If my experience is at all typical of other consumers, I would guess that Amazon's Prime strategy is central to its whole attempt to conquer worldwide retailing and therefore that amazing delivery capacity lies at its heart, whether instantly via things such as video streaming or highly expedited in the case of tangible products.
Now Amazon could continue to rest comfortably upon its existing accomplishments by which it has used third-party delivery services to achieve a big part of its goals. But it is not. Indeed, it is spending huge sums of money to build massive warehousing facilities all over the place in support of a long-term plan to achieve super-fast delivery. And, in doing so, it has abandoned its former (and highly effective) strategy of trying to avoid physical "presence" in the various states in order to avoid having to hold back sales/use taxes from its customers.
So, fanciful or not in their present state of technological development and in the present state of legal and regulatory tangles that might arise, drones of the type shown in Amazon's promotional materials can hardly be called a simple marketing ploy to divert attention from some otherwise critical publicity affecting Amazon or its founder. The huge benefits to Amazon as a universal retailer that might from such a delivery mechanism are stupendous and obvious. If it should prove unfeasible to gain these benefits owing to technological limitations, that is one thing. If regulators should attempt to freeze delivery mechanisms to current forms and bar new ones such as drones, that is yet another thing. Such barriers may prove insuperable and cause the effort to fail. But to accuse Amazon of not being ready, willing, and able to devote even vast resources to the potential use of drones as part of its broader strategy - and instead to be using this as a mere publicity stunt - is, in my view, to miss the obvious. Amazon has a long-term goal of becoming the primary shopping source for millions of consumers across a broad range of products. It wants to leverage technology in ways that help remove the physical-presence advantage used by traditional brick-and-mortar retailers. If it can do so by building vast warehouses and then finding a magic way of delivering products to consumers in ways that better what they can do by visiting the local retail store, why not go for it. And not just go for it but really go for it, with a massive investment of time, energy, and capital with the long-term view of using this strategy to achieve potential exponential growth over competitors.
Whatever else this is, it cannot be mere vaporware. The fact that its announcement may have been accompanied by conventional marketing hype and by what may have even been a cynical deal with news outlets to agree to promote it on a big shopping day only confirms the seriousness of the effort, in my view. People like to get excited about exciting possibilities. Steve Jobs knew that and his way of presenting has become legendary. Mr. Bezos has some of that same flair and, when combined with adept entrepreneurial skills, stands to make an amazing mark in the annals of commerce. He may win in the end or he may lose. But he is going for the big win and he is doing it with flair.
You may like what Amazon is doing or you may hate it but it can't be denied that it is bold, daring, and very real. The author here misses it altogether in suggesting otherwise.