If nothing else, Jeff Bezos has single handedly turned the drone fear on it's head.
Do I think this autonomous instant delivery system is anything more than a media stunt? nope. that's all it is. While technically feasible for a proof of concept, I don't think the power systems can do what they want and keep it affordable. A 10 mile radius? round trip? fuggitaboutit. At 30mph -- cooking it for a quad carrying a heavy load -- that's a 40 minute flight. Are flight times up to that? yes. Running full speed the whole flight? well, maybe. With a durable airframe and modest cargo capacity? Don't think they can pull it off with any consistency.
But what this *has* done is got *everyone* talking about it, with expectancy instead of fear. This does a couple of valuable things for us.
First, it changes the public's temperament. "Drone" no longer equals death and surveillance. It's no longer the creepy Santa keeping a logbook and stalking little children -- now its the Santa that drops presents under your tree (you know, the tree in your front yard
).
Second, it's more pressure on the FAA to get their head back in the game and make rules for UAS that make sense -- it's no longer a special interest lobby, the AMA, but now heavy hitting commercial venues too. Once big money gets involved, bureaucracies are often prodded into action.
For amazon, this has earned them a seat at the table helping revise those rules, even if it is vaporware -- a smart move on their part, if this kind of shipping does become feasible in the next decade or so.