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The Wall Street Journal reports that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) may be relaxing its hard-nosed approach to commercial drones. Amazon in particular recently complained that the FAA took so long to approve drone test flights that the approved hardware was already outdated.
The two biggest companies seeking to use drones for package delivery say U.S. regulators have suddenly become more receptive to their efforts, a potential boost to the chances of success for one of the burgeoning technology's most promising commercial uses. Amazon.com Inc. and Google Inc. say they have noticed the sharp shift in attitude in recent weeks on critical issues such as drone test flights.
In an apparent sign of the recent shift in attitude, the Federal Aviation Administration plans on Wednesday to announce an initiative to study drone flights beyond the sight of the operator, according to a person familiar with the agency's plans. The agency thus far has virtually banned such flights, including for research, and proposed rules earlier this year that would prohibit them.
"Honestly in the last two to three weeks, things have made a dramatic change," Dave Vos, head of Google's delivery-drone project, said Tuesday at a drone conference. "Three to four months ago, we were a little bit concerned about how much progress we could make here in the U.S., but... what we're seeing today is significant opportunity to work here in the U.S. with the FAA."
[More after the break...]
The BBC reports that a patent application has emerged, revealing details of Amazon's planned delivery drones:
According to the patent, the drones will be able to track the location of the person it is delivering to by pulling data from their smartphone. The unmanned vehicles will also be able to talk to each other about weather and traffic conditions. According to the plans, Amazon's drones will be able to update their routes in real-time. A mock-up delivery screen suggests that people will be able to choose from a variety of delivery options — from "bring it to me" to nominating their home, place of work or even "my boat" as places for packages to be dropped. Last month car maker Audi said that it would be trying out package delivery to the boot of its cars with Amazon and DHL.
Other details revealed include: Amazon will employ a variety of unmanned vehicles depending on the shape and weight of the product. Flight sensors, radar, sonar, cameras and infrared sensors will be employed to ensure safe landing zones are found. The unmanned vehicle would constantly monitor its path for humans or other animals and modify navigation to avoid such obstacles.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday May 10 2015, @02:08PM
"- receptive to throw tens of thousands of hard-working Americans out on the streets."
Remember back in the day, when it was predicted that future technology would give us so much more leisure time?
How many soylentils are married? Living in Sin?
Do you both have jobs?
When I was a kid, my mother stayed home to look after my sister and I. Other than when he was at sea or stationed in Saigon, my father was always home for supper.
These days it is quite common for people who work full time to qualify for food stamps, medicaid or subsidized housing. When it is proposed to increase the minimum wage, we hear the argument that doing so will cost us jobs.
Despite that the US economy has been steadily growing since the great depression. The dot-com crash and subprime meltdown were severe but short lived. hardly a week goes by that I don't read the wonderful news that jobs are being created, and unemployment is down.
My whole family had a pretty good life in the seventies; my parents purchased a home for the first time in 1971. Mom paid cash for the condo where she lives now; she and dad paid cash for the house they lived in before he passed away in 2003.
I quite commonly read that steady economic growth is required for us all to enjoy prosperity, yet for twenty years I have been stymied with the puzzling question as to why we need to increase the per-capita GDP in any way. To clarify, why does the GDP need to increase faster than the population?
It was - at least until recently - completely legal to sleep on the sidewalk in Portland, Oregon. About a year ago I read of an effort by a city councilman to outlaw "camping in public places", because of the problem with "aggressive panhandling in the downtown core".
I spend most of my waking time in Portland's downtown core.
There is no such panhandling.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday May 10 2015, @03:54PM
Amazon ships mostly via UPS in the US and in Canada. Were the use of drone delivery to become widespread, how many UPS drivers would lose their jobs?
I'm not a Luddite by any means; were the Amazon delivery drones to enable UPS truck drivers to have more leisure time, I'd be all for them.
What we have, in reality, is technology's real application being used to make already wealthy people filthy rich.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2, Touché) by deadstick on Sunday May 10 2015, @11:00PM
What we have, in reality, is technology's real application being used to make already wealthy people filthy rich.
In the case of suburban delivery via drone, those people will be pediatricians and veterinarians.
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Sunday May 10 2015, @05:33PM
These days it is quite common for people who work full time to qualify for food stamps, medicaid or subsidized housing. When it is proposed to increase the minimum wage, we hear the argument that doing so will cost us jobs.
A better idea perhaps would be to require companies in the U.S. to restore overtime pay to an equivalent of what it was prior to 1975. If that was the case, anyone making less than roughly $70,000 per year would have to be paid overtime if they worked over 40 hours in a week. Personally, I would like to see overtime pay for over 8 hours in a day except for special circumstances such as those working 4 ten hour days rather than 5 eight hour days.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 10 2015, @06:34PM
The problem is partly population growth and immigration. When a city has ten thousand people and only one thousand homes that averages to ten people per home. This creates congestion, traffic, parking issues, etc... and it drives more people to live in fewer homes. The city I live in is overpopulated. So you must either cram more people in fewer homes or else you wind up with more people wandering the streets.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday May 10 2015, @11:16PM
kuro5hin's trane claim that there eighteen million in the US.
I'm not so sure, but I do know that there are many empty storefronts in oldtown Portland.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 10 2015, @06:47PM
> puzzling question as to why we need to increase the per-capita GDP in any way
Inflation makes todays currency less valuable than yesterday's.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Monday May 11 2015, @12:25AM
yes you are correct that a dollar today won't buy what yesterdays dollar did. What of inflation-adjusted GDP then? Unless it's steadily growing we don't have prosperity. But my family had prosperity in the 1970s, most people I knew at the time did. Back then it was uncommon for families to have more than one wage earner.
My ex-wife used to speak of the great poverty of her hometown. I expected to find a shantytown when I visited the first time, like people living in cardboard boxes. Actually everyone in rural newfoundland owns really nice homes, very few people rent.
When I was a senior engineer at apple in the mid-nineties, I could not afford to purchase a home, I rented a small house that I shared with another engineer. None of my coworkers at apple owned homes.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by kaszz on Sunday May 10 2015, @11:47PM
Tip:
1) Follow the money!
2) Pay attention to access to education
3) Pay extra attention to rules for wages
4) Analyze cost structure for daily living
For the people to benefit a more efficient society they need to be able to update their professional skills and have a social security while doing so.
Btw, Is there any reason to consider USA a 1st world nation anymore? nice GDP but it doesn't seem to matter for the people.