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Comment by parvenu74 | Hacker News Reader

I can't help but think there are going to be significant unforeseen consequences of this -- consequences that will give rise to business models we haven't even begun to consider yet. Off the top of my head: why have retail stores to which you have to drive 5 to 15 miles? Put a densely packed warehouse (one that looks more like a large home than a warehouse going ten levels below grade) of the most commonly needed groceries right in a cluster of neighborhoods and orders can be made online, picked by robots, and delivered by autonomous vehicle (and restocked from larger, more central warehouses in a similar manner).

And kicking it up a notch: how about the domestic robot signing for the order and beginning dinner preparations with the just-in-time delivered products while the humans in the house... well, play video games....

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We have a lot of that in the UK already:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iogFXDWqDak

All the supermarkets here have been doing home deliveries for years.

While I am enjoying the Jetsons-like future that is envisioned in your post, I'm quite curious how we can maybe do simpler solutions. For example, we used to have a milkman who just dropped off milk on our front door. I can easily imagine dairies owning their own regional distribution networks with autonomous vehicles performing milk deliveries for much cheaper. No domestic robot really needed to sign for the order.

Same goes for groceries, I suppose. A co-op of farms operate an automated warehouse together whose responsibility is to consolidate the various fruits and vegetables and distribute via autonomous vehicles to homes. It gives a competitive advantage to regional farms so they can actually still do things at a reasonable economy of scale.

Just my two cents. Also, yes, video games all day. :)

The domestic robot and video games part was tongue-in-cheek but your idea of locally-sourced, fair-trade, free-range, antibiotics-free, non-GMO, brownie-points-loaded options could greatly benefit from this type of logistics setup. Really what this does is make it a lot easier to never have to leave your home for any reason if you don't want to. There are some people with this type of phobia now who can work from home and have everything they need delivered to them, but they are an abnormal exception. As the cost over going out to get your own stuff versus staying at home and having it all come to you drops toward zero I wonder if anti-social reclusion might become an unintended consequence.

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