Meet the BRCK
brck.com
brck.com
General Description: The BRCK is a rugged, cloud managed, full-featured router with built in failover and programmable GPIO expansion. BRCK can connect to the internet through RJ47, GSM, Wifi Bridge, as well as Ethernet Over USB via the GPIO Breakout. It’s rugged build and cloud managed interface make it ideal for “away teams”, monitoring systems in remote locations, and businesses with challenging infrastructure. BRCK’s GPIO breakout provides 20 pins for digital and alaouge Read/Write as well as I2C, SPI and UART. This, combined with BRCK’s Arduino Profile, make it ideal for quickly connecting hardware to the Internet of Things.
A pretty picture of your product is not design, it's a dream of a first year art school student who doesn't understand business, who doesn't understand how to send the message and how to describe the product.
Taking BRCK as an example, I see "It's the easiest, most reliable way to connect to the Internet." and some picture suggesting that this is a hardware device. Insufficient. If I page down it gets even more confusing.
I don't think it works as a news brief. I had to read the whole page to figure out what the thing does. Of course, it looks like they're selling it as a black box that makes the Internet happen, so maybe the technical details aren't such a big deal.
The website misses more specific details about how it works, when it will be available and how much it will cost. I can't wait for this thing to hit the market!
I am a target audience for BRCK, and from looking at their page, it's not clear to me at all what it is.
Based on the context, I'm not sure they even meant to say RJ45, since they mention Ethernet over USB elsewhere in the blurb.
edit: They explicitly say 10/100 RJ45 port later, so it's probably just a typo.
http://www.discount-low-voltage.com/Connectivity/Shielded-Pl...
I guess more people value the internet now so naturally RJ is going to rise. ;)
edit: Oh. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070313080701AA...
See, now this is a description that makes me want to own one.
The original (successful) campaign is here on kickstarter:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1776324009/brck-your-bac...
So many product web sites are lacking a simple "how it works" section (I'd say 75%).
It must be a wifi hotspot using cellular data.
I understand what they're trying to get at, but it annoys me to see them say "used in Africa" as if that were functionally equivalent to "used on the Moon." And I'm American! I have to think it'd sound even more tin-eared to someone from an African country.
If it works in Cape Town South Africa, it'll work anywhere.
Seriously, I even looked through specs and still not sure what it does!
This is a hotspot that works anywhere in Africa: http://www.groundcontrol.com/MCD-4800_BGAN_Terminal.htm
USAP vessels?
I blame Bootstrap's "scrolling story" for worsening this problem of late.
So much fun to build as a web dev, so sexy for exec's to check off.
But message gets lost and nobody wants to scroll.
An implementation of the scrolling-style that I respect is https://www.pingdom.com
Strong headline to capture attention, solid paragraph explaining the details and what problem they're solving, and BOOM a "Get Started Now" button to guide me.
Z
The problem is not communicating what your users care about. Thats such a big part of UX, looking at it from a new customers perspective, instead of your own.
1) I want a reliable product... like BRCK .. okay.
2) This product really meets that criteria. Prove it.
3) So, is it useful?
4) Fine. Because of 1..3 I want more detail and to buy one.
For instance with http://gridspy.com (my site)
1) So, why should I monitor (energy usage) at all?
2) Okay, so why GridSpy (not a competitor)...
3) Fine, tell me more about what you do...
4) Lets get started. Give me a quote on some hardware.
It's a process. You can't just lead with (4) because the customer hasn't yet decided that they want your class of product at all.
The BRCK is a rugged, cloud managed, full-featured router
with built in failover and programmable GPIO expansion.
BRCK can connect to the internet through RJ47, GSM, Wifi
Bridge, as well as Ethernet Over USB via the GPIO
Breakout. It’s rugged build and cloud managed interface
make it ideal for “away teams”, monitoring systems in
remote locations, and businesses with challenging
infrastructure. BRCK’s GPIO breakout provides 20 pins for
digital and alaouge Read/Write as well as I2C, SPI and
UART. This, combined with BRCK’s Arduino Profile, make it
ideal for quickly connecting hardware to the Internet of
Things.
But, I bet I'm not alone.
I get that moaning about its design lets you feel smart by participating in the discussion without actually contributing anything meaningful, but at least just upvote a single person for it instead of posting the same damn comment over and over again.
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I like that it seems as open and adaptable as they could possibly make it while also keeping it simple. It would be interesting to see just how rugged it is. I'd also like to see how this could be used in an environment that requires a little less "ruggedness", like a coffee shop or a community board room.
I think the issue here, and we definitely saw this a ton with that Sailfish OS or whatever phone recently (probably fitting that I can't remember what it's called) is with some of these product launches, there is an extremely vague title submitted to HN that gets voted up to the top. There is something alluring about seeing that the community has voted this new thing, whatever it is, as the most important item of the moment. And when we get to the website, we are disappointed and/or annoyed when we can't figure out what exactly this thing is or why it was voted to the top of HN. So we talk about our experience on the website itself, as if it had been presented as a design critique.
The problem with all of those "design critiques" (if they could even be called that) is they derail any discussion about the product itself. As of this comment, three of the top four comments are complaining about the design or structure of the website, with the fourth being mine. You have to scroll halfway down the page to get to anyone talking about the actual product. That's shameful.
Are you ruling out constructive feedback? The difference between subtle, obscure, and obtuse design is not always evident to the designers (or creative teams directing them). Think of what horrors people used to do in the (low-bandwidth) Flash era.
So, so awesome. I hope more hardware companies start doing this.
The first (duplex, it seems in satellite it still makes sense to offer simplex data) modem I found was this: http://www.globalstar.com/shop/index.php?main_page=product_i....
Of course there is no price, and I find it mildly scary that the US sales contact is listed as "USA/Government", not just USA.
This thing has a 20-pin header which they claim includes data connections, but there is no pin-out. There is a PDF (http://www.globalstar.com/en/docs/gsp1720/GSP-1720%20Sell%20...) but it's more of a brochure and doesn't provide a lot of detail.
The bandwidth for data over satellite modems is low enough (10s of kilobits/second) so I guess it seems reasonable to do over GPIO, though.
We recently ran a test of the BRCK up in the far northern reaches of Kenya, where the closest mobile phone tower was 160km away. The only option for internet was satellite, so we hooked up a BGAN terminal and ran that ethernet line into the BRCK to broadcast the signal as WiFi. (more here: http://www.brck.com/2013/11/brck-eclipse-day-7-home-again/)
Nope. I'm an "early-bird" backer of this. The last update on shipping says they've pushed to January.
Apparently, there were complications sourcing the 3G modems they intended to use.
From the update:
"Unfortunately, we live in a world where small, African, tech companies don't have the influence to get global component suppliers to meet our delivery deadlines. In particular, we have been unable to secure a timely supply of the 3G modems that are specified for the BRCK. Although it would seem straightforward to simply switch to another modem, the implications of this change effect mechanical design, board layout, and certification - all things that require time to adjust. We are now working with multiple suppliers to find a suitable alternative that we can source in sufficient supply to meet our production demands."
I am sorry we had to delay the production, we all so badly wanted to get it out on time...
No worries. I backed the project as a great idea that happens to provide a reward, not the other way around and I have no reason to doubt your ability to deliver.
We made the mistake of using anodized aluminium for the front panel of our units. Then it turned out that the current batch of Aluminium our suppliers were using was trash and couldn't be anodized. That took weeks and weeks to design a workaround for and get quotes and stock in. In the end we had to pay for junk aluminium that we threw in the bin.
Then we had an aerial manufacturer who kept shipping us different aerials every time we ordered the same part, which never matched the sample.
Next we discover that the manufacturer who provides our plastic cases had taken a plastic with a certain safety rating but didn't take into account that the dye that they also added changed that rating and prevented us from using the cases. We were in a shed filled with noxious smoke trying to burn cases (which shouldn't burn) over several batches to get that sorted.
And finally we have a RF system that some customers try to use in a faraday cage and of course it's pretty hard to get working. For example installations in industrial coldstores.
Which product? http://gridspy.com/devices.html
Of course effort and time solves these issues but wouldn't it be nice to just have to ship bytes.
Also, for something that apparently involves Africa,[2] the loading speed of that page over my iPad's LTE is shameful.
[1] The paragraph was already in use in English by the time of Beowulf, between the 8th and 11th century.
[2] Apparently. I didn't scroll all the way down.
The overdosing of criticism on the website might have been somewhat justified if the BRCK was a web product. Yes, a simpler single screen presentation would have been much better. We do not need more than 4 comments saying it.
I am really excited about the BRCK's (badass name)fail over technology and wonder and hope it could be deployed to POS and other devices like tablet and phones. Reliability of POSs are really hindering cashless systems here in Nigeria.
Erik, have you spoken to the TECNO chaps or Huawei about licensing this technology? A minibrck* will not be a bad idea for urban areas that prioritize reliability over backup power.
Good stuff guys, I am excited that a pure technical play is coming out from these parts.
*Not sure you saw what I did there. we'll have the BRCK and the brck.
Your phone isn't even close. If you just want to hop online for a short while: No advantage over using your phone, I guess.
Charging: not sure about that one either. Either there is a power source or there isn't?
I will say one funny observation after reading HN for years; I sometimes think I'm the only person here who's ever gone camping or stepped off the asphalt. No other hacker stereotype comes as close to universal as this. All that "never kissed a girl" "don't like sports" has some ring of truth however minimal, but none of it is as almost universally true as "never slept on the ground in a forest". I may very well be the only person here to ever have walked on a hiking trail.
So there's one data point for you. I don't post that much on HN though..
That said, I do like the look of this and will probably try and get hold of one.
The bigger issue is probably not having OS X architected to play nice when you're paying by the byte.
Which would never be the case... Right now no Macs come with any mobile data and I somehow still manage to find them useful. If my MacBook had come with 3G it wouldn't be obsolete now that LTE is the rage, the worst thing that could happen is I would tether with another device like I do now.
I also have a Chromebook and I have to say it's nice not to even think about it--you're just online.
There're two reasons why LTE isn't a panacea to cell standards bifurcation and modern cell phones still require fall-back data radios that support EVDO, HSPA, etc.
http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/17/3g-macbook-pro-auction-pu...
Apple and telecom? I think the picture is pretty clear.
Nice little insult there. Way to start out on the wrong foot with Africans.
PS: Yes I'm actually African, and that pissed me off.
The facts are simple: there are significant parts of Africa that are very sparsely connected to what is commonly available in many (or most) other countries of the world.
I get how this can be somewhat offensive, but I also think the point comes across and isn't directed at the African people.
If it works in Africa, then, objectively, it works in sparsely populated and sparsely connected areas.
If it works in a really nice hotel in Johannesburg, it's working in Africa.
Your point is invalid.
"I was in the middle of the ocean!"
Did you think I was in water? You're wrong. I was on an island that is in the middle of an ocean.
"I stayed in a hotel in New York."
Did you think I rented a hotel room? No, I simply stood in the lobby.
You can't say that because someone says something without constraining it with every detail, that the communicated point is incomplete. Communication is a loose protocol.
According to the site, so are the developers. They built it in response to a problem they actually had... in Africa. I think you're taking this the wrong way.
;-)
Or is this still too soon?
I'd love to know the exact details too but it's unlikely even they will know until at least after the first round of production.
http://hawaiitribune-herald.com/sections/news/world/kenyan-t...
It would be cool to see some form of mesh networking added to this as well.
The design is intended, as most marketing pages are, to capture attention and interest. Scrolling storytelling is a very effective way to do that.
HN readers, in general, are very critical of emotional-impact-based decisions. The truth is, many people respond to things that are 90% aesthetic and 10% functional. Note: Jabberwocky[0]. If you want to dive in deep, you are a part of the crowd that doesn't make impulsive decisions based on marketing. Congratulations - click on the specs link to see an easily readable, fairly cold page.
If you want to make an impact on the majority of people, consider that most people are less concerned with technical details or even descriptive language, and more concerned with how they feel.
But - with shared onboard storage, that's cool... what would be interesting is having a device with, say, 4 radios and sim slots - and people could add in their sim to allow the device to aggregate data use from multiple sims in a torrented manner.
Would it work on open sea?
How useful would it be in a European country with expensive mobile data?
Where can one buy it?
We've got some pictures with it next to computers and on top, or near, other "stuff". That was the idea we were going for in that top header image on the site anyway.
Look like this is a ruggedized GSM/WiFi/Copper hotspot. Like those you buy from china for $20. No satellite access, thats stupid.
If I am to lug this around it better be as light as possible.
The Huawei is already glued together so it's as rugged as you'll get, and it has a microSD slot for disk storage. "Cloud" - every consumer router I've seen has a WAN configure option...
If it's closed-source, can it be flashed with something open?
The BRCK was designed for a different use case. It's designed to allow more connections and to have failovers for poor power and internet connectivity. It also allows you to extend it with both hardware and software of your own making.