Anyone who has piloted a drone knows that wide open spaces are your friend, so the idea of an indoor drone might seem like a questionable idea. But there is method in the madness for the team at Eighty Nine Robots, a company formed by a group of students from Northwestern University. Their Rook drone is intended to allow users to remotely do a sweep of the interior of their homes from anywhere in the world via a Wi-Fi connection and an iOS or Android device.
Once the Rook is connected to the user's home Wi-Fi, it can be remotely controlled via smartphone and used as an indoor flying security camera, giving users the ability to monitor and investigate any activity that seems to be out of the ordinary. The Rook can also be used to regularly monitor pets or baby sitters or to see if a stove or iron has been turned off or a garage is closed.
Battery life, however, is a very slight five minutes, but the company says that should be plenty of time for users to propel the drone through most homes at least once throughout the day. An automated charging dock will also fully recharge the Rook within an hour.
A recently launched Indiegogo campaign allows early backers to purchase a Rook for US$99, which is a reduction of over half of the expected regular retail price of $200 to $250.00 and considerably less than the price of more expensive drones designed for outdoor use. The price of the Rook includes soft blade guards to reduce the risk of damage that might occur if the drone runs into items in the home. The company expects to begin shipping the Rook in December 2016 if all goes as planned.
While the Rook may be the first drone designed specifically for in-door use, it joins small drones like the world's tiniest camera drone and the Axis VIDIUS whose small sizes mean you're more likely to find them flying inside than out.
Source: Eighty Nine Robots
Once drones are smarter you could equip them with some obstacle avoidance but also an external buckyball structure that allows you to collide into other drones or objects without destroying the thing. Maybe you could buzz around a national park for a couple minutes in FPV before disconnecting and having it auto-return to base.
FPV RC cars that are controlled over the internet would be a fun alternative to a software racing game as well. I actually thought about putting an Arduino controller RC car on a track in my basement and allowing it to be controlled remotely from the Internet but doing this is simple enough that I'm surprised I haven't seen a anyone else doing it on a slightly larger scale allowing people to queue up and race each other. Maybe twitch races RC cars would be fun.
Maybe it will be here in a couple more years but I would expect a company to do it as a promotion temporarily if nothing else.