Drones At Home: Are You Ready?

Project Wing was revealed by Google this past week with a video of dog food being dropped from a Drone. Whoah – really?  This may be the first time I may be showing my age, because cautionary alarms are going off in my head.

The reality is, it’s hard not to meet a Drone up close and personal and not have some kind of reaction. Even the word drone carries it’s own tone (so to speak). To Drone is not really a nice image. Unanimously we all want to take flight when anyone drones on and on for too long. But I digress.

This past weekend our friends gave us a demonstration of their new Drone. They skillfully launched this buzzing oversized Jack (you know the game of Jacks that you played with a small ball for hours). Well, they airlifted Jack from their own little launch pad (a white surface the size of Home Plate)–– flew it up to the second story deck where  a group of us were standing and there it hovered and hovered and hovered. Apparently it was snapping pictures in our faces –and as it buzzed and hovered, we all gawked and yakked about this visitor/ intruder/ invader/ stalker/ ingenious device … and then we watched them land their toy Drone – brilliantly and precisely back on the landing pad.

With mouth agape I tried to process the free flow of thoughts invading my brain:

“OMG, that machine is actually hovering in front of us and – it’s taking our picture – that is amazing – no that is disturbing – no that is revolutionary – well I’m not sure what it means but I’m having some negative thoughts about this extreme toy.” And without coming to any conclusion I began to survey my friends to see where they stood on the Drone.

The feedback ran the gamut from disturbing to cool – to ban them or let’s buy one. One friend mentioned how Drones could be at delivering medicine and supplies to remote places and people who needed help – Drones for Humanitarian purposes, pollution control (cutting down on delivery trucks), and bringing internet to remote areas. That makes sense but what about for personal use?

If you’ve only read about Drones at Home and haven’t listened to them  “live-in your face” or seen them up close and personal – it’s entirely different and here’s why:

1. They make a humming bee like sound (maybe that’s the drone thing – annoying if you’re not into whirring machine like noises).
2. They look like toys yet appear way smarter than any toy i’ve ever seen — when they hover up close it’s hard not to try to figure out what they are doing: snapping your picture, giving you the once over, grabbing information out of the cell phone in your pocket, or ready to shoot a squirt of water in your face?
3. A Drone at Home in the wrong hands is kinda creepy – imagine if you don’t like your neighbor and their drone is hovering at your window snapping pix and feeding that info back to it’s source.
4. Permission to Drone? What is appropriate Drone etiquette – is it ok for the Drone Driver –to just start launching without permission. Is this a solo activity or does it require consent of those being “droned.”

To be fair – I didn’t react well the very first time I experienced the Microwave. I was 14 years old and I was sure I was being radiated, after all, I had just finished reading On The Beach and I was sure the microwave was a gateway to nuclear destruction. In the same vain, images of Orwellian 1984’s Big Brother are going full frontal for me as I looked into the “eye” of this Drone. Yes, the eye – because that lens on the Drone looks like the peering perpetrating eye of a Cyclops.

But, because I am not an overly private person (hence this weekly blog), and am not a paranoid person by nature (except when I can’t find the jewelry I hid in my own home) – why should I be concerned about Drone invaders in the wrong hands?

With a Drone – it’s hard to see who is at the helm – where is the Wizard? A visitor from another planet?

I’m not going to stay up at night worrying about the Drones at my door for now – but I think it’s worth noticing that something revolutionary is happening at our doorsteps – and a radical new toy is making it’s way into our living rooms.

For now I think it’s safe to say,  it will not be on my birthday wish list. However if you’re intrigued you can buy it on Amazon with one click. http://www.amazon.com/DJI-Phantom-Vision-Quadcopter-Camera/dp/B00J8JLOA4/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1409519785&sr=8-6&keywords=drone

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