Amazon to use quad copters to deliver packages

[jharkin]

Not looking to make this political, but last I checked, robotics repair paid way more than delivery driver. Programmer more than that, and automation engineer, even more. There'll be lots of good jobs in manufacturing, programming, and maintaining those drones.

Close a door, open a window...

I dont disagree... but my point is not about payscale... its about the number of jobs relative to the size of the population. UPS has something like 100,000 drivers out on the roads and a similar number of trucks. If we replace all the delivers with drones will you need 100,000 repairmen and engineers? probably only a fraction.

Just like when we automated factories we replaces 100k's of assembly worker jobs with 1k jobs running the automation.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

We are innovating ourselves out of work. THose laid off workers wont be buying a lot from anyone especially amazon.

 

[webbie]

According to futurists, we all should be out enjoying the view and partying!

But, things turned out a bit different - the economic advantages of productivity did not flow to the people (in general)....

Sure, that's a political topic. But it's important to note that people should educate themselves in the useful trades and arts...there are not going to be too many highly paid factory or delivery jobs in the USA in future years. Some, yes, but not many.....

As to where the productivity gains end up, that's for the voters and activists of the future to decide. The die is pretty much cast for now.

 

[webbie]

FYI, if you want some idea of the free PR that Amazon gained from this, here is a little chart of my drone site traffic - you can guess that the uptick was because of their PR story.....now it's going back down again! That was almost a doubling of our readership on the peak day.

 

[Ashful]

But, things turned out a bit different - the economic advantages of productivity did not flow to the people (in general)....

I dunno webbie... seems to me those advantages flow just fine toward the people willing to put themselves in a position to receive them. Not to get too far off on a tangent, but I work with former kids of privilege, who went to art school at great expense, and now make $9/hour. Likewise, I went to engineering school with kids who had to borrow and work their way thru school, and some now make more than I. It's a choice, and the better road isn't always easy, but those who have done it against significant odds are proof that anyone can. There will always be victims and victors, you just have to decide which role you want to play.

 

[webbie]

Well, yeah, my point if you have to be very flexible and learn more than one trade or way to live. This is unlike the past and also unlike basic human behavior. Henry Ford quoted something in his book, which foretells all of this, about most (I think he said 95%) of people wanting to just work a good hard and productive day (given the proper chance and salary) and only 5% willing to advance.

At the time and up until about 1960, this worked here and in many other places like Japan, where if you worked hard and showed up, you had a basic living. No more. Now you have to do much much more.

One of the things about innovation and entrepreneurship is....well, like blogging or starting an internet forum! That is, if everyone did it, it would not be the same. If everyone blogged, there would be no one to read it. If everyone acted as those 5%, then they wouldn't be that 5%....

Anyway, don't want to get too far off course - but it's a fair statement to say our future societies will have to deal with a situation where automation and robotics do away with a lot of repetitive work...and that, as of yet, I feel that we have not adapted to this....causing some misery. Let's watch over the next decade or two and see what happens!

 

[Ashful]

Well, yeah, my point if you have to be very flexible and learn more than one trade or way to live. This is unlike the past...

Agreed on all points, webbie!

 

[shmodaddy]

 

[begreen]

Pure dreaming, it's not gonna happen.

 

[webbie]

Pure dreaming, it's not gonna happen.

If you were a betting man I'd take you up on that with a 10 year window........

 

[Ashful]

Pure dreaming, it's not gonna happen.

Someone was once ridiculed for suggesting that men would one day fly thru the sky in horseless carriages.

 

[begreen]

There are too many issues to resolve like apartment deliveries, theft, power lines, FAA regs, range, abuse (think terrorists here), privacy concerns, weather issues, inability to press a door bell button, guard dogs, etc. There may end up being some niche delivery opportunities like aid for some remote areas, but I don't see this happening large scale in an urban environment.

 

[Ehouse]

It used to work getting payments upstairs and the receipts back in Penny's and Sear's in the 50's

Damn I'm old.

We're about the same age (I'm not old, However) but our Penny's had an overhead system of cables. Each department station had a pull chain which when yanked, sent a canister with the cash etc. up to the balcony for processing. The canister with receipt returned to the station by gravity. A good model for inner city transport in MHO.

 

[fossil]

Amazon drone delivery. Completely feasible. Completely impracticable. Completely hype.

 

[jharkin]

There was an editorial on this in the Boston Globe this weekend. Apparently there is a Pizza chain in the UK that uses drones to deliver Pies and in South Africa they use them to deliver beer to spectators in Sports stadiums (who can order via their iphones). Seems that its coming....

 

[begreen]

The beer delivery was a one shot (or cup) experience and not without a lot of problems. Not sure about the UK pizzas, but hope it's not rainy and windy (never happen right?).

 

[BrotherBart]

Bezos needs to try the concept delivering the newspapers for the Washington Post, which he just bought, first.

 

[begreen]

I Amazon starts delivering booze (or pot) in the future, piracy is going to get a lot more interesting.