And then there’s the other use, as a mobile dash cam for law enforcement. Perched on the officer’s shoulder, the drone would be ready at a moment’s notice to fly up and survey the scene. Or to allow the officer to safely see around corners, over walls, or behind other obstacles.
And all available at the behest of a simple voice command. A personal drone sure would be handy. There are plenty of tiny drones out there already, but building in this kind of capability is going to take some work. What surprises me most, though, is that Google didn’t think of something like this first. Especially given the obvious potential for connecting to Android devices. Using the phone to process voice commands, store video, and issuing simple movement instructions would take a lot of potential weight away from the drone. One of the other scenarios mentioned in the patent is traffic jams. Even in a situation where traffic is stopped, I’m not sure how sensible it’d be to send a drone out of the window. If traffic starts moving again before the drone gets back, it’s unlikely to be able to catch up. And it’s not like you can just sit there holding up the traffic even longer while waiting for it to come back.
If nothing else, if this comes to reality, perhaps it’ll make drones a little less scary and more accepted by the general public. What do you think? Are “personal drones” going to start making a useful impact in our daily lives? Is this a good thing or bad? Is this a patent for the sake of owning the idea and we’re still years away from getting the technology so small and light? Let us know in the comments. [via Geekwire]
