COLLEGE STATION, Texas — Exactly a decade ago, Amazon revealed a program that aimed to revolutionize shopping and shipping. Drones launched from a central hub would waft through the skies delivering just about everything anyone could need. They would be fast, innovative, ubiquitous — all the Amazon hallmarks. The buzzy announcement, made by Jeff Bezos on “60 Minutes” as part of a Cyber Monday promotional package, drew global attention. “I know this looks like science fiction. It’s not,” said Bez
Only one item can be delivered at a time. It can’t weigh more than 5 pounds. It can’t be too big. It can’t be something breakable, since the drone drops it from 12 feet. The drones can’t fly when it is too hot or too windy or too rainy.
You need to be home to put out the landing target and to make sure that a porch pirate doesn’t make off with your item or that it doesn’t roll into the street (which happened once to Lord and Silverman). But your car can’t be in the driveway. Letting the drone land in the backyard would avoid some of these problems, but not if there are trees.
Amazon has also warned customers that drone delivery is unavailable during periods of high demand for drone delivery.
I’m not sure how ‘Amazon failed at doing something they promised and ended up with a shitty result’ advertises them. That’s like saying telling people that McDonalds food is full of E. Coli is an advertisement for McDonalds.
I’m pretty sure they didn’t spend all this money to make stupidly unnecessary and difficult drone deliveries in a small town in Texas for the press since, again, that makes them look terrible.
That’s how advertising works. You just try to get the name of a company out there as much as possible. It doesn’t have to be gold press to be effective. I mean we are talking about one of the most successful companies in human existence.
I really don’t understand why “Amazon sucks” is a successful advertising strategy for Amazon. Why don’t other companies use that strategy? Where is the Pepsi fucked up and put out a flavor that makes people vomit campaign that works because it gets Pepsi’s name out there?
I would like to take this time to thank the slow government FAA for preventing Amazon from clogging up the airspace with crappy drones and preventing a stupid system from taking off.
Aside from all the functional downsides, I’d expect these to go the way of Tesla when hitting a larger scale. Lawsuits and traffic incidents.
Ok sure, there’s limitations. So what percentage of their current deliveries are actually possible with drones? If it’s above 0%, then there’s an opportunity.
Beyond that it’s a finance/ risk/ reward/ regulation issue.
Imagine a van which drives into a suburban housing estate and instead of parking individually at different houses for 5-10 mins each, spends less than 5 mins prepping a set of drones which take off from the roof of the van and return in minutes.
It saves time and fuel. It doesn’t work everywhere, but it doesn’t need to.
In fact it could be the same van. Do deliveries exactly as normal, and use a drone for the last half mile when convenient. It’s not either/or.
Reminds me of an insurance company that wanted to use drones to survey roof damage and in the long run they decided it was overall better to just use a camera on a long ass stick.
The program itself isn’t absurd, but Amazon is a bunch of fucking clowns. I only expect them to fail in the world of logistics. But they’re so big & everybody keeps giving them their money, they can do whatever they want, poorly, forever. They fail ‘up’.
Drone delivery is indeed part of the future of logistics. They just need to make the drones more robust to handle slightly bigger, heavier loads, like at least 10# would be great & a reasonable goal. Arm it with AI so it knows where to drop the payload. Etc etc. There are indeed a number of kinks to be worked out…and who better to crash & burn, learn on than Amazon? 🤡
I live on the 10th story of an apartment building. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
I live in a duplex with a front yard that’s about two square feet between the front stoop and the sidewalk. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
I live in a house surrounded by a lot of trees. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
I have an enclosed front porch, inside of which deliveries can safely be left without worrying about them being stolen. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
Drone delivery to someone’s home might be useful for a small number of people in specific circumstances. Most circumstances would be far more efficient if done by a human.
I’ve seen videos of a firm doing interesting stuff with bigger “mothership” drones that hover much higher and then lower a much smaller drone like thing on a cable to place the parcel on the ground. They can hit pretty precise targets and can maneuver around more obstacles than bigger drones can.
All that needs to happen is for the tech to advance to the point where it’s cheaper to do x% of their deliveries via automated drones than it would cost to have delivery drivers do it and they’ll start doing it. Saving millions(billions?) by say halving the number of human operated delivery trucks will make it a no brainer for them.
I’m just sitting here thinking personal home delivery maybe isn’t the most sustainable thing in the world.
Perhaps we could invest the massive amounts of money that it takes to deliver goods to homes into better transit and post offices that don’t look like crap.
I remember people were hyped when they announced on Thanksgiving 2012 that drone delivery service was right around the corner. Brilliant marketing from them because people were hyped.
This service was announced more than a decade ago. If they’re still having learning experiences, I think they may be trying too hard to get this to work.
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If I’m honest it really is not at all surprising.
Maybe the end game is something far more sinister and this is a good way to iron out the bugs.
As someone who frequently orders one can of soup, this is excellent news.
man killed by falling soup can which he ordered on Amazon
Dropping a can of soup 12ft onto a driveway seems bad for the can and for the driveway.
Just give it a tiny parachute
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I’m not sure how ‘Amazon failed at doing something they promised and ended up with a shitty result’ advertises them. That’s like saying telling people that McDonalds food is full of E. Coli is an advertisement for McDonalds.
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I’m pretty sure they didn’t spend all this money to make stupidly unnecessary and difficult drone deliveries in a small town in Texas for the press since, again, that makes them look terrible.
And yet here we are talking about them. Whether or not its thru positive means, its online presence grew with this.
Who is going to be more likely to order from Amazon after reading that their drone delivery service is shit?
That’s how advertising works. You just try to get the name of a company out there as much as possible. It doesn’t have to be gold press to be effective. I mean we are talking about one of the most successful companies in human existence.
I really don’t understand why “Amazon sucks” is a successful advertising strategy for Amazon. Why don’t other companies use that strategy? Where is the Pepsi fucked up and put out a flavor that makes people vomit campaign that works because it gets Pepsi’s name out there?
Welcome to the future
I would like to take this time to thank the slow government FAA for preventing Amazon from clogging up the airspace with crappy drones and preventing a stupid system from taking off.
Aside from all the functional downsides, I’d expect these to go the way of Tesla when hitting a larger scale. Lawsuits and traffic incidents.
Ok sure, there’s limitations. So what percentage of their current deliveries are actually possible with drones? If it’s above 0%, then there’s an opportunity.
Beyond that it’s a finance/ risk/ reward/ regulation issue.
Imagine a van which drives into a suburban housing estate and instead of parking individually at different houses for 5-10 mins each, spends less than 5 mins prepping a set of drones which take off from the roof of the van and return in minutes.
It saves time and fuel. It doesn’t work everywhere, but it doesn’t need to.
In fact it could be the same van. Do deliveries exactly as normal, and use a drone for the last half mile when convenient. It’s not either/or.
Reminds me of an insurance company that wanted to use drones to survey roof damage and in the long run they decided it was overall better to just use a camera on a long ass stick.
The program itself isn’t absurd, but Amazon is a bunch of fucking clowns. I only expect them to fail in the world of logistics. But they’re so big & everybody keeps giving them their money, they can do whatever they want, poorly, forever. They fail ‘up’.
Drone delivery is indeed part of the future of logistics. They just need to make the drones more robust to handle slightly bigger, heavier loads, like at least 10# would be great & a reasonable goal. Arm it with AI so it knows where to drop the payload. Etc etc. There are indeed a number of kinks to be worked out…and who better to crash & burn, learn on than Amazon? 🤡
I live on the 10th story of an apartment building. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
I live in a duplex with a front yard that’s about two square feet between the front stoop and the sidewalk. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
I live in a house surrounded by a lot of trees. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
I have an enclosed front porch, inside of which deliveries can safely be left without worrying about them being stolen. Where does the drone deliver my 10 pound load to?
Drone delivery to someone’s home might be useful for a small number of people in specific circumstances. Most circumstances would be far more efficient if done by a human.
What does this actually solve?
I’ve seen videos of a firm doing interesting stuff with bigger “mothership” drones that hover much higher and then lower a much smaller drone like thing on a cable to place the parcel on the ground. They can hit pretty precise targets and can maneuver around more obstacles than bigger drones can.
All that needs to happen is for the tech to advance to the point where it’s cheaper to do x% of their deliveries via automated drones than it would cost to have delivery drivers do it and they’ll start doing it. Saving millions(billions?) by say halving the number of human operated delivery trucks will make it a no brainer for them.
I’m just sitting here thinking personal home delivery maybe isn’t the most sustainable thing in the world.
Perhaps we could invest the massive amounts of money that it takes to deliver goods to homes into better transit and post offices that don’t look like crap.
I remember people were hyped when they announced on Thanksgiving 2012 that drone delivery service was right around the corner. Brilliant marketing from them because people were hyped.
I remember people being hyped about netting them or shooting them out of the sky.
Turns out the FAA is that corner
I get that this is probably more a learning experience than anything…butttt
The way the world is going and the conditions this thing needs to operate? Idk man
This service was announced more than a decade ago. If they’re still having learning experiences, I think they may be trying too hard to get this to work.
Great, it drops the package from 2 meters.
12 feet is more like 3.5-4
Just like plopping a grenade in a foxhole …
That’s an improvement over the delivery drivers that yeet my package over my fence