When I first saw this little item I knew I had to have one. It was small and compacted nicely. I thought it was the perfect option instead of lugging around a full size or even a compact, hard tripod. My initial impressions were less than positive.
But after a further review I have actually come to like this little gadget. It fits nicely in the Camelback and if you are only using a smaller digital camera it seems to work fine. I used it for the above self portrait. You can see the little rock where it was perfectly perched. I have at this point carried this little tripod into the field on countless occasions. It works. It works perfectly.
I believe there are three sizes. I have the middle one. The tiny one seems to be too tiny for even the smallest of digital cameras although I never tried it. The larger one seems to be a bit silly in that you might as well carry around a real tripod for that kind of bulk.