Many years ago, I bought my wife a Nabaztag rabbit. In many ways, the Nabaztag was ahead of its time. When I bought this (around 2006-2007) Internet of Things (IoT) was not the common household name it is now. Yet, here was this small and adorable rabbit that would fetch the weather for you. It was clever, and it was a wonder to have for a short time anyway.

But, the Nabaztag had a fairly short life. Eventually, the internet infrastructure used to deliver the vital information the rabbit needed shut down. There were rumblings of getting a new service up and running, but many of them fell short of happening. You have to also realize that this was a device using a microcontroller (not an SBC like a Raspberry Pi) so updating the firmware was not a trivial task (although it could be done). It seemed like the days of our cute rabbit were numbered, but we did not have the heart to simply throw him away. So in the closet, he sat…until.

Many years later, with the advent of the Raspberry Pi and later the Pi Zero, a group was looking at resurrecting the rabbit and replacing the guts with a Pi Zero. The original creators of the Nabaztag also got involved, and eventually, a new circuit board that would allow a Pi Zero to be plugged into would be made. This board would need to replace just about all of the guts of the Nabaztag but would potentially unlock a lot of future possibilities, not to mention allow the rabbit to get information without relaying a main server and instead pulling from public servers.

I of course jumped on the chance to bring our rabbit back to life. I pre-ordered the board and then…COVID-19 hit. Like with many electronics, supply chains were interrupted and this resulted in the boards being delayed. But finally, in the summer of 2022, we got the boards and performed the surgery. Now, we once again have our little rabbit giving us weird sayings, the weather, and even the air quality. I hope to add more features soon.