Eyes Above The Waves

Robert O'Callahan. Christian. Repatriate Kiwi. Hacker.

Wednesday 19 October 2016

Pivoting To Cyber-Forestry

Forestry work is dangerous. Wouldn't it be great if we could save money and lives using autonomous drones to trim trees in rural and urban areas? We could call it cyber-forestry, or we could call it frickin' flying chainsaws ... I could go either way.

You may be thinking of potential downsides, like what happens if the flying chainsaws get hacked. Don't worry, our security people will be the best in the business. Well, among the best. Well, as good as Yahoo's anyway.

Government regulation could become an issue. We'll use the Uber approach: scale first, lobby later. With thousands of flying chainsaws deployed everywhere, who dares regulate us?

Yeah OK, I admit this could turn out badly for humanity. But hey, if we don't do it, someone else will. Better for us to be first, because we're wiser and smarter than them. Whoever they are.

Comments

David Leunen
How can we regulate ourselves ? I mean, when states fail to do it quickly enough.
Robert
Tricky. Maybe industry leaders could opt into a self-selected oversight board, where the board deliberately includes a number of third-party skeptics and is required to operate with transparency. Create an incentive to be subject to the board by having its members vow to restrict sharing of certain technologies to be between board members ... but allow anyone to join.