Snapchat was the first photo camera app in the world that offered many filters like dog filter. It was launched in 2012 and since then has gained immense popularity and love from all over the world. It reached a high of more than 150 million regular engaged users at one time. Even now, its number of daily active users is growing. To retain its success, the company has launched two hardware products. One was back in 2016, and one was launched recently. Read more about both here.
Image Source- https://www.pixy.com/
The first hardware product by Snapchat,
which changed its name to Snap Inc. in 2016, was Snap Spectacles. It was
launched in 2017. It costs $130 and records video with the push of a button. It
can also sync the movie remotely without even a smartphone, allowing you to
share it with others easily. There is no doubt that the spectacles were a hip
product, but they were also a failure as less than 1% of Snapchat users bought
these glasses.
Pixy- The Flying Selfie Drone
Pixy is a flying selfie drone that's also
the second product released by Snap Inc. The company says that it's a "free-flying
companion" which lets you take photos without a selfie stick. It is
available in the US and France, where drone use is more permissible than in several
other nations like the UK.
Pixy is a self-contained device that can
record video as it flies and wirelessly transfer and save it in the app. After
the flight is concluded, the selfie drone will sit quietly in the palm of your
hand, and you can use it instantly.
The CEO of Snap Inc., Evan Spiegel, has
high hopes for the device. He believes that Pixy might be more successful than
the Snap Spectacles. He said, "After a couple versions of camera glasses,
it just becomes very clear that the market for camera glasses is actually very
small and constrained to people who want that first person POV. I think the
market for Pixy is bigger."
Image Source- https://www.pixy.com/
High Hopes
The hopes for Pixy are also high because
drones are now more popular in the industry and even with the general public.
According to the Managing Director of
Nationwide Drones, Owen Jenkins, "Drone use is already mainstream across
media, cinematography, surveying, and inspection. It can only be expected that
personal drones will become commonplace in society. If it's small, light, and
slow, it's very unlikely to cause damage or injury. I can't see why they won't
be the next smartphone boom."
Though Jenkins expressed concern about Pixy
not having a direct controller, it's not a big issue as it's just 101g and comes
with enclosed propellers which means it is unlikely to cause any damage even if
it went rogue. He said, "It sits comfortably under the 250g limit where
the user laws start to kick in."
Snap Inc. also said that products like Pixy
are "subject to local, state and federal laws about who can fly them, how
and where they should be flown." It also urged potential users to pay
attention to the applicable drone laws in their country/state/city. Read more
about Pixy here.
Sources:
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-61269912
https://www.theverge.com/2022/4/28/23043011/snapchat-pixy-drone-hands-on
https://medium.com/predict/snapchats-latest-production-flying-selfie-drone-542946c903dc