Is there a viable alternative for EU customers that are sensible about the geopolitical aspects of this?
I also looked at some open source firmware, but didn't find anything particularly appealing. e.g. [0]
I don't own one, just a fun little DJI Mini 2, but it's only a matter of time.
The US isn't the EU, but I have negative trust in DJI (that is, I assume they're doing dastardly things with their huge firehose of data) and figure Skydio has a reputation to maintain if they want to differentiate, so neutral and even slightly positive.
I hope Skydio learns from Apple that privacy is something consumers who don't want the cheapest Chinese model of something demand, and does a better and more consistent job of delivering it.
I had been searching for it on YouTube thinking it was a DJI video, I’m fairly sure it was, hence me not finding it.
Does any company make an indoor capable drone that can fly a fixed path (through a house). It does not really matter how fast it is, and it does not need to be a strong drone.
"All" I want is to walk through a house with a drone, capturing the video and then have it repeat the same path over and over again autonomously. I don't even care about obstacle avoidance beyond the most basic "stop if you can't move to the next point"
Ring Always Home Cam | Flying indoor cam with multiple perspectives, custom flight paths, and In-Flight Live View
I would buy the version of that drone which doesn't immediately make me think of Ubik, though.
The market is huge and bewildering and I don't put a lot of time into keeping up, though. If there's not something in this niche, there will be.
The reasons why I would like something like the Avata are:
* I want something that does not rely on Wifi but has their own transmission system (DJI is really top of the market here) because it should fly around a two story house where I can't guarantee coverage
* and I don't want to deal with switching networks (the goal will be switching between multiple houses and flying the route recorded for that specific house)
* and a better camera (the Tello is a toy camera). I would go for adding a naked GoPro but that's a hack
* and if all stars align, something that has indoor path following already built in
edit: Ohh, you work for skydio, I should've guessed. I wish you and your team a successful spam campaign.
There's no need to be nasty. They were just asking if you thought copying the market leader was a good idea. Personally I'd pay more for the Made in the USA product if it has the features I need (not necessarily the "most" features)
This also means anyone can use the SDK DJI created to run their own drones. If I get a lot of time I might be tempted, though my drone will probably die to my code..
All the parts are going to come from there anyway...
Collecting photo and video footage combined with GPS data without the explicit consent of the owner would be the biggest one, IMO. That would be a great way to build maps of areas that aren't visible from satellites, or to get more detailed imagery than a satellite, or to build full 3D maps of areas using photogrammetry or similar.
Just the GPS data could also be very useful, as it would be a map of the space that drones are likely to be able to fly through. If someone has a 3D map of areas where consumers successfully flew drones, seems like that would make it much easier to send semi- or fully-autonomous drones through there too, if the area were of interest. The US Navy has a problem with mystery drones surveilling their ships, so it seems reasonable to assume that folks are doing the same with sensitive facilities on land. Maybe it would even be useful for plotting flight routes for cruise missiles, so they can stay as close to the ground as possible?
Capturing wifi access point information, like some mapping companies have done, could be beneficial to an organization that doesn't have traditional mapping vehicles. Same for any other radio signals that the device can pick up.
All of that is more or less passive, with the exception of sending the data somewhere. There are a lot more options if the manufacturer is willing to be more aggressive and risk someone noticing that their products are behaving oddly.
And it could also ask for photos near locations where Chinese dissidents or their family members live.
1) drone is flying in Ukraine?
2) motor amperage is higher than normal (probably carrying a grenade)?
If 1 and 2, return to takeoff point and drop the grenade
Not that I could trust an US or EU product to be less invasive of users privacy; if we don't want products that phone home we must make them by ourselves. Not an easy task, however, especially wrt undocumented chipsets running tight closed firmware.
For example, I have Huawei headphones, but did not download their app. Even with bad intent, there should be no way they can 'phone home' over regular BLE, through my device's default audio drivers.
Same for a password app that doesn't have internet access allowed or a WiFi device that's on a closed network (only works if they don't need cloud to function of course).
Perhaps this kind of isolation is not possible for a DJI, maybe because they have 3G or (need) WiFi on board or in the app that's connected to the world? The further away this need is from the core usage, the easier it may be to 'block' or replace it with something 'Western'.
There's tons of great open source flight controller software out there - ardupilot, inav, betaflight, etc. I'm wondering what you didn't find particularly appealing about them?
If I were a Ukrainian DJI pilot I'd be worried about China doing Russia a favor by releasing a firmware update with this logic:
1) drone is flying in Ukraine?
2) motor amperage is higher than normal (probably carrying a grenade)?
If 1 and 2, just return to takeoff point and drop the grenade
Does that mean they can run the metadata through machine learning and save all the video their filter decides is interesting?
That sounds like it has geopolitical aspects whether they're doing it right now or not.
Instead, putting that same money into a corporation from a place where privacy is valued and there isn't a direct benefit to the state is best in my opinion. All of these little micro-choices add up in the long run.
I think, if you value personal freedom and rule of law instead of rule by law, you need to stop funneling money into the Chinese economy.
Surely a company in Taiwan could be competitive in this space?
[1]https://taskandpurpose.com/news/marine-corps-long-range-unma...
I'm of the opinion technology can move too fast, and giving money to DJI is fuelling that fire.
That won't be a Mavic, but that's european, and really not bad.
Open source would be PX4, Ardupilot and BetaFlight, pretty much. But there you need to build your own frame.
https://parrotpilots.com/threads/parrot-anafi-is-made-in-chi...
People here care if it's a Chinese company or not.
It's like a reverse "what if China invades Taiwan and takes TSMC".
https://www.seafarerfunds.com/prevailing-winds/party-committ...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/technology/who-owns-huawe...
https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/29/the-disappeared-china-r...
So if you were one of these people and some jamoke was flying one of these drones around your area I'd imagine that would have a profoundly negative effect on your psyche. Which is one of the reasons I'd never fly a DJI drone. I'd expect there's a potential that the drone is feeding back track and positioning data w\ imagery to a "service".