After a 2002 surfing trip to Australia, Nick Woodman was frustrated with the fact that he couldn’t adequately capture his experiences on the waves through film or photographs. The equipment needed to take pictures of him and his friends while they surfed simply wasn’t available to amateur photographers. Determined to be able to capture images of him and his friends surfing, skiing, and motorcrossing, Nick came up with a prototype 35mm camera attached to a wrist strap made from plastic scraps and an old wet suit. He called the camera the Hero because it could get up close to the action and capture an image, making the subject look like an real life action hero. Since then GoPro has become one of the leading names in high quality affordable cameras, specifically cameras that can be worn to give a first person point of view of the world. Today GoPro has sold over 26 million cameras world wide.

As drone photography became more popular, GoPro realized they needed to add to their product lineup. In 2014 they entered negotiations with DJI to build a GoPro branded drone. When this deal fell apart, GoPro approached 3D Robotics to build the drone. Once again, this deal fell apart and GoPro opted to remain in house for the design of the drone. Nearly 2 years after GoPro began working on a drone program they were ready to introduce the world to a GoPro specific drone camera in early 2016. However, more complications pushed the timeline back and it wasn’t until late October, 2016 that GoPro finally released their drone called Karma. The hype behind Karma was tremendous. Customers were expecting the drone to be as superior as the rest of the GoPro lineup. Unfortunately, Karma did not live up to it’s name.

Shortly after it’s release, several customers started complaining about power issues with Karma. In mid flight the drone would suddenly loose power and crash to the ground, even on a fully charged battery. Besides the fact that this resulted in the destruction of an expensive piece of equipment, it posed countless safety concerns. A drone that randomly looses power in mid air can cause serious damage to private and public property, or severely injure people. GoPro quickly recalled any and all Karma drones and fully refunded their customers. By February of 2017, GoPro re-released Karma to the public, fixing the latch that kept the battery in place. Sales were dismal as customers no longer trusted a GoPro drone and the company’s revenue took an $80 million loss. In January 2018, GoPro announced that they would discontinue the Karma drone along with any future drone products. This led to GoPro cutting it’s global workforce by 20%.

Still, GoPro cameras and accessories continued to sell. The line of Hero cameras have become a favorite of photographers looking to attach a camera to an existing drone, like a DJI, Parrot, or hobby drone. By 2019 GoPro sales were climbing again and they were sure the drama from Karma was well behind them. Until customers started having issues with Karma drones at the beginning of the new year. Though the power failure issue had been corrected, there now seemed to be an issue with Karma’s GPS system. A Karma user went onto GoPro’s forum and wrote, “I recently got a karma and am having an issue with compass calibration. For some reason this doesn’t work: As soon as I select compass calibration in the controller, within half a second (not enough time to pick up the drone and start calibrating), I get the message ” calibration failed, try again.” It also gives a message about not being able to calibrate the compass without a GPS signal. I am trying this in a field and had the drone there for at least 10 minutes, and the controller has no problem picking up a GPS signal: it shows my position on the map exactly. Is there a way to see if the drone has a GPS signal? All items have the latest updates installed.”

GoPro quickly responded to the numerous reports of this GPS malfunction. They said they were aware of the situation and that their engineers were working to remedy it as quickly as possible. The problem stemmed from the fact that GoPro never sent out a software update for Karma after discontinuing it in 2018. Much like the Y2K scare 20 years ago, Karma’s GPS was not prepared to rollover for the change of the decade, an issue that most tech companies prepared for well in advance by sending out software updates. In 2019 James Vincent, an AI and Robotics reporter for The Verge, explained it as such, “The rollover issue itself is caused by the fact that GPS systems count weeks using a ten-bit parameter. This means they start counting at week zero and reset when they hit week 1,024. The first count (or “GPS epoch”) started on January 6th, 1980, and the first reset took place on August 21st, 1999. That means the next one is due April 6th this year. When the rollover happens older devices may reset their date, potentially corrupting navigation data and throwing off location estimates. GPS relies on precise timing data to operate, and each nanosecond the clock is out translates into a foot of location error.”

Apparently, GoPro forgot about preparing customers who had purchased Karma drones with the needed firmware updates. The company had originally stated that updates and support for Karma drones would be made available, though they did not say for how long they would be making these updates. By mid January 2020, GoPro finally released the necessary firmware updates that would provide accurate GPS data for Karma drones. GoPro’s venture into the world of drones was nothing but a headache from the start with failed design negotiations to faulty battery latches. Hopefully this latest update will help the company refocus on what they do best, making the cameras that allow people to capture the world in new and imaginative ways.

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