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joeschmoe86 t1_j3kgl3t wrote

Reply to comment by jfcarr in Drones Are Already Delivering Pizza, If You Haven't Noticed by the_remainder_17

It'll be Uber all over again: Don't care if it's illegal, do it anyway and scale it so fast that the political fallout from prosecuting such a popular service into oblivion would be too great.

For anybody who doesn't remember, Uber started out as an illegal taxi service with a phone app until cities passed ordinances to accommodate it.

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DigitalSteven1 t1_j3kvsur wrote

Actually curious how that'd be illegal. Seems like it'd also really be on a state by state basis. But I still don't see how it'd be illegal for a middleman to deliver food for you. That'd be like saying paying my mom to pick up carry out for me would be illegal.

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Excludos t1_j3l78aa wrote

>how that'd be illegal

It's about the safety of drones flying above people, cars and houses. If one falls out of the sky, at worst case scenario, what kind of damage can it do? Imagine what one of these can do, and then imagine thousands of these in the air at the same time. Drones are already heavily regulated, and these trial areas have special allowances to operate. You can't just expand it nation wide without changing the rules

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NoxFortuna t1_j3lgyp3 wrote

It's not just one at a time imo, the logistics of it all are going to be very difficult to pin down without massive, heretofore unseen cooperation between all entities using them. Think of how many straight lines exist between a single Domino's and every house it can service, and imagine drawing that straight line on a map. Now do that for every single Domino's. Then do it for every McDonald's, every BK, every Wendy's, every DD, every Starbucks, and that's just a few restaurants. If this were somehow simultaneously implemented in every store and restaurant overnight tonight, there would be nothing but colliding drones all over the streets. We'd have to pin down regulation altitudes that didn't mix each other and be prepared to prove and fine any violators- since lower heights should be faster processes and thus entities will fight over those "rights." Delivery points would need to be slightly different down to a foot or two so a house ordering two things at the same time doesn't have them collide at the destination or land on each other. If someone decides to plant a tree in their yard, we need to hope the drone doesn't divebomb into it thinking that space was clear the last few times.

We could probably solve this with more technology, and communication between delivery drones- similar to how a city full of auto cars could have them transmit location information to each other to speed up traffic. However, similarly, that requires all the entities making the drones to play nice and nobody trying to exploit the system to gain an edge.

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youreblockingmyshot t1_j3m56jy wrote

Drops pizza onto windshield of car going 70 mph causing 30 car pile up and 5 deaths with several injured. Papa John’s could not be reached for comment.

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RidesThe7 t1_j3m7qph wrote

I was trying to think of likely bad scenarios, and this one is more plausible than what I was coming up with.

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Excludos t1_j3mgxbe wrote

I mean, you don't need to dream up incredibly unlikely scenarios. Imagine thousands upon thousands of these in the air, crashing daily. They'll hit powerlines, people, cars, windows, etc. Not all of them dangerous necessarily, but when they happen enough times, it's bound to go wrong

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youreblockingmyshot t1_j3mdu4r wrote

Glad I could help. It’s never to early to regulate proper pizza box folding techniques.

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flickh t1_j3mobwp wrote

Delivers new fridge to playground full of children, chopping off several heads with rotor blades

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jessehazreddit t1_j3m6uga wrote

Because previously all drivers and taxi services, serving the public at least, normally require(d) licenses. Uber added Eats later.

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joeschmoe86 t1_j43fl8l wrote

And those licenses were usually limited in number, hard to get due to competition, and extremely valuable. Then Uber just came in and ignored all of that, got away with it, and the people who followed the law got totally fucked.

That said, the people who followed the law were taxi services who were using the rarity of their licenses to charge exorbitant prices, so not many people outside the industry cared.

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Fairy_Princess_Lauki t1_j3l61j9 wrote

In my state at least it’s illegal to fly a drone over fenced private property, anywhere that isn’t easily visible from the street

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RedditEzdamo t1_j3m5fnt wrote

I think legality falls on Uber not actually being a real job if I remember correctly? I know they have so bizarre rules that make it so the drivers don't actually "work" for Uber. They're like volunteers that can get tips.

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