Gadgetory

while it remains to be seen whether the general population can be trusted not to fly drones into the White House the age of the drone is here and there's no turning back there's too much money at stake and it's not coming from hobbyists it's coming from big business commercial drones flown by licensed accountable companies will transform the way business is done around the world so let's go beyond the toys with the top five industries that are already being transformed by drones starting off at number five journalism whether it's covering the front lines of the battlefield or the red carpet of the Oscars journalists and news agencies are increasingly using drones they're like a news helicopter for a fraction of the price and because they're autonomous all they need are some GPS coordinates and they can be on the scene before a reporter can even load up the van at number four mapping whether you're surveying a construction site or creating a 3d map of cheap sunita the high-resolution cameras in the sensors being packed into drones can capture an insane amount of data from their environment imagine an architect or an engineer being able to watch the daily progress of a building being constructed halfway around the world with a 3d model that they can zoom around that's pretty cool and it's already here coming in at number three transportation not for people but for our stuff though you could make the argument that self-driving cars are type of drum for aerial drones transportation of goods can go two ways in fact your heavy payloads using big expensive drones we're seeing the military already doing this to supply soldiers in the field with unmanned full-size helicopters that can carry up to 6,000 pounds and then you've got your last mile deliveries of small goods your Amazon diaper delivery service or as we're already seeing bags of crystal matter which brings us to number two law enforcement aside the leading counter drones to take down Heisenberg helicopters expect to see more local police and security firms use drones for monitoring and first responding in one way it's kind of cool to know that if you're in trouble a police drone could reach you in minutes or scare the punks off your lawn but on the other hand the buzzing sky full of police video camera sounds like an Orwellian nightmare either way it's time to bring your pot farm indoors unless of course your farm is legit because the number one industry is set to be transformed by drones its farming and I mean real farms everything from organic beat farms to big Agri ranches and livestock even fish farms drones have already proven useful for monitoring crop growth chlorophyll density soil quality even counting livestock populations just crazy amount of data on big stretches of farmland allowing farmers to make smarter decisions and more food for us so there you go five industries that are poised to be transformed by the use of commercial drones many of which are already getting started but that's just my opinion let me know what you think send me a message on Twitter I'm at Donald and for more top fives like this visit top-5 cnet.com I'm Donal Bell thanks for watching you