Lacking a bit of sleep, I initially read this as “anonymous flying umbrella follows and shields users from rain” which certainly intrigued me more than the actual title.
IMO it's worth watching the video rather than reading someone's writeup of it. My favorite part is this (written) list of everything that went wrong [1] ... and how much of it is due to the intersection of hardware, software, vendors, and linux
I saw this on Facebook before I saw it here. While it bears a superficial resemblance to 1000s of clickbaity tech stunts this one really delighted me. Some of these should be edited into a remastered release of Blade Runner.
I don't know - I got an automatic garbage can that not only opens and closes, it also ejects the garbage bag when it is full and vacuums in another one into place.
today's luxury is tomorrow's necessity.
things get normalized. pop-up ads, selfies, subscriptions, the cybertruck...
pop-up ads
- existence depends on surplus technology, electricity, and global communications networks.
- not required for food, shelter, water, or survival.
One example of the peak of that craziness was in 2016, after Snapchat released glasses with an embedded camera, which were more or less received as as a gimmick by their user base, Snapchat changed their name to Snap Inc and told their investors that they're now a hardware company.
noise, autonomy are real constraints. And the wind resistance is a safety critical issue.
To make it wind resistant you need to increase the drone's power/weight ratio which works against battery life/autonomy and weight (more battery, more weight)
This is a nice technical experiment but cannot work as a general public product in my opinion (I build drones since 2013 and know this topic in depth)
tangent: ridiculous that a site called designbloom has such an atrocious user experience. popovers, things that take over your reading space, and just general shiftiness all over the page that's unrelated to the content you are reading.
>what was supposedly a small project ended up big and complicated
Welcome to the drone world! So many moving parts and one tiny mistake, you end up losing a $60k drone in the ocean (true story!)
That being said, regulations prevent flying drones of any size above people, unless the drone is high to certain altitude, because of all the dangers that bring, a small issues and the props will harm them.
[1] https://youtu.be/EYRrUiM_A6g?si=T60tAChuo-GNtfqW&t=921
They should have used Apple hardware.
today's luxury is tomorrow's necessity.
things get normalized. pop-up ads, selfies, subscriptions, the cybertruck...
* Never ran out of batteries
* Didn't rely on an IR sensor that would work about 80% of the time, but would sometimes require waving more than once to get it to open.
* Didn't have a delicate gearing mechanism (automatic one eventually stripped a gear and broke).
* No set open time. God forbid you throw something in, turn to the counter and throw a second thing in...
* large lid, since it relies on foot power, not a motor / battery can only realistically open a certain weight lid.
My inlaws also have an automatic one -- last time I visited I saw that they also suffered from the stripped gear issue...
I wish public restrooms used foot-operated faucets instead of the existing "wave frantically for 3 seconds of water" sensors they have.
I am jealous of the auto-seal garbage bag option, but I am skeptical about long term reliability.
Indeed, see stuff like fridges, cars, phones, internet access...
> pop-up ads, selfies, subscriptions, the cybertruck...
None of these are a luxury, or ever was; in a way, they are the opposite.
ergo luxury
This would probably sell in Shenzhen.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixie_Labs_Nixie
Welcome to the drone world! So many moving parts and one tiny mistake, you end up losing a $60k drone in the ocean (true story!)
That being said, regulations prevent flying drones of any size above people, unless the drone is high to certain altitude, because of all the dangers that bring, a small issues and the props will harm them.
Cool project tho!