quote:

Originally posted by Boogerhead:

quote:

Originally posted by editengine:
These things have to be driving the Secret Service insane.

I hate to break it to you, but the very existence of such an organization is illustrated insanity. Insanity and insane levels of paranoia are a prerequisite for employment within...

Actually, Secret Service guys are the least paranoid feds. Think about it: they have to investigate every crackpot who says he wants a piece of any of a fairly large set of protectees. If they were paranoid, they'd be popping these people all the time. Instead, you see hardly anyone gets prosecuted for that kind of thing, and you almost never hear of any kind of abuse of power scandal with the Secret Service. They developed a very smart assessment tool a long time ago that they apply to the crackpots to determine whether they need to worry about them. The vast majority of the time, it says they don't need to worry. So they thank the crackpot for agreeing to a consensual interview, say goodbye, and never cross his path again. [shrug] Opposite of paranoid, right there.

hrm.

How do you always seem to confuse me?

Split, however, is one paranoid motherfucker.

quote:

Originally posted by Boogerhead:
hrm.

How do you always seem to confuse me?

Eh, we just have different experience. USSS wouldnt bE able to survive if they were paranoid. They're not especially enlightened or anything. It is an evolutionary thing. With so many crazy people and insincere threats out there, they wouldnt last a day on the job if they were paranoid.

It makes sense.

In my mind, the atmosphere that makes them necessary is insane.

Not that it will change any time soon, but that's the sentiment I was trying (unsuccessfully) to articulate.

Three months of complete sobriety seems to be affecting my thought processes.

Tacocopter Aims To Deliver Tacos Using Unmanned Drone Helicopters

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The Internet is going wild for Tacocopter, perhaps the next great startup out of Silicon Valley, which boasts a business plan that combines four of the most prominent touchstones of modern America: tacos, helicopters, robots and laziness.

Indeed, the concept behind Tacocopter is very simple, and very American: You order tacos on your smartphone and also beam in your GPS location information. Your order -- and your location -- are transmitted to an unmanned drone helicopter (grounded, near the kitchen where the tacos are made), and the tacocopter is then sent out with your food to find you and deliver your tacos to wherever you're standing.

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Pirate bay is going to float their servers on a fleet of drones to keep them out of any ones jurisdiction. I <3 this.

Meh, I haven't used torrents in ages. It relies too much on the interests of the average internet user, and the average internet user has fucking shit taste.

Jellyfish Drones sounds like a band name...

"“We’ve created an underwater robot that doesn’t need batteries or electricity,” said Dr. Yonas Tadesse, assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Texas and lead author of the study. “The only waste released as it travels is more water.”"

Portable Machine Gun Drone....

.........

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I love the stuff from FPS Russia, I have no idea who this guy really is, where he gets the gear, or how he funds it but it is always funny and explody.

quote:

Originally posted by editengine:
I love the stuff from FPS Russia, I have no idea who this guy really is, where he gets the gear, or how he funds it but it is always funny and explody.

Yeah, the guy is a real trip. He's obviously got connections. The toys he gets to play with are pretty amazing.

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quote:

Originally posted by editengine:
I love the stuff from FPS Russia, I have no idea who this guy really is, where he gets the gear, or how he funds it but it is always funny and explody.

I did a bit of searching on the guy after I saw that drone video. Could not find out much beyond what he reveals on his own channels.

I do/did wonder if a lot of the explody-ness is not actual explody-ness; but, some sort of post-production special effects trickery. I saw him with this "man-portable" minigun, a la Terminator 2, and I felt even more suspicious (at 2:05 of this video):



hearing gun nerds talk about man-portable miniguns, they seem to think it is about as cinematic a portrayal of firearms as Hackers is a cinematic portrayal of computer hacking.



but, then, at moments like 2:42, you see a big crate feeding his ammo. And, this seems like what would happen if this really is a thing. Of course, the big crate of ammo = not *actually* man-portable at that point...

dat brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrp

The minigun.

Movie probs would actually explain where he lays his hand on those toys.

Speaking of suspect explodyness. Something don't look right about that drone blowing the car up finish to the video posted above. That, and the fact there doesn't appear to be any recoil issues evident when a very light drone fires a machine gun... seems to defy physics. It does makes a lot of sense if it was a movie prop though.


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This message has been edited. Last edited by: oddmanrush,

This was largely done in response to two bulldozers, one driven by a friend of mine, falling through into the old South Pole station buildings during the 2009-10 summer. Earlier that season my boss took me out there to drive around in a snowcat all over the old station area. Summer 2010-11 they had explosives folks down here to do demolition work, and I guess they were just checking to see how much might be left standing.

http://antarcticsun.usap.gov/f...thandler.cfm?id=2653

Despite the paraniod set replacing black helicopters with predator drones in their online rants it appears that drones are going to filter down to civilian use sooner rather than later. For the time being the only regulations are on those that fly over a certain altitude but for those under the reg ceiling there are myriad uses already being suggested. Remote sensing applications for environmental and wildlife monitoring are being discussed a lot by geographers, news channels will almost certainly ground expensive choppers and switch to drones. As far as military tech goes this probably won't reach the ubiquitous level of the internet or cell phones but what other uses can we envision for such devices?

Are we going to need to reconfigure our idea of public space to include the air over our homes?