Chumby is dead. Long live Chumby!

It's time to get blogging again. Sure I'm active on Twitter, post those requisite photos of my kids to Facebook, and write more than my fair share of posts on my company's Yammer feed. However, this is where the longer form explaining it all really happens. Recently, happenings in the gadget world got me thinking I need to put on my blogger hat once again.

The Chumby One, running Zurk's Offline Firmware.

Many of you know that I have always held a special place in my heart for the Chumby line of desktop gadgets. Ever since their unveiling back in 2006, I have liked the idea of a simple desktop internet-connected clock/radio/widget device.

Sadly, while the devices sold okay over the years and even spawned versions from Sony and Best Buy, the company shut down in 2012. There are many of reasons for this. I even gave a eulogy of sorts for the Chumby company and outlined some of my own thoughts about what happened. Luckily, one of the former Chumby staffers founders, Duane, kept the Chumby servers running for many months so those of still using our dear old Chumbys could still get our widgets and music streaming.

Then abruptly, though not surprisingly, the Chumby servers shut down recently. This seemed to be the beginning of the actual end of Chumby...but not so fast!

From www.chumby.com:

In January 2013, one of the volunteers initiated an effort to create a company to acquire all of the remaining assets of Chumby Industries for the purpose of maintaining the service. That company, "Blue Octy, LLC", completed the transaction in mid-February.

They created a temporary stub service that will allow the following devices and apps to boot to a clock:

• chumby Classic, chumby One, chumby 8
• Insignia Infocast 3.5" and 8"
• Insignia Connected TV
• WOWbox 3.5" and 8"
• chumby Lite (Android)
• chumby for Sony Tablet S (Android)

The Sony Dash is supported directly by Sony now and no longer runs off the Chumby servers.

Full text of the the Chumby announcement is available on Chumby.com. At this point there is no timeframe for when the full service will be back, but at least you can get a basic clock and even Pandora and other streaming services still seem to work as well.

Alternatively, and what I've decided to do with my Insignia Infocast 3.5" and Chumby One, is to run Zurk's Offline Firmware for Chumby. This runs off a USB stick to insert into the device and you can customize the widgets and settings using XML files as well as Zurk's very cool browser-based dashboard.

I am both anxious and excited to see what happens next. While I still expect my Chumbys to become expensive paperweights one day, I do not think that is going to happen just yet.

Chumby is dead. Long live Chumby!

RIP Chumby

Today I am taking a short break from the Scrum for SharePoint series to cover another topic near and dear to my heart.

The Insignia Infocast 3.5 by Best Buy
(similar to the Chumby One).

Way back in the mid-2000s, before we had the iPhone or Android or even webOS, a little company named Chumby appeared on the scene with a neat gadget that was going to replace your clock radio with something much cooler. Prototypes of the Chumby came out in 2006 and 2007, and the first widely-available consumer version was released in 2008. I was very excited to see the Chumby appear on the scene, in part because I was sad that the 3Com (Palm) Audrey had failed so miserably back in 2000.

It's hard to remember, but back in 2008, there was not much out there like the Chumby. The iPhone and Android operating systems were relatively new and still gaining traction. There were zero consumer grade tablets available on the market. Even with the iPhone and Android out there, they were geared towards phone devices. There were definitely no clock radio gadgets to compete with Chumby. So theoretically, the Chumby had a good chance to succeed.

The Chumby is not a tablet and it is not a phone or iPod-like device. It really has no equivalent out there in the world. It is first and foremost an internet clock radio. Think of your old Sony Dream Machine, add in the likes of Pandora and Shoutcast internet music and podcast services, and add the ability to change the clock face to one of hundreds of different options. That is a Chumby.

There are other things a Chumby can do, like display news feeds, Facebook, Twitter, internet web cams, and more. Yet at its core, the Chumby is a clock radio that can get live content from the internet.

My boys really enjoy the Sony Dash. We have it
in our dining room.

I bought a Chumby One for my dad in 2009. At first, he didn't know what to do with it, but over time he came to appreciate the different clocks faces to choose from and its ability to play Pandora and other internet music services.

I got my first "Chumby" in 2010 when I picked up a Sony Dash for a relatively good price. However, even though I got a "deal" at the time, price was one of Chumby's downfalls: the Dash list price was $200 at the time--I think I got my for a "steep discount" at $150--and the Chumby-branded units were not much cheaper.

The Dash was a step up from the Chumby, as it had internet video as well. You could (and can still) get Netflix, YouTube and Hulu Plus video, among other choices. So it was worth a slight premium over the much smaller Chumby One (3.5" screen vs. 7" screen), but still a bit expensive for what you got.

We have installed the Insignia Infocast 3.5 in our master
bathroom media station.

Later in 2010 I picked up Best Buy's Insignia branded version of the Chumby One, the Infocast 3.5. This time I got it for under $45 and had a $25 gift card to boot. Now that was a deal. Under $50 would have been the perfect price point to allow the Chumby to be more successful.

Alas, regular prices didn't get much lower than $100, most people didn't understand why they needed one in addition to their iPhones and iPads, and therefore not many units were sold. In 2011 Sony stopped making the Dash. Around that time Best Buy also stopped making the Infocast line. Later in the year, Chumby itself stopped making hardware as well, leaving the Chumby platform flailing around a little bit without much support. The company said they were going to focus on a connected TV platform, but nothing much came of it.

Just the other day, Chumby announced that the whole team had moved on to new things at Technicolor and that there was no one left at Chumby to turn the lights off.

The Chumby network is still up and running--for now--but much like what happened to services like ReplayTV, it could be shut off at any time. This leads to one of my ongoing concerns with this particular platform: it is 100% dependent on having a network connection to work at all. Without a WiFi or optional Ethernet connection, a Chumby is essentially worthless. There isn't even a way to boot up a Chumby in to a disconnected mode. The thing just stops at the "Connecting to Network" screen and gives up.

(As an aside, there are some ways to run some Chumby devices offline. One example is: Zurk's Chumby One/Infocast 3.5 firmware and Zurk's Infocast/Chumby 8 firmware.)

Another issue was the app platform: all Chumby apps were free and had to be build on the Adobe Flash platform. While that worked well enough for the most part, there are two issues with it: no way for developers to make any money, and somewhat limiting of a platform. The Chumby is based on a modified Linux kernel, but won't run regular Linux or Android apps without major modifications. So it's a relatively closed platform.

I guess even back in 2008 we could see the writing on the wall, but I still had high hopes that a device dedicated to being an internet clock radio could survive. I still think there is a place for a Chumby-like device, with some tweaks to the platform. Using a phone or tablet as a stationary clock or radio is not always practical or economical. Sure, as an individual I can use my Android phone as an alarm or an iPad as a Pandora music player, but what about family or group situations? Sometimes a dedicated device is useful.

Maybe something else will come about to take Chumby's place? Or Chumby will get picked up by another company and the legacy will continue? I can only hope.

UPDATE: Chumby is dead. Long live Chumby!

WardworksTech: Why I love the Sony Dash

The other day I was listening to my favorite podcast, Buzz Out Loud, and Molly Wood mentioned that she finally bought herself a Sony Dash when it was a Gold Box special on Amazon for $99. I was excited that she finally came around to check it out! Then, sadly, a few days later she mentioned she is already having second thoughts about the Dash and may send it back.

I obviously respect Molly's opinion--I will admit the Dash is not for everyone--but I wanted to make a case for why the Dash, and its cousins the Chumby and (Best Buy) Insignia Infocast series, are worthwhile Internet-connected devices. Here is why I love the Sony Dash.

I think the Dash, Chumby, Insignia Infocast are misunderstood. They are not tablet alternatives or smartphone replacements. They are gadgets that act as clock radio replacements that include widgets, local and Internet music and video, and photos. They are meant to be passive internet viewers with only basic input ability. Yes, they have so-so capacitive touchscreens. Yes, they have virtual keyboards. Yes, you can check your email and post to Twitter. These use cases are not the strengths of these devices.

The strengths of these devices is in their relative (I must emphasize relative) simplicity. They have alarm clocks, access to Internet radio like Pandora and/or Slacker, ability to play local or streaming audio and video (including Netflix and Hulu Plus on the Dash), and can act as digital photo frames with content from Flickr and Facebook. They can all use the Chumby application store to add additional widgets like stylish clocks, world photo viewers, news feeds, Twitter, Facebook, Google Calendar, and weather apps. They do these tasks well, with (mostly) simple controls, and usually just work as advertised. Nothing more, nothing less.

You could use a smartphone or iPad in a similar way, but then you lose use of the other functions on the device while it is docked. Those devices are also much more expensive. The Dash is a dedicated device, hands off for the most part, just sitting there and doing its job. It's like having a Roku to watch Netflix vs. hooking your laptop to your TV every time you want to watch a movie. The latter will work, but it's a pain and you lose access to your other programs when it's being tethered.

I got my Dash a little after it came out last year and have loved it ever since. Now my 4-year old son loves it too. He's figured out the basic touchscreen controls and knows how to set it to show his favorite clock, the RoboClock, full screen. I got my brother--someone who's not a gadget freak like me--one for Christmas and he loves it. I recently picked up the Insignia Infocast 3.5" for $40 over Christmas and I love that too. I even got myself the Chumby app for Android, and happily play my Chumby Clocks channel on my HTC Evo when it's not in use.

Now to the reality of the business world. The Chumby and Dash are probably not being marketed very well, and their pricing is also not ideal. I've always said these devices should be in the sub-$100 range for them to take off and really be worth the money. The Dash is finally hovering around that price point right now, and the Infocast 3.5" is well under that (I picked one up on sale for $40 during Christmas and now they're back to around $70).

They are devices that no one needs and do not compare to much of anything else available at the moment, but once you get one and learn it's sweet spot of usage (clock, picture viewer, radio, passive widgets), they are quite fun devices.

Finally, others have written about the Dash with similar thoughts, particularly Dave Zatz of Zatz Not Funny. Dave has even covered the upcoming refresh of the Dash platform, something I have been looking forward to. I think Chumby and Sony have created a good platform for a passive Internet device and I am looking forward to updates and improvements that may expand this to a wider audience. We shall see if it works, or if it becomes the 3Com Audrey of the 2010s.