Friday, December 30, 2016

Plantations... of the Future!

     Yesterday, during a routine media investigation into its patents, an enterprising journalist discovered that last April Amazon had bought through bribes been given a patent, by the United States Patent Office in our nation's Capitol, for a flying warehouse.
     Yes, you read that correctly. Jeff Bezos's latest brainchild is to launch an Arial Fulfillment Center in the form of a blimp, eventually reaching an altitude of 45,000 feet (or about 15,000 feet above the cloud deck). Then, once the orders come in via satellite signal, UAVs (Unmanned Arial Vehicles or drones) will then float down and deliver the package to your house.
     Ars Technica called it a "demented" idea and at least one aviation expert wasn't too far behind, calling it "loony." But wait, it gets better.
     So who's going to pick these orders and load the drones? You guessed it, minimum wage-earning temp workers like the ones here on terra firma. You see, Jazzy Jeff's idea is to import temp workers from Planet Earth in a shuttle sorta like what you see in science fiction movies. Then, considering the shuttle pilot knows what s/he is doing and actually docks and forms a pressurized seal, the flesh and blood drones will then cross a short threshold nearly nine miles above the planet and begin their frenzied days vainly trying to satisfy impossible quotas set by bottomlessly avaricious corporate management.
     But, worry not. I'm sure Amazon will take total responsibility in the event this drone crashes or the fulfillment center becomes unmoored from the blimp, because Amazon has an impeccable record of doing so when one of their low-paid temps dies on the job.
     The graphic is an actual one obtained from the Patent Office that shows how this Rube Goldberg contraption is supposed to work. Apparently, the fulfillment center carrying tens of millions of dollars of merchandise is to be suspended by a blimp by as little as 2000 feet above commercial air traffic, which typically flies just above the cloud deck at 35,000 to 43,000 feet. Then, after the living drones load the inanimate drones, they then float down to earth and will have your package sent to your house in as little 17 minutes, if we're to believe the results of a test run in the UK a couple of weeks ago.
     (Not shown: The Flying Spaghetti Monster giving His Beneficence.)


     The logistical problems pretty much guarantee this will be the worst idea in human history, sort of Crystal Pepsi, the Edsel and Ford Pinto rolled into one times 10,000. The primary problem the geniuses who'd dreamed this up don't seem to have hashed out in their Flying Spaghetti Monster schematics are the drones interfering with FAA commercial air traffic (not to mention military jets). And this neatly dovetails, pardon the pun, into the other logistical issue of the FAA's prohibition of drone pilots not having a clear sight line.
     This is Jazzy Jeff's idea of combating the criticisms with which his original drone idea had met years ago, which was people shooting down the drones with bows and arrows and what have you and absconding with the merchandise. But this would only protect the warehouse, not the drones that still have to come back down to earth.
     And heaven forbid Uncle Sam would ever approach a massive multinational corporation and ask them to do their patriotic duty and snoop on their own customers for the sake of national security and a few million bucks for their troubles. Or that said companies would ever be on board with such a scheme. Oh no, no potential for abuse there, comrades.
     And let us not forget the stellar record private industry has in taking its first toddler steps into space.
     This HG Wells/Rube Goldberg scheme has got failure written all over it in 45,000 bold fecal matter.

2 Comments:

At December 30, 2016 at 6:25 PM, Anonymous Anton said...

What a massive tool is Herr Bozos. Nice graphics, though: "The Shape of Things to Come" (fiction) and the demise of The Hindenburg (non-fiction).

 
At December 30, 2016 at 7:14 PM, Blogger jurassicpork said...

And you win the Pottersville Cultural Reference Award!

 

Post a Comment

<< Home

KindleindaWind, my writing blog.

All Time Classics

  • Our Worse Half: The 25 Most Embarrassing States.
  • The Missing Security Tapes From the World Trade Center.
  • It's a Blunderful Life.
  • The Civil War II
  • Sweet Jesus, I Hate America
  • Top Ten Conservative Books
  • I Am Mr. Ed
  • Glenn Beck: Racist, Hate Monger, Comedian
  • The Ten Worst Music Videos of all Time
  • Assclowns of the Week

  • Links to the first 33 Assclowns of the Week.
  • Links to Assclowns of the Week 38-63.
  • #106: The Turkey Has Landed edition
  • #105: Blame it on Paris or Putin edition
  • #104: Make Racism Great Again Also Labor Day edition
  • #103: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Toilet edition
  • #102: Orange is the New Fat edition
  • #101: Electoral College Dropouts edition
  • #100: Centennial of Silliness edition
  • #99: Dr. Strangehate edition
  • #98: Get Bentghazi edition
  • #97: SNAPping Your Fingers at the Poor edition
  • #96: Treat or Treat, Kiss My Ass edition
  • #95: Monumental Stupidity double-sized edition
  • #94: House of 'Tards edition
  • #93: You Da Bomb! edition.
  • #92: Akin to a Fool edition.
  • #91: Aurora Moronealis edition.
  • #90: Keep Your Gubmint Hands Off My High Pre'mums and Deductibles! edition.
  • #89: Occupy the Catbird Seat/Thanksgiving edition.
  • #88: Heil Hitler edition.
  • #87: Let Sleeping Elephants Lie edition.
  • #86: the Maniacs edition.
  • #85: The Top 50 Assclowns of 2010 edition.
  • #(19)84: Midterm Madness edition.
  • #83: Spill, Baby, Spill! edition.
  • #82: Leave Corporations Alone, They’re People! edition.
  • #81: Hatin' on Haiti edition.
  • #80: Don't Get Your Panties in a Twist edition.
  • #79: Top 50 Assclowns of 2009 edition.
  • #78: Nattering Nabobs of Negativism edition.
  • #77: ...And Justice For Once edition.
  • #76: Reading Tea Leaves/Labor Day edition.
  • #75: Diamond Jubilee/Inaugural Edition
  • #74: Dropping the Crystal Ball Edition
  • #73: The Twelve Assclowns of Christmas Edition
  • #72: Trick or Treat Election Day Edition
  • #71: Grand Theft Autocrats Edition
  • #70: Soulless Corporations and the Politicians Who Love Them Edition
  • Empire Of The Senseless.
  • Christwire.org: Conservative Values for an Unsaved World.
  • Esquire's Charles Pierce.
  • Brilliant @ Breakfast.
  • The Burning Platform.
  • The Rant.
  • Mock, Paper, Scissors.
  • James Petras.
  • Towle Road.
  • Avedon's Sideshow (the new site).
  • At Largely, Larisa Alexandrovna's place.
  • The Daily Howler.
  • The DCist.
  • Greg Palast.
  • Jon Swift. RIP, Al.
  • God is For Suckers.
  • The Rude Pundit.
  • Driftglass.
  • Newshounds.
  • William Grigg, a great find.
  • Brad Blog.
  • Down With Tyranny!, Howie Klein's blog.
  • Wayne's World. Party time! Excellent!
  • Busted Knuckles, aka Ornery Bastard.
  • Mills River Progressive.
  • Right Wing Watch.
  • Earthbond Misfit.
  • Anosognosia.
  • Echidne of the Snakes.
  • They Gave Us a Republic.
  • The Gawker.
  • Outtake Online, Emmy-winner Charlotte Robinson's site.
  • Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo
  • No More Mr. Nice Blog.
  • Head On Radio Network, Bob Kincaid.
  • Spocko's Brain.
  • Pandagon.
  • Slackivist.
  • WTF Is It Now?
  • No Blood For Hubris.
  • Lydia Cornell, a very smart and accomplished lady.
  • Roger Ailes (the good one.)
  • BlondeSense.
  • The Smirking Chimp.
  • Hammer of the Blogs.
  • Vast Left Wing Conspiracy.
  • Argville.
  • Existentialist Cowboy.
  • The Progressive.
  • The Nation.
  • Mother Jones.
  • Vanity Fair.
  • Salon.com.
  • Citizens For Legitimate Government.
  • News Finder.
  • Indy Media Center.
  • Lexis News.
  • Military Religious Freedom.
  • McClatchy Newspapers.
  • The New Yorker.
  • Bloggingheads TV, political vlogging.
  • Find Articles.com, the next-best thing to Nexis.
  • Altweeklies, for the news you won't get just anywhere.
  • The Smirking Chimp
  • Don Emmerich's Peace Blog
  • Wikileaks.
  • The Peoples' Voice.
  • Dictionary.com.
  • CIA World Fact Book.
  • IP address locator.
  • Tom Tomorrow's hilarious strip.
  • Babelfish, an instant, online translator. I love to translate Ann Coulter's site into German.
  • Newsmeat: Find out who's donating to whom.
  • Wikipedia.
  • Uncyclopedia.
  • anysoldier.com
  • Icasualties
  • Free Press
  • YouTube
  • The Bone Bridge.
  • Powered by Blogger