks must flow!
19
Why are bus routes involved at all? If I want something delivered, I want it brought to my door, not the nearest bus stop. They already exist so what is the debate about? The "it's scary" meme is a bit silly. All technology can be misused. One should be more frightened about one's cell phone than thes things.
20
Such drones should be the future of police surveillance. Put a small camera in them and have them patrol the skies over a city. If one catches a crime in progress, it can pull away and follow the perp.
DON'T TELL ME WHY THIS WOULD BE INEFFICIENT, IT'S COOL.
DON'T TELL ME WHY THIS WOULD BE INEFFICIENT, IT'S COOL.
23
@7 Maybe now I'll be able to catch my bus without dodging drug dealers and cops standing around in front of the McDonalds and blocking the sidewalk.
24
The military versions are coming. Intelligent swarms of them. They will have needles. Poison needles. That they stick in our eyeballs.
26
Why the hell do people keep letting fiction hold back innovation? Sheesh, you'd think this was an argument against evolution or some such. Machines don't "go bad" ... even if they had an AI more capable than an ant (which is still scientifically impossible) they'd probably worship us the way we use to worship animals.
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