Whistle's PR Department Won't Talk To Me

Almost two months ago, Whistle announced their new GPS tracker, Whistle 3. As a Whistle 2 user, I immediately had questions. First, I tried their Facebook page. Many dog companies are happy to interact with their customers and fans through social media. I asked them my pile of questions, and the social media team responded the next day. They said they had forwarded my questions to their public relations department, and I could expect a response within a few days.

Nothing.

I waited 2.5 weeks for a response and then messaged Whistle via Facebook again. They apologized and said they'd send along my info to the PR team again. 

Two weeks later, I contacted them yet again. I was told to email the press department directly with my questions. It's been two  weeks since I emailed press@whistle.com, and I have yet to receive a reply.

Their unwillingness or inability to answer basic questions about their new product makes it difficult to compare to both their existing product and to other options on the market.

The Questions

1. Does Whistle 3 use 3G cellular networks? Does Whistle 2 use 3G cellular networks?
2. Is there any incentive for Whistle 2 users to upgrade? (Pod claims to offer a discount for existing users wanting to upgrade.)
3. Could an existing Whistle 2 subscription plan be transferred to the new device? If I purchased a 12-month subscription in December, would I have to buy a whole new plan for Whistle 3? Would my Whistle 2 plan be refunded?
4. Does Whistle 3 offer a virtual leash or temperature monitoring? What features does it have that Whistle 2 doesn't?

Those just don't seem like tough questions to me. Either Whistle is lacking in the customer service department, or their PR people don't actually know enough about the product to answer. What do you think?

Dog Tech: Failed Smart Collars

I first read about "smart collars" before "wearables" was even a buzzword, before smart watches and FitBits were everywhere. They sounded AMAZING. Also, EXPENSIVE. I can't remember the first technological marvel I read about, but I do remember that it was supposed to be priced around $300. That may have been ten years ago, I'm pretty sure it was before we all had smart phones and smart everything else. Before the days of crowdfunding. Simpler times.

Just a regular dumb collar.
Photo by Erin Koski

I don't know if either of those "smart collars" actually made it to market. They were both supposed to monitor your dog's heath and activity, but I don't think they included GPS tracking. Since then, the world of wearables has expanded exponentially, and the idea of a smart collar that can monitor, track, and locate your dog has become much more reasonable. So has the price point for such technology. Crowdfunding is now a realistic way to get your dream project off the ground too, which opens up the doors for small startups and individuals with vision.

Unfortunately, not every dream becomes reality, and while delving into the world of pet wearables I've encountered a surprising number of failed products. Let's take a look!

Dogtelligent

Dogtelligent was an ambitious Indiegogo project to develop a Connected Collar. Features included an ultrasonic whistle noise, remotely triggered vibration, virtual fence and leash options, tracking, temperature monitoring, and bark control, all with 14 days of battery life, for under $200. It got a lot of press, and was originally set to ship in November of 2015. Then the ship date got pushed back to September of 2016. Finally the entire project was abandoned after two years, despite raising $136,332 from nearly a thousand backers.

What went wrong? It seems the project started with a really big idea, and all of the funding went towards development. Dogtelligent failed to secure funding for actual production. I'm told that a company needs to produce something like 20,000 units to get the best price for components and stuff. Unfortunately, many of the backers were led to believe that there was already a developed product, and they were just funding production, so there are a whole lot of angry would-be Dogtelligent customers.

Voyce

Voyce was a health monitor collar designed to collect diagnostic data like heart rate and respiration, Tracking was not one of its features. This one actually made it to market, and began shipping in early 2015. It included the ability to interface with veterinary software. The collar cost around $300, and required a $10 monthly subscription fee,
What went wrong? Voyce shut down in December of 2016 after failing to make any kind of profit. People weren't buying it. I suspect the price and the subscription fee turned a lot of people off. As many have mentioned, human activity trackers don't require a subscription fee.

Zazu PetLink

Zazu PetLink was supposed to be a sleek, small, brightly-colored tracker and health monitor. They planned to offer a very different sort of subscription, paid on demand and only when you needed it. Despite having over 1000 preorders by summer of 2015, the company appears to have missed their April 2016 ship date. Their Facebook page has not been updated since then, and the company website is still announcing an April 2016 ship date and accepting preorders.

What went wrong? This company is based in Colombia, and I haven't found anything explaining their dropping off the face of the earth. There might be some sources that I haven't found because they aren't in english.

PetTronix RomEO Seekr

 The PetTronix RomEO Seekr was a GPS collar with a handheld tracking device and no subscription fee. It offered active tracking and a virtual leash, and did not require a cellular signal to work. It looks like they had a successful product, and were planning to release an updated one.
What went wrong? I have no idea what is wrong with this company, but they missed their spring 2016 release date, and are no longer responding to people on social media.

Beagard Activity Collar

Beagard was an activity monitor collar that could run for months on a single battery. The collar interacted with a smart phone app. The company was supposedly running a prototype and was ready to start manufacturing completed units in 2015.

What went wrong? It looks like the Beagard Indiegogo campaign only attracted six backers.

Those are my favorite failed pet wearables. There are a few more that may or may not come to fruition, but I've learned not to hold my breath. Have you heard of any others?

Dog Tech: Whistle Pet Tracker

Zip has been wearing her Whistle Pet Tracker for almost two weeks now, and it has been an interesting experience. This is the oldest dog wearable on the market, and the first one I've owned. Originally known as Tagg, this product finally gave dog owners the ability to track their dogs in real time.

The dog wearables market has lagged a bit behind human wearables, but not by much. FitBit has been around since 2008, Tagg came out in 2011, and smartwatches didn't really take off until 2013. They're not terribly different, either. Both human and dog wearables can track activity and location, and primarily interact with your smartphone. For some reason though, most pet wearables require a monthly subscription cost. This seems weird to me, my Moto360 works without a monthly fee.

Note that this screenshot taken at 4:18 pm
showing activity had not been logged since
approximately 8:00 am.

Anyway, the Whistle is performing approximately as expected. It keeps track of Zip's activity and location in a fairly accurate and fun manner. It gives me her average amount of time spent active each day, and sends me a weekly report comparing her activity to similar dogs. (Spoiler alert: Zip is more active than the average young border collie.) Since this is my first dog tech review, I wanted to identify some key factors with which to compare the Whistle to other smartcollar devices. Here's what I came up with:

Cost: $60+montly fee
I purchased my Whistle tracker on Amazon for $60. It requires a monthly fee of $10. There is a discount for buying an entire year of service, however that appears to be non-refundable according to various reviews. I am not yet certain I want to use the device for an entire year, so I am paying month-to-month.

• Initial Purchase Price: $60
• After 1 Year: $190
• After 2 Years: $310
• After 3 Years: $430

Accuracy: Decent
Whistle is reasonably accurate when it updates the tracker. An "Active Tracking" session only updates on her location every 3 minutes though. We've done a couple of tracking sessions on hikes with Zip running off leash, so far I've determined that the app and device could probably get me within shouting distance if she was lost. If there was some reason she couldn't come when I called, I don't know if I'd be able to find her. If she was actively running away from me, it probably wouldn't help very much at all. A dog can run pretty far in three minutes. However, when I initiate a tracking session, it inevitably reports her as being a mile away before reporting her actual location.

Coverage: Not sure yet
So far I've only tried tracking Zip in places with decent cellular signal. The app has been able to find the tracker and give me Zip's approximate location within a couple of minutes.

Safe Zone: Big, round, and static
Whistle's safe zone is defined by its base station, the user can set an acre-sized or large circular Whistle Zone. The zone cannot be smaller, and the shape cannot be changed. Setting an additional zone requires an additional base station. There is no option to set a mobile safe zone, and the app does not seem to know how far my phone is from the tracker.

Notifications: Many, some untimely
I could change this, but currently I get an email, text message, and push notification from the app every time Zip and I leave the Whistle Zone. I get a text message and a push notification every time we return to the Whistle Zone, and it also blows up my phone every time the tracker needs charging or is fully charged, and every three minutes during a tracking session. It's great, there is no way I could possibly miss something going wrong. However, the time it takes to inform me that Zip has left the Whistle Zone varies between fifteen minutes and an hour. Again, precision is not Whistle's forte.

Battery Life: 5-7 days
Surprisingly, the Whistle battery has lasted several days at a time despite Zip and I spending the vast majority of our time away from the base station. The first time I had to charge it was seven days after we started using it. This was with Zip just wearing the tracker to work, though I also took a couple of days off while getting over a cold. I had to charge it again five days later, but we also had two ~20-minute active tracking sessions in that time. It seems like active tracking eats up a ton of battery. On the plus side, it only takes about two hours to go from 20% to fully charged, and it notifies me when it's getting low. On the down side, I have to take the tracker off my dog in order to charge it.

Size: Big
This thing is kind of big and clunky, even on 36-lb Zip. It's not heavy, but it is bulky and stiff. A cat would need to wear the Whistle tracker on a harness, and there's just no way I could use it on Ru.

Durability: Surprising
My friends lost a Whistle tracker in a foot of water for well over an hour. It wouldn't connect to anything until it dried out, but now it works fine.

Dog Tech: Whistle First Impressions

Well, Whistle's 30-day money back guarantee was too good to pass up, so I bought a Whistle GPStracker for Zip. It arrived today, and I thought I'd share my first impressions. This is the first pet wearable device I've had in my possession, though I did get to play with a Pod tracker at SuperZoo.

Whistle is advertised as an end to lost pets. It offers on-demand tracking of your pet's location from your phone. Users can set up a custom Whistle Zone, and the app will alert them if the pet leaves that zone.

Health and activity monitoring is another Whistle feature. The company promises to track long-term health trends, and alert users to changes in their pet's sleep and activity patterns.

Whistle's flagship product was an activity tracker, like a FitBit for your pet. About two years ago they acquired Tagg, a GPS pet tracker. There was a rocky start to the merger for users, as evidenced by all the angry reviews on Amazon. It seems the tracking functionality tanked, while Tagg users complained that the app had become a bloated social media manatee. I'm hoping things have gotten better since then.

What's in the Box

The Whistle arrived mounted on a clear plastic...thing. It took me an embarrassing several minutes to figure out how in the world to remove it. (You have to slide it down, it's the same way it hooks onto the collar mount.) Inside the box a base station, two-piece collar bracket, wall plug, USB cable, and tiny instruction booklet. I also had some trouble locating the cable inside the box insert. (It's in the top.)

The instruction booklet instructed me to plug the base station in. The first page also includes a note that the tracker must be placed on the base station before it can be activated. I set up the base station, plugged it in, slid the tracker into place, and went to work.

Getting Started

The next step was the install the Whistle app on my Android phone, and then follow the steps to activate my tracker. 

Welp, I followed the steps, but there were definitely some missing. First I entered  the tracker ID number, then I filled in Zip's personal (dogtional?) information. Next I chose a picture of Zip. Then the app took me on a little tour of the main screen and told me what everything did. That was it. All done.

According to Whistle's support page, I should also have been prompted to enter a daily fitness goal for Zip, (lol seriously!) and then been asked to enter payment information and set up a service plan. Since the app skipped that step, it seemed I had ruined everything and there was no going back. Both the website and the app told me to complete the activation, but did not offer any options to do so. I finally had to log in and out of the website several times before it would let me start the activation process all over again.

The Whistle Zone

Now that we're all activated, I set up Zip's Whistle Zone. This is an area around the base station that is a "safe zone". If Zip leaves this area, I will receive text messages that she has done so, and hypothetically could begin tracking her. There are basically two immediate issues with the Whistle Zone.

1. It's a circle. My house, like most suburban southern California homes, is on a square-shaped lot.

2. It's way too big. Like, maybe an acre. My house is sitting on a quarter acre, so the minimum size of Whistle Zone also encompasses the neighbors to either side, the drainage ditch behind the house, and the truck parked across the street. So if Zip gets out of the yard but then hangs around with the kids next door, I'll never know that she's out.

What's Next?

Next, Zip and Godzilla and I are going to go to work and see how the Whistle performs. I'm a little worried about the battery life though, apparently leaving it on the base station to charge all day long got us 21.86% battery life.