Zucker punched: Google gobbles Facebook-wooed Titan Aerospace Web giant Google is buying Titan Aerospace, presumably to help it blanket the world in internet connectivity beamed from drones and balloons. The acquisition was reported by the WSJ on Monday, and will see the Titan Aerospace team work with Google's "Project Loon" group which makes high-altitude balloons for dispensing cheap …
I like knocking all of the big companies that seem to want to own us all but in fairness to Google this article refers to them having killer robots which they do not.
The Boston Dynamics 'Big Dog' is a research vessel to provide grunts with the same abilities they used to have with mules..... but hopefully a bit smarter.
Mules disappeared from the US Army in 1956.
With the increasing reliance on battery power and patrolling in relatively remote areas over the last few years, the need for a less than vehicle sized means of replenishing ammo and batteries became clear so one of DARPA's ideas was for a competition to produce and develop all terrain semi-autonomous robots that could do a similar job to the old mules without a wrangler, Big Dog was the effort produced by Boston Dynamics.
For all I know Google may turn it into a killer robot but when they took over the company the only way Big Dog would kill anyone was if it fell on them.
Drones if anything are a little more scary; they have the potential to be far more invasive on our lives, as well as carrying the interthingy to remote areas they could be used for spying and delivering direct advertising such charcoal or fire lighter ads while you are trying to get the barby going on a weekend. God knows what targeted ads you will get if one sees you in a hot tub with a bevy of girls? Maybe it will just film you!
Not knocking the technological achievement, which is remarkable, but it seems to me that there is yet progress to be made because those robots may be semi-autonomous and capable of carrying the necessary munitions to the front line where required, but given the racket they make to do so, I can't help thinking that "the enemy" will quickly learn to target the tinny quadrupeds and do a one-stone-two-crows thing.
Big Dog needs to get stealthier or more heavily armored for the battlefield, either of which will require an order of magnitude improvement in energy management and production. Even the civilian version could be of more use if rendered half as audible as it is now.
I wish them good luck finding the solution.
Global spanning recon drone network, uptodate traffic and location reporting, accurate live maps which include new roads, rather than maps that were out of date three years ago when the satellite last did a feed into Google Maps...
And they also provide broadband? Bonus! Can you pack it with phone call detection & decryption? SOLD!
Governments around the world make a very healthy income selling RF space to mobile companies;. And what if the said governments don't want an effective spy network over their lands.
The current Tory government in blighty (no its not a coalition, if you think it is; your just kidding yourself on) will no doubt say "YES" as Google has better access to no 10 than the current Tech gov department.
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