#dronesdronesdrones

[wolfliving]

Drone-delivery inside-baseball

*I think that I catch maybe half the references here, but that is some strange-sounding drone industry jargon.

https://www.suasnews.com/2019/01/are-burritos-the-new-oil/

ARE BURRITOS THE NEW OIL?

by Patrick Egan

I’m sure you heard the good news about drone ID and tracking being possible. Prior to the test performed by Airmap, Kittyhawk, and Google, no one besides DJI, NASA, Intel, various companies, and folks working ADS-B had any idea that remotely IDing aircraft was possible. Google apparently came into it as the use case with strings attached, but with no freemium cellphone app offering of their own. Beyond their grasp, I guess? Or maybe there is more than enough money in burrito delivery to support aircraft certification and the UTM? Is a burrito in the hand worth two pivots in the bush?

Google is all over the burrito thing again like molé sauce on a chicken enchilada! Curious, as the word on the street did not confirm that Dave Vos just got tired of the money and prestige of working at the Goog cover story and left for greener pastures. No, contrary to the cover story, there were rumors that the burrito-on-a-string delivery was viewed as an embarrassment from folks on high at the company. I guess either story is plausible, but why would they then be doubling down on the Part 135 burrito?

Soon after the Dave Vos culture reset, I met the new crew and asked, “So what are you going to focus on now?” “Food” was the answer since studies show that people are really receptive to drone food delivery. I said, “Really, not so much for Dave.” A quizzical look is all I got in return.

So what are we to deduce from the renewed and now yet-to-be-certified burrito delivery effort? Looks like they brought in the industry legal luminary that was instrumental in helping 3DRobitics get where it is today, Nancy Egan (no relation to your humble author). I guess they felt like they had no choice but to bring in the big guns to reinvigorate the gordo burrito moonshot effort.  

I know, at this point you’re asking what the heck a drone burrito has to do with oil. Good question and one that we will examine here. How burrito delivery ties into the big picture is what I want to know. In Europe they figure it will cost you a two-dollar user fee to get into the airspace. Good news is that they assume that most of the burden will be covered by the lucrative aerial photography market.  We’re still in Postmates range with the fees, but that Part 135 certification doesn’t come cheap.

I’m thinking there has to be something bigger afoot; this is the moonshot factory, after all. And we’ve had it drummed (42 gallon) into us that data is the new oil, but apparently disruption means leaving that loser behind. I’ve been postulating for some time that Google is playing possum with the delivery-drone-on-a-string dodge while the real deal will be drones bristling with sensors collecting pictures and data like the Earth/Map thing. You’d be able to order up stock photos, video B-roll, LiDAR, and IR thermal scans of all areas covered in the delivery scheme. If you wanted to go one better, you could be the blessed third-party administering access to the NAS like the FCC did/does with bandwidth. Or you could just stay strung out on the gilded burrito, and I’ll just admit that I mistook the whole moonshot factory thing for something else.

[futurescope]

Synchronicity

The Anti-Drone Business Is About to Take Off -- PM

Drone Vandalizes Soho Kendall Jenner Billboard -- NYMag

The Anti-Drone Drone - Scientific American

[brucesterling]

http://petapixel.com/2015/08/19/this-new-shotgun-shell-is-for-shooting-down-drones/

[journeymancreativejournal]

The Morning propaganda shows are in full force justifying not only the use of drones, but the use of drones on American citizens. Fucking disgraceful. History will not judge kindly. ...so they'll just rewrite history. And wage a PR campaign that makes these kinds of actions acceptable. They never should be. Acceptable. Ever.

[varanine]

People in the United States imagine that drones fly to a target, launch their deadly missiles with surgical precision and return to a U.S. base hundreds or thousands of miles away. But drones are a constant presence in the skies above the North Waziristan tribal area in Pakistan, with as many as six hovering over villages at any one time. People hear them day and night. They are an inescapable presence, the looming specter of death from above. And that presence is steadily destroying a community twice the size of Rhode Island. Parents are afraid to send their children to school. Women are afraid to meet in markets. Families are afraid to gather at funerals for people wrongly killed in earlier strikes. Drivers are afraid to deliver food from other parts of the country. The routines of daily life have been ripped to shreds. Indisputably innocent people cower in their homes, afraid to assemble on the streets. "Double taps," or secondary strikes on the same target, have stopped residents from aiding those who have been injured. A leading humanitarian agency now delays assistance by an astonishing six hours. What makes this situation even worse is that no one can tell people in these communities what they can do to make themselves safe. No one knows who is on the American kill list, no one knows how they got there and no one knows what they can do to get themselves off. It's all terrifyingly random. Suddenly, and without warning, a missile launches and obliterates everyone within a 16-yard radius. ... This is what it means to live under drones. It has turned North Waziristan into the world's largest prison, a massive occupied zone. A humanitarian worker who was in New York on 9/11 and is now working in North Waziristan told us that the atmosphere in the two places feels very much the same. The constant sense of terror is a feeling that knows no boundaries.

Living with death by drone, Jennifer Gibson, Los Angeles Times

[otakugangsta]

X-37B

[diamondregime]

Front 242's video for Quite Unusual, making use of drone photography in '91. 

[futurescope]

Brainflight: Brain Computer Interface for controlling drones

Researchers from the EU project Brainflight (Portugal, Germany and the Netherlands) have developed a brain-to-computer interface that enables people to control drones with their minds.

During a public presentation in Lisbon (Portugal), TEKEVER and Champalimaud teams use high-performance electroencephalogram (EEG) systems to measure brain waves noninvasively, and then use specially conceived algorithms to convert brain signals into drone commands. The “drone operator”, wearing a cap that measures brain activity, influences the drone’s path using nothing but simple thoughts. Essentially, the electricity flowing through the pilot's brain acts as an input to the drone’s control system, in order to perform, on the air, a mission with objectives previously defined by the research team.

“The project has successfully demonstrated that the use of the brain computer interface (BMI) on a simulator for the Diamond DA42 aircraft, where one pilot controlled the simulator through the BRAINLFIGHT system. We’ve also integrated the BMI the UAV ground systems and have successfully tested it in UAV simulators. We’re now taking it one step further, and performing live flight tests with the UAV.”, said Ricardo Mendes TEKEVER’s COO.

[read more]

[futurescope]

Drones are watching: This small zoom lens can identify objects from 1000 feet away

Up to this point, small (personal) drone-cams have to be right next to objects to recognize anything. Good for us, bad for law enforcement units, who want to operate undercover.

The Aeryon HDZoom30, a one pound, 30x zoom lens, 1080p camera changes that fundamentally. It can be mounted on a small drone (this one) and identifies license plates or persons from over 1000 feet (305 m) away.

The Aeryon HDZoom30 Imaging Payload enables aerial image capture at 30x Optical Zoom. This Aeryon imaging payload sets a new standard for clarity and precision in unmanned aerial imagery, enabling operators of the Aeryon SkyRanger sUAS to capture high quality video and still images at more than 1000 ft. (300 m) from their target. The Aeryon HDZoom30 makes it possible for ground teams to determine the thread count on a bolt, recognize a face or read a license plate at safe or covert stand-off distance.

Sure, it's part of an incremental technology development and therefore it was predictable (same applies to batteries and design - think about biomimicry drones that fit to their natural surrounding). But it's always scary when reality catches up with unpreferable futures.

[more infos] [via motherboard]

[futurescope]

Airspace Design for Small Drone Operations

Amazon released a proposal on the design, management and operations of the airspace for the safe and efficient integration of low-altitude small unmanned aircraft systems.

[amazon proposal]

[futurescope]

Superflux: Drone Aviary

Superb new futures research from Superflux, which dares to look "into a near-future city co-habit with ‘intelligent’ semi autonomous, networked, flying machines.

The Drone Aviary reveals fleeting glimpses of the city from the perspective of drones. It explores a world where the ‘network’ begins to gain physical autonomy. Drones become protagonists, moving through the city, making decisions about the world and influencing our lives in often opaque yet profound ways.

The installation will be displayed within the V&A Civic Objects display at their "All Of This Belongs To You" show, running from 1st April to 19th July 2015 in London.

[read more about the project] [Motherboard Feature]

[futurescope]

Drone Wars: South Korean Drones Prepare to Take Out North Korean Drones

And so began history's first autonomous all-robot war. IEEE has the story:

With the news that North Korea has been flying camera-equipped spy drones, South Korea has begun to develop ways of countering that technology. Firing guns or missiles would be an option, of course, but another way of taking on enemy drones is with drones of your own.

Funded by a South Korean defense research institute, a group of roboticists at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) has been testing out ways of using autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to locate, intercept, and disable other UAVs.

Wondering if they know SkyJack.

[Unmanned System Research Group] [read more]

[futurescope]

SHEP the Drone - Paul Brennan invented worlds first Drone Sheepdog

Because obvious. And Billy Hill theme.

[via Tom Emrich]

[futurescope]

Postnormal trophy hunting: Drones

Icons based on

Fishing by Eric Milet from the Noun Project

Drawing Drone by Demograph™ from the Noun Project

Javelin by Mister Pixel from the Noun Project

Drone by Aha-Soft from the Noun Project

Bug Catcher by Krisada from the Noun Project

Garbage bag by Blaise Sewell from the Noun Project

net by Stanislav Cherenkov from the Noun Project

mail drone by Aha-Soft from the Noun Project

[The Noun Project]

[futurescope]

Injured by a drone? Consider legal advice from a Drone Injury Lawyer

And then this happened:

"So you are out for a jog, minding your own business, and then something falls from the sky. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a … drone? If a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) causes you injury, here is what to do:"

Of course it exists. How could I doubt the existence? Thank you Eunomia, we're saved. Service note. Here are 5 general What-to-do-in-case-of-injuries-rules:

Immediately get medical help for your drone related injuries.

Determine who was operating the drone.

Collect witness contact information.

Don't give a statement.

Speak with a drone injuries lawyer.

Applies roughly to realtor drone negligence, delivery drone injuries, photographer drone injuries and construction site drone crash accidents.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to start a law firm specialised in Autonomous Car Injury Claims, Biotech Negligence, Virtual Reality Abuse, IoT Blackmailing, Bio-engineered Food Poisoning, 3D printed Organ Failures, flimsy and cheap AI Consulting, Genetic Property Management, Neurodata Privacy Concerns, Employee Biome Screening Violations, Smart Drug Casualties and Cloud DNA Robberies.

Drop me a line if you need help1!

[Drone Injuries Lawyer Blog] [Robot Surgery Injury Claims] [via William Gibson]

"Nothing on this site is to be considered legal advice. Visiting this website does not establish an attorney client relationship. Each emerging tech injury case is different. Speak with a futurist to obtain relevant legal advice specific to your potential case." ↩︎