Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees • Hacker News Board

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#11

Post by dr_ » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:22 PM UTC

krschultz wrote: post #9

I really think the GoPro killed them. If I want good quality video, I need something better than a Flip. If I need a durable, small, device for getting some OK video, I'll get a goPro. If I need OK video quality and don't care about durability, I'll use my smart phone. When I'm out skiing, I see half the teenagers with GoPro's mounted on their helmets, their ski poles, chest harnesses etc video taping each other hitt…

Mmmm...I think it's more likely all the smartphones out there that now have decent enough video capabilities for most people.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#12

Post by RBr » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:24 PM UTC

Really? We're surprised by this?

Camera phones with video recording capabilities are almost ubiquitous. More then that, they're cheaper and solve the primary usage case better then the portable Flip cameras do. Flip cameras provided better quality portable video and now that embedded mobile technology has caught up to that quality, justifying the price to carry around another device is difficult.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#13

Post by xinsight » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:26 PM UTC

Did the HD video capability of mobile phones (e.g. iPhone 4) kill the Flip? If so, this has happened before; Pure Digital's first product was a cheap point-and-shoot camera that you'd take in for processing, but it was also beaten by the rise of (equally poor quality) cellphone cameras.

Interesting take-away from a user experience perspective. A dedicated device that is famously easy to use, still loses out to more complicated devices that do everything.

History of Pure Digital and Flip:

http://techcrunch.com/2009/03/19/flip-video-wrong-wrong-wron...

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#14

Post by metageek » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:27 PM UTC

savrajsingh wrote: post #5

Wow, flip appeared and disappeared fast. I wonder how the camcorder makers feel.

The product lasted 5 years (though with a name change).

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#15

Post by akent » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:31 PM UTC

brown9-2 wrote: post #10

I wonder if the executives who spent $590 million on Pure Digital will also get a pink slip?

Did that acquisition EVER make any sense?

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#16

Post by bennesvig » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:32 PM UTC

RBr wrote: post #12

Really? We're surprised by this? Camera phones with video recording capabilities are almost ubiquitous. More then that, they're cheaper and solve the primary usage case better then the portable Flip cameras do. Flip cameras provided better quality portable video and now that embedded mobile technology has caught up to that quality, justifying the price to carry around another device is difficult.

The iPod touch even has pretty good recording features and the ability to take photos, which Flip cameras cant.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#17

Post by josephb » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:33 PM UTC

callumjones wrote: post #2

Woah, couldn't they at least try to sell it?

You would imagine they would try to sell it off.

They may have already and failed.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#18

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:34 PM UTC

dr_ wrote: post #11

krschultz wrote: post #9

I really think the GoPro killed them. If I want good quality video, I need something better than a Flip. If I need a durable, small, device for getting some OK video, I'll get a goPro. If I need OK video quality and don't care about durability, I'll use my smart phone. When I'm out skiing, I see half the teenagers with GoPro's mounted on their helmets, their ski poles, chest harnesses etc video taping each other hitt…

Mmmm...I think it's more likely all the smartphones out there that now have decent enough video capabilities for most people.

[deleted]

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#19

Post by xinsight » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:35 PM UTC

daniel_reetz wrote: post #7

Imagine if they had bothered to put an ethernet jack on it, or wifi in it, or made it time-lapse capable out of the box. Or made the whole thing USB-stick-sized. There are so many things you can do with cheap cameras that you can't do with an expensive camera phone - the problem here is a total lack of vision. (and yeah, I'm aware of IP cams, and their wretched ActiveX-only interfaces, and their price range, and they…

I agree, they could have gone in a lot of directions with an inexpensive camera. I guess the problem was that Cisco wanted the mainstream market - and they weren't going to go after the various niche markets like: timelapses, infrared, fast shutter cams (e.g. skateboarding tricks), sport cams (e.g. mountain biking, longboarding)...

Or maybe Cisco didn't want any competition for their line of rather plain, low-quality home security IP cameras.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#20

Post by brianbreslin » Tue, Apr 12, 2011, 1:39 PM UTC

akent wrote: post #15

brown9-2 wrote: post #10

I wonder if the executives who spent $590 million on Pure Digital will also get a pink slip?

Did that acquisition EVER make any sense?

well the logic was the following (I'm assuming): video requires tons of bandwidth, more video out there means more bandwidth requirements. Where are cisco's cash cows? in routers/exchange devices.