
World’s First Flying File-Sharing Drones in Action - evo_9
https://torrentfreak.com/worlds-first-flying-file-sharing-drones-in-action-120320/
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wisty
Why does it have to fly? I mean, it's cool, but surely there's better and less
obvious solutions. Also, launching a UAV during a protest? Good way to get
yourself shot.

A camouflaged server can be left anywhere. Wifi detectors will pick it up, but
if that's a concern than a remote drone is going to be even more likely to get
taken out. If you waterproof them, you could toss them down a drain, and hope
they stay in place. You could strap them to a vehicle. You might be able to
strap them too a medium-sized dog. Obviously, you'd run the risk of getting
traced back, but the same could be said for launching a UAV.

There's millions of ways cheap, weatherproof servers can be used.

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camtarn
Never underestimate the bandwidth of several autonomous drones loaded up with
ultra-light USB drives :)

Now all we need is a more advanced drone which can generate or pirate its own
power. I love the idea of these homing in on power lines, clamping on, and
sipping juice like some sort of mischievous electrovorous jellyfish - I'm
assuming this isn't practical since AC clamps are metal and rather heavy, and
I don't know how much current you can actually get out of them (they're
usually just used for measuring current) but it's a cute image :)

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angersock
You know, I think you're on to something. I think the frequency for overhead
power lines is basically just 50 or 60 Hz, depending on region.

You could probably setup a lightweight tuned secondary coil on the robot, and
then use some clever rectifier/zener tricks to get a reliable trickle charge
out of it.

Hm.

EDIT:

BAHAHAHA THIS IS TOTALLY POSSIBLE
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogowski_coil>)! WE CAN HAVE DRONES LIVING OFF
THE GRID! FUCK DA POLICE!

:D :D

~~~
electromagnetic
In my region, a fine for "stealing electricity" has a fine starting at like
$30,000. This is normally aimed at grow ops, which tap into the service lines
before the meter (usually by an interior cut below grade so it goes
unnoticed), however when the government is already abusing its power, I don't
think it's a wise idea to actually get into a position where you could be
facing a massive fine. So I certainly wouldn't suggest going anywhere near
power lines.

I'd suggest solar-cells. If you get the right efficiency-weight ratio, they
might actually add to the flight duration of the craft, and when the battery
starts dying simply have the UAV target a south-facing roof and ditch. As the
UAV would likely already have motion-sensors, simply program it so that any
abnormal shakes in this 'sleep mode' and it takes off so no one goes up on a
ladder and tries to grab it.

Also using this latter method, they could collect data on how long it takes
before they get disturbed to find friendly zones for if they are disturbed in
sleep mode.

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angersock
Considering the outlandish fines being levied for something on the order of
ten unlicensed copies of a song, being caught with a drone carrying hundreds
or thousands would seem to overshadow electricity stealing fines. I like the
solar-cell idea though.

~~~
electromagnetic
I thought the whole point of the drones wouldn't be to carry pirated data, but
simply act as a means of unregulated information communication.

It would be too complicated and convoluted to ensure data went where you
wanted it if you're only uploading gigs to a certain drone in a swarm. It
would also ensure you're traceable for any piracy you do commit (IP #.#.#.# at
_____ this location is sending Lada Gaga Album leak to IP #.#.#.# at ____
location).

In my mind, the swarm should be using a mesh network. Without ISP's assigning
your IP based on ones they own, you can literally join the local network with
any random IP address and the mesh net handles getting your data between the
drones and to your destination. What's better, is if these drones are
connecting to open wifi nodes the mesh net doesn't have to be contiguous. A
mesh net can be formed by a few open wifi nodes bridging the gap between major
cities.

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sek
<http://vimeo.com/36267881>

This is art guys, forget energy supply for a moment and enjoy the idea. A
politcal statement, as a counter measure to oppressive use of modern
technology.

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cobrausn
I can't wait until the government types (or involved parties with money) roll
out hunter-killer drones that target these, furthering the oppressive use of
modern technology. ;-)

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neilk
Pretty obviously a hoax, er, I mean, conceptual art project.

I may be in the minority here, but I think that just having the idea counts
for nothing, even in art. Their idea is pretty shallow, anyway. They're just
assembling pre-existing memes together. Does anyone remember the old "imagine
a Beowulf cluster" meme from Slashdot? It satirized a similar fanboy attitude.
"Imagine an autonomous flying file sharing device!"

Solving the hard problems of making a crazy idea a practical reality is the
only thing that counts in my book. This is not impossible; I've seen people do
it time and again, and I've even done it myself.

Or, as Steve Jobs put it, real artists ship.

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sek
You think to narrow, art is there to inspire you. The core idea is filesharing
without boundaries. If someone has a practical idea derived from that, then
something was accomplished. This discussion here shows that it is a success.

Why do you use the word meme, do we call art memes now?

To the Slashdot example, HPC is a solved problem. File sharing on the other
hand has much bigger ideas and problems behind it, take government control of
information as an example.

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iliis
A really cool idea, but as others have mentioned a tiny bit impractical with
only a few dozen minutes of flight time. However, there are actually serious
attempts to adress these issues: Cellphone providers are looking into blimps
as antennas; A guy I know is working on a autonomous airplane, that can keep
itself in air more or less forever (Their goal is acutally to go to mars with
this):

"The goal of this project is to design and build a solar powered micro
airplane for autonomous exploration. This system, named Sky-Sailor, is fully
autonomous in navigation and power generation. Equipped with solar cells
covering its wing, it retrieves energy from the sun in order to supply power
to the propulsion system and the control electronics, and charge the battery
with the surplus of energy. During the night, the only energy available comes
from the battery, which discharges slowly until the next morning when a new
cycle starts."

<http://www.sky-sailor.ethz.ch/>

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mindslight
Cool art/tinkering, but one word as to practicality: transit.

I never quite got the long term plan for things like this or Sealand hosting.
As one broken clock correctly said, the internet is not a dump truck. To be
accessible from "the web", one requires some interactive uplink to the
internet. If action can truly not be taken against the server, simply cut its
cord. (Yes, it's possible to get some people to use their own radio hardware
for communication with uav/minisat/moonserver, but the number of people who
idealistically go out of their way to value freedom will always be much
smaller than the ones who take the easiest path)

Where I'm going with this is that any salvation _must_ come from software. The
_whole philosophy_ of the Internet is that dumbly passing packets back and
forth is _good enough_ , and the end nodes should have the intelligence to
deal with whatever network failure occurs. I know that programming servers is
easy, and centralized sites give the owners publicity and ad money, but the
only lasting effect from these things is to create the community and mindshare
from which next-gen protocols can be invented.

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miahi
And what happens after 10 minutes of flying, when the batteries will be
drained? Charging the battery takes at least as long as the flying time.

~~~
dlikhten
At first I assumed it was a hybrid blimp technology that would float above the
weather, it's power is only needed for purposes of changing direction and
transmitting with a directional antenna. It can have a large solar panel on
top for recharging operating the bare minimum amount needed for operations.

This was of course not true. So anyone with a rifle can just shoot these
babies down, and so can rain, and so can battery drainage.

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angersock
Well, shit, I guess they weren't kidding.

Huh.

(For folks States-side, for an idea on how to implement one of these this
design report has some good info:
[http://www.ti.com/corp/docs/landing/universityprogram/11_win...](http://www.ti.com/corp/docs/landing/universityprogram/11_winners/Rice_U_Robert_Brockman_Part_2.pdf)
)

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sukuriant
I'm still not convinced. It still seems like a hoax. It's just too... funny.
But really, if censorship becomes ridiculous, this sort of system might be
able to circumvent it for the internet as a whole.. well, for the free
internet as a whole

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rdoherty
2x2200mAh batteries running GPS + 4 motors and other electronics means the
flight time is maybe 10 minutes? (For comparison, the iPhone 4S is 1432mAh,
running GPS continually on it drains it very fast)

This seems like a cool idea but the harsh realities of battery life, weather,
maintenance, etc will most likely prove it unfeasible.

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SkyMarshal
Is there any legal protection against someone just shooting these drones down?
They're flying outside national law, so if someone or organization opposed to
them could detect them, why not just shoot them down?

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DennisP
Because falling bullets will kill somebody.

Unless maybe you can get 'em with birdshot, and you're careful to make sure
nobody's downrange.

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dinkumthinkum
This is a joke, right? What's to stop kids or the MPAA from taking potshots at
these things?

