It raises the question why a drone can't deposit it lower than 12 feet. Is this drone theft control?
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It can't be allowed to fly too close to people, and there's also concerns with interfere, collisions, animals, etc
Probably loss of signal from GPS for one, and there are far more obstacles like power lines that can be hit below 12 feet.
Having built commerical drones, it's mainly two things, obstacles and ground effect.
it's just advertising it's not really meant to be practical you're advertising for them good job
Maybe the end game is something far more sinister and this is a good way to iron out the bugs.
I mean, the most obvious sinister application for this tech I can think of would be military dones that precisely drop small bombs on targets, but based on the ongoing war in Ukraine, that technology already has been developed, so Amazon of all companies developing it again would be pointless.
EDIT: come to think of it though, while the technology for that military application already exists, having a delivery drone industry might be a benefit to a country in wartime anyway, because the factories to build those drones could be repurposed to make military drones, and the drone fleet itself could be requisitioned, sort of like how navies have often throughout history pressed civilian ships into service in various roles, and with probably minimal modifications be used to gain a sizable fleet of bombing drones very quickly without having to have the military maintain that fleet idle in peacetime. Not sure this actually benefits the company much though, just the country that has a sizable network of these drones and/or factories to build them within it's control.
can't fly when too hot
What the fuck?! My cheap ass, $10 AirHog drone that is entirely plastic and foam can fly in 115F temps (as hot as it's ever been here). What the shit kind of crappy components do Amazon's delivery drones use?!
See also: Royal Mail in the UK experimenting with drones. Not doing the last miles delivery to customers, but reinforcing the network with a human still actually shoving the damp bits of paper through the door.
How is the delivery drone going to navigate around my wire antennas strung between the trees?
Even when you know where they are, they're hard to see unless the sun hits them just right.
I suspect that would be your responsibility to either clear the area or not use the service. I can see the service having some useful niche case uses. Mainly if you need something light on short notice.
This sounds like a terrible premise for an episode of the Jetsons