Cosmic Log
Amazon has won yet another patent for a system that would use robotic mannequins to check the fit of garments purchased online – and take selfies showing how the clothes look.
The first patent, issued in January, addresses the robo-selfie part. A patent published on July 4 focuses on the sensor-equipped mannequin, which can be adjusted to fit the shape of the prospective buyer and take pressure readings to determine whether the garment is too loose, too tight or just right.
If filmmakers ever decide to do a remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds,” with drones instead of birds, they could use Amazon’s concept for a drone-dominated fulfillment center in their set design.
The artwork, included in a patent application published today, shows a nine-story hive that’s swarming with drones. I’d hate to be the stick figure standing beneath that swarm.
A team of six Amazon inventors filed the application in 2015 with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in 2015. Their intent isn’t to stir up nightmares, but to secure the rights to a design that optimizes Amazon’s traditional fulfillment centers for drone deliveries in an urban environment.
What happens if a child or a dog wanders into range while a drone is dipping down to make a delivery? Amazon has an answer: a “virtual safety shroud” that the drone creates, potentially based on readings picked up by its propellers.
The detect-and-avoid system is described in a patent application published today. Among the inventors is Gur Kimchi, the vice president and co-founder of Amazon Prime Air’s drone delivery operation, so you know it’s serious.
Amazon traditionally doesn’t comment on its patent applications, but here’s how the safety shroud would work, based on the description in the application, which was filed in February.
How does Amazon plan to keep automated warehouses free of debris? With automated cleanup robots, of course.
At least that’s a scenario laid out in a patent granted to the Seattle-based online retailer today. There’s no guarantee the cleanup robots will become a reality. But it makes a weird sort of sense to have robots pick up after messy robots.
We’ve known for weeks that Amazon has been working on ways to give Alexa-powered, voice-controlled devices the ability to make and receive phone calls, but a newly published patent details how it could be done.
The patent also shows that the idea has been in the works for more than four years.
The system described in the patent would link an existing cellphone number with the Alexa device, and includes a provision for identifying authorized users by their voices. Alexa could let the user know a call is coming in, and then pick it up and route the call over its speaker when the user gives the go-ahead. Users could also initiate calls via Alexa.
Call charges would be billed through the user’s cell carrier, but once the call is routed through the Alexa device, the cellphone would be left out of the picture. Instead, the Alexa device would send the call to the carrier through a type of connection known as voice over Internet Protocol, or VOIP.
Amazon has patented some crazy ideas, including flying fulfillment centers that drop packages from the air. But its patent for “aquatic fulfillment centers” could be the craziest one yet.
The concept calls for warehousing packages underwater in specialized tanks – or even in a designated area of, say, Seattle’s Lake Union. Packages could be dropped from the air, parachute down to the water, and then sink to a specific water level based on its density.
When it’s time to select a package for delivery, a coded series of acoustic tones could be beamed through the water, activating a device on the desired package to inflate a balloon from an attached cartridge of compressed air. The package would then float up to the surface for retrieval and shipping.
Amazon’s inventors are taking a page from Inspector Gadget’s playbook to design drones with adjustable landing legs and reconfigurable propellers.
Those two design tricks are the focus of patents issued today. It’s hard to say whether they’ll become features on Amazon’s delivery drones, still in development. But surely there’s a chance someone will make use of the innovations, right?
Amazon has come up with some wild and crazy patents, but a patent issued today has to rank among the wildest: It calls for turning the packages ejected by its delivery drones into radio-controlled gliders.
The patent application was filed back in 2015, months before the Seattle-based retailing giant unveiled its initial design for delivery drones. There’s no indication that the concept has been incorporated into Amazon’s prototype systems. But don’t be surprised if someday you see your package of potato chips winging its way into your back yard.
The maneuvering system, developed by a team of inventors including Brian Beckman and a trio of Israelis, calls for ejecting the packages from drones while they’re in flight. A spring-loaded shooter, a drogue parachute or a set of actuators could do the trick.
Amazon has sought patents for hitchhiking drones, mini-drones that can sit on shoulders, drones that assemble themselves like Lego toys – and now drones that flip their wings to go from vertical to horizontal flight.
The hybrid foldable-wing design is covered in a patent that was published Jan. 24, following up on an application filed back in 2014.
When the drone takes off, the robo-plane’s jointed wings would be folded around to provide a stable base for a vertical takeoff, with the rotors spinning in a horizontal plane.
But once the drone gets up in the air, the wings and tail would stretch out to create an airplane-style configuration. The rotors would then be spinning in a vertical plane, like a traditional airplane’s propellers, to push the drone forward.
When it’s time to land, the drone’s wings and tail would fold up again for a vertical landing.
If you’re thinking about building a knockoff of Amazon’s Treasure Truck, the funky delivery vehicle for flash deals ranging from cameras to candy, consider yourself warned: The design is now patented.
The patent was issued today, covering the ornamental design for the heavily modified Isuzu cab-over truck. The truck is typically stocked several times a month with one or two types of discounted goodies and makes deliveries to a few locations in the Seattle area.
The Treasure Truck been compared to an ice cream truck for grownups: Amazon app users can get alerts about the deals on their smartphones, but once all the goods are spoken for, that’s it. (Today’s deal, offering two pounds of wild Dungeness crab for $35, is already sold out.)