
Amazon files patent for flying warehouse - colinscape
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-38458867
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randomdrake
The "Detailed Description" of the actual patent[1] reads like wonderful
science fiction.

It uses the familiar UAV for "unmanned aerial vehicles" and introduces AFC for
"aerial fulfillment center."

They have visions of the AFCs not only being placed above metropolitan areas
where people can simply browse the inventories of them, but actually moving
into place in on demand scenarios:

"An AFC may navigate to an area based on various positioning factors. For
example, a temporal event (e.g., a football game) may be expected to produce a
demand for certain types of items (e.g., sporting paraphernalia, food
products, etc.). In advance of the event, the items may be delivered to the
AFC in a quantity sufficient to satisfy the expected demand and the AFC may
navigate to a position such that UAVs deployed from the AFC can safely
navigate to the location of the event and deliver the items, thereby
satisfying the demand. In some implementations, the AFC may navigate to a
lower altitude and provide advertising for the temporal event or for other
occasions (e.g., product announcements, product releases, sales)."

Very reminiscent of carriers from StarCraft slowly lumbering into position and
releasing robotic fleets from their bowels.

But they don't stop at just advertising for these "temporal events." Bringing
up visions of the omnipresent geisha blimp from Blade Runner, they describe
ways in which ads can be displayed around 2,000 feet in the air above cities
as well.

There's language like "docking bays" and "dirigibles" in a world with shuttles
going to and from AFCs, charging and repairing UAVs autonomously.

The patent is a long read, as patents tend to be, but definitely fun if you're
into this sort of stuff.

[1] - [http://patft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-
Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=...](http://patft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-
Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=9305280.PN.&OS=PN/9305280&RS=PN/9305280)

~~~
burger_moon
Having beer and brats delivered to your tailgate party at a baseball game by
an Amazon blimp and drone sounds pretty awesome.

It sounds quite ambitious with current technology of drones but if successful
could really change the landscape of public events. I wonder how long it would
be before the NFL banned them from selling merchandise at games.

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ghaff
I'm not sure it sounds awesome so much as dystopian consumerism with the skies
buzzing so that tailgaters can get their fixes without walking a few steps.

That's probably grouchy of me; I am a regular user of Amazon Prime. But there
probably is some limit to instant wish fulfillment especially to the degree it
makes the environment less pleasant for everyone.

~~~
83457
I wonder if there were people who felt the same way about telephones and
immediate long distance communication :-)

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jpalomaki
A true cloud storage platform. Reasonably high bandwidth provided by drones
carrying 8TB hard drives.

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bbarn
I know it's very slippery-slope in nature, but drone deliveries bother me. I
think of them being great theft targets, then of course they need to defend
themselves, then we've got armed drones delivering packages. This would
advance the "theft target" part greatly.

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empath75
Or, you know, insurance. But sure, let's put missile launchers on them
instead.

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ythn
I foresee anti-theft measures being more like the drone rendering itself
useless/calling home if stolen or captured. Also marking the parts with amazon
identification so you know they are stolen. It's no different from stealing
the mailman's truck when he gets out to make a delivery, and mail trucks don't
need "defense" built in.

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Alupis
People aren't talking about stealing the drones - rather, stealing the goods
the drone is carrying.

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HNaTTY
Unless you're assuming an awesome future with net guns fired from pirate
drones, downing the Amazon drones and stealing their wares, this is just the
same package theft issue that already exists.

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bbarn
With the exception that the human factor is removed. I have to imagine the
number of teenage kids who'd take an en route drone out of the sky is greater
than the number that would attack a UPS driver or steal from someone's door.

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amelius
Can we have some laws please for visual sky pollution, before it is too late?

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maverick_iceman
Yes, just like we should have decided social media laws in the age of MySpace.
/s

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amelius
Or when tracking ads became a thing.

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palazzone
I am an LTA Aerospace Mechanical System Specialist and I will just say, what
they have set out to accomplish will prove much harder than what Blue Origin
has accomplished. Yet they do not know that yet because the LTA industry is a
very niche industry and only a few really experts in the field who understand
what it really takes to keep these systems alive against our unforgiving
mother of nature.

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lotsoflumens
I should file a patent for the orbiting warehouse ... and the submarine
warehouse too.

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magoon
This scheme could be economical, reliable, and (finally) a great use for
airships besides overhead stadium camera angles.

The airships, themselves, could even be drones.

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alttab
As long as the core systems that keep the AFC in air don't run on DynamoDB.

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Diederich
Can you expand on that?

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DrSeuss
Carrier has arrived.

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ghusbands
Amazon are steadily reducing delivery times, aiming for fewer and fewer
numbers of hours, now, rather than days. The patent is clearly a part of that
effort. Are there any other companies so dedicated to that goal?

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stanfordkid
I really worry about data privacy -- it's trivial for Amazon to capture tons
of video of people and use this for a variety of purposes. It's like street
view but with a million more cameras that can be positioned on demand. I think
we need more policy around our rights to images of ourselves... in particular
I think we are reaching a phase in human society where data is an extension of
the human self rather than existing as a foreign object. Existing laws and
judicial philosophy need to be amended to reflect this fact.

~~~
cookiecaper
The pace of technical change in society has greatly outpaced the ability of
our legislative and judicial systems to cope with it. While I hate to say it,
as the difficulty of passing law is an important protection from an
overzealous government, we need to find some way to get these things expedited
(and expedited like in real person terms, not legal terms where an expeditious
case is one that is finally resolved 5 years later -- many cases stretch on
for ~10 years after accounting for appeals, etc., and some even longer).

It'd be a really interesting thought experiment to try to revise our legal
systems in a way that allows them to match the pace of technical change whilst
keeping protections from government overreach in place.

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maverick_iceman
What happened to having at least a working prototype before you can file a
patent? Can I patent deep sea warehouses (with pipelines linking them to
continents) just because I have the idea?

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jazoom
In the USA, it seems all you need is to dream up something.

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davelnewton
They filed for a blimp w/ a place for storage?

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zitterbewegung
You are talking about the company that filed a patent for 1-click ordering.
Honestly, its a blimp with a place for storage and the ability to launch
drones.

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davelnewton
Hm I forgot about that one-click thing. Still annoys me >:|

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kolbe
That's just a diagram of the mother ship from Independence Day!

All kidding aside, this looks awesome. I know drone delivery has its concerns,
and there will always be naysayers on any new technology, but I'm excited
about the ways in which drones can start improving our lives.

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neximo64
I respect amazon's audaciousness with this idea but I think it might be better
to stick to the ground as the drone needs to go somewhere once its done and to
go up is probably not optimal.

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zaroth
I think the theory is that it uses no power while it is coming down heavy.
Going back up with no payload is easy.

The potential energy stored by the height of the airship is the solution to
the battery problem. It might also solve much of the noise and air traffic
problem if these drones are basically floating down silently from above, and
then with no cargo they can head back up either loudly but instantly or
quietly and calmly.

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Slump
According to the patent, the drones would not fly back up to the airship but
rather they would fly to collection center on land, be loaded into a smaller
ship with other supplies and then flown back to the large airship. Presumably
with the energy saved from gliding rather than flying to their delivery
destination they'd have more range to make it to collection centers that are
more sparse then if they just flew back and forth from the centers themselves.

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ChuckMcM
Now I know Bezos is just trolling us. What's next, fantastical steam powered
difference engines sorting packages for delivery? :-)

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Tempest1981
So _should_ this be patentable?

Regardless of whether it's a good idea, is it novel, and non-obvious?

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danr4
This is gonna be hard to patent troll, but I’m sure they’ll find a way.

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nunez
Holy shit this is literally from Storks

