Gadgets: Karotz / Nabaztag

Introducing Nabaztag

“Nabaztag” (apparently “bunny” in Armenian language) is a product originally released by the small French company Violet, I think in (or around) 2005.

It’s a fun little fellow that connects to the Internet and interacts with the user in a variety of ways. It can dictate incoming e-mails, Twitter updates of your friends, world news, the local time and it can also playback small MP3 files that people send to it. Also, it features some LEDs that can light up in various colors. The ears of the bunny are motorized, they can move in all kinds of directions. One application for the ears was that you could turn the ears of your bunny yourself manually, and that other Nabaztags that would be connected to yours will move their ears automatically in the same position.

Nabaztag version 2: Nabaztag:tag

In 2006 the second version nicknamed Nabaztag:tag was released, this time a passive RFID-reader was added to it (the new bellybutton!). Via Violet’s website you could program your bunny to react differently to different RFID tags, I believe one example was that you could let your bunny read the news when you held your RFID tag next to the bunny. These tags were available in small colored “stamp”-format  (neatly called “zstamps”) and in bigger bunny format (“nano:ztag”). Hardware-wise it featured a more standard audiochip. Finally, I believe very basic voice recognization was introduced for the first time (as far as I know this feature hardly works at all though). Violet promised a lots of new functionality via their website.

Frequently crashing servers

Technically speaking the Nabaztag is basically a simple, “dumb” product. It can playback incoming audio streams that are sent by Violet’s servers and react to a variety of other incoming messages (to turn on/off LEDs and move the ears in specific positions), so basically the intelligence of the bunny is controlled fully by Violet’s servers, including the text-to-speech synthesis. Without an Internet connection it is basically a silent, static piece of plastic.

Unfortunately this became a huge problem for Violet, which was a small company. As more and more users got their bunny their servers struggled more and more, resulting in failure of new bunny registrations, non-functional bunnies or very long service delays (for example it could take hours before the bunny finally responded to a simple request, IF it responded at all). Also many promised applications never materialized and if they did, they contained lots of bug or were unusable because of the heavy server payload problems. At one point Violet announced that they will be charging money (I’ve read about US$6) per month subscription for all but the most basic services and that the amount of messages would be limited to 15 per month for non-paying users… this news didn’t fare too well with the existing users of the rabbit. It didn’t happen though.

To their credit, Violet did release a simple web-based API, so programmers could easily send their own commands to the Violet server which would interpret the command and send the command to the specific Nabaztag. This opened a lot of possibilities and was, according to my small research, quite stable.

Open-source server alternatives

In 2007 an “unofficial” open-source project OpenNab was released by an individual developer, that made it possible for people to set up their own servers that the Nabaztag can connect to. It includes all kinds of plugins that duplicate functionality of apps. offered by Violet. Originally OpenNab could connect to Violet’s servers as well (so you had both of best worlds), but this functionality stopped working after Violet heavily changed their backend. It requires a server with Apache and PHP, but it seems it’s not to be in active development anymore, as of this writing the last released version is from 2007.

There’s also a project called OpenJabNab, a newer C++/PHP based server, but at this time only available in source-form.

Violet in serious trouble

According to some reports Violet changed their server infrastructure somewhere in 2009 switching from a proprietary technology to the more open XMPP-protocol (XML-based Instant Messenger format), I’d guess they hoped they would be able to scale better on the long term. This resulted in new bugs and temporary server rageouts.

In late 2009 Violet declared for bankruptcy, I think the internal problems and the serious economical problems worldwide were too much for them to handle both at the same time. It has been the sad tale of a small company with not enough resources to keep their good ideas going. This could have been the end of the Nabaztag… but luckily another company saw the potential. French company Mindscape stepped in and saved the bunnies…

Nabaztag version 3: Karotz

In 2010 they announced “Karotz”, the next-generation version 3 rabbit. The new owners said in a blog post they found the Nabaztag name too hard to pronounce and searched for a more easily remembered name and finally chose “Karotz”, dropping the Nabaztag and Violet brandnames completely.

The cool thing is that Mindscape seems to be very serious and dedicated to make Karotz a winner. They have a very active English blog, where new posts are posted almost daily. Even designers are posting very detailed posts.

As of this writing I have learned about the following:

• Karotz will be released in March 2011
• It will make use of a completely new web server architecture
• It will feature completely new hardware… more powerful processor, more memory, a webcam, a better microphone and an USB port. It still has a built-in RFID reader and motorized ears. It is still compatible with the funky colored ears that Violet used to sell separately.
• ..and completely new operating system and software (now Linux-based) inside
• Extensive multimedia support: it will be able to playback internet radio stations and will even be able to playback MP3 from the built-in USB port.
• For software developers, like me, perhaps the best news is that it will support two different kinds of custom applications: applications can run directly on the hardware thanks to the integrated V8 Javacsript engine (with user-configurable security access per application, you probably don’t want all applications have access to the internal webcam or microphone!). Just like Nabaztag, Karotz will also be fully controllable via a simple web-service based API.
• Thanks in part to the new microphone, Karotz owners will be able to call and talk directly to other Karotz owners (so use the Karotz as a virtual internet phone). Perhaps even cooler, Mindscape promised apps for iPhone and Android phone owners so smartphone-users can call Karotz owners. Apps for other smartphones are considered.
• It will support for more wireless encryption technologies, this time it will support: WEP, WPA and WPA2 (Nabaztag version 1 only supported WEP and Nabaztag:tag (version 2) only WEP and WPA). The new Karotz will also support wired ethernet for the first time via an optional accessory that connects to its USB port.

For owners of the original Nabaztag, Mindscape kept the original Violet server architecture on-line to this day, but they announced on their official blog that they still have lots of technical difficulties with Violet’s original server architecture (famous server outrages) and decided they will abondon it completely in early 2011. They will NOT abandon the original Nabaztag owners though. They will basically create an “invisible” adapter where the Nabaztag connects to, that in turn is connected to the new Karotz servers. Not all old Violet features will be available, but it is not known yet which ones will not make it. Due to hardware restrictions I guess it would not be able to make use of many new Karotz features, but Mindscape suggested that it might adopt a few new features along the way. I think owners of the old Nabaztag should be grateful that Mindscape is going to put great effort in keeping their bunnies working. Oh, and they are promising that developers will be able to make use of API’s too for the good old Nabaztag.

Of course we must wait to see if Mindscape will be able to keep their promises (Violet was known for making lots of promises…) and keep the system stable on the long-term. Mindscape seem to be serious though and I love their unheard of openness on their official blog and will definitely keep an eye on this project and plan to update this section of my site accordingly regularly.

By the way, if you think it’s childish for a 30-something old writing enthusiastically about a plastic bunny, I will quote a small bit of a Karotz blog post:

“In February we released a survey that allowed us to rework our commercial strategy (positionning, targets, objectives, etc.) Only for information: 62% of Nabaztag owners are men, among these 44% are between 26 and 35 years old, 73% would suggest Nabaztag to a friend, and more than 50% personalised their Nabaztag with earz or home made costumes… and they also have accessories, mostly Nanoztags.”

Thanks Mindscape for sharing that info I feel much better now

I’ve read that the Karotz will cost about 200 euro’s, which is quite steep for a gadget (I expected it to be a bit less expensive), so they better take their time to get it right from the beginning. Bad early reviews could potentially ruin its success. There will be an upgrade offer for existing Nabaztag owners by the way.

I did not own either a Nabaztag (or a Karotz obviously, as it is not for sale yet) while writing this. I will update this article where necessary when I will.