Home security company Y-Cam has enraged its users after pulling its free lifetime cloud storage for its internet-connected cameras. Customers were told they had 14 days' notice to download any footage they required before the free service was deactivated. Y-Cam will now offer one year of free seven-day rolling cloud storage …

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Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:11 GMT Anonymous Coward

What a surprise...

.... really, what a surprise...

Same old tactic - lure people in with some free offer, then tell them they have to pay.

Unless you have a remunerative ads business also, there's no way you can offer "free services" - and the cloud is built to avoid you can host your own.

42 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:14 GMT hplasm

Lifetime Guarantee!

If it breaks, you die!

20 0 Reply
1. Thursday 7th December 2017 08:43 GMT BongoJoe
  
  Re: Lifetime Guarantee!
  
  Like pacemakers.
  
  3 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:26 GMT Anonymous Coward

Boom. Gotcha.

Thanks for buying our stuff. Now you have it, we'll now lock you in because that would be cheaper than you buying all new stuff.

The "cloud" is nothing more than a way to make you subscribe and pay.

Nothing more...

Bollocks to that. This proves you CANNOT rely or trust any company with "cloud based storage" to honour their agreements. Ergo, don't use cloud storage for anything you value.

Such as Photoshop, Lightroom etc as that's now almost entirely cloud based. Fortunately there are ways to circumvent most cloud based lock ins..

42 3 Reply
1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:34 GMT spold
  
  Re: Boom. Gotcha.
  
  Due to our failing short-sighted business model we have decided to monetize our existing suckers, sorry invested customer base. Next, edited "best bits" of your videos streamed on you-tube? Blackmail you as to who was 'round while the wife was away...?
  
  21 0 Reply
2. Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:48 GMT gv
  
  Re: Boom. Gotcha.
  
  "Now you have it, we'll now lock you in because that would be cheaper than you buying all new stuff"
  
  To a certain extent, yes. But, as there is a hardware component almost always involved somewhere, when said component needs to be replaced, then it's goodbye and goodnight (probably for ever).
  
  10 0 Reply
  1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 15:32 GMT Anonymous Coward
    
    Re: Boom. Gotcha.
    
    But seeing as most modern electronics last for a good 5 years, had I bought these cameras last month I would now have almost 5 years of paying for their "storage services".
    
    It;s a fucking con.
    
    I hope the Streisand effect kicks in.
    
    13 0 Reply
  2. Thursday 7th December 2017 16:36 GMT JimboSmith
    
    Re: Boom. Gotcha.
    
    I bought a wifi pan tilt camera for security and left it pointing out of the window at the gate into the tiny front garden of my house. I can use this to see who is coming to the door from anywhere in the house on my phone tablet etc. I had a few options for which camera to get but most were clones/rebadged. Of the shortlist several wanted a permanent internet connection which I balked at. A few had just got cloud storage as an option and nothing else. One of them had very negative reviews at how slow viewing via the cloud was.
    
    The one I settled on (a foscam) had it's own wifi built in but also accepted an ethernet connection. I hooked it up to a spare router with a suitable password and the system is self contained. Works on all my tablets and if I can be arsed one day I'll add something to allow it to be connected to the telly in the living room. Then I'll be able to have it as a second picture (picture in picture) in the top right hand corner whilst watching something else. Handy for the pizza deliveries.
    
    Can't remember if I ever considered the company in question but they would doubtless not have made the shortlist.
    
    1 0 Reply
3. Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:58 GMT Anonymous Coward
  
  "Such as Photoshop, Lightroom etc as that's now almost entirely cloud based"
  
  Not yet - only the new Photoshop Lightroom CC (the old one has been rebranded Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC, for maximum confusion - Photoshop is not Photoshop Lightroom...).
  
  But of course is an attempt to make people believe "the Cloud" is the solution and lure them towards them ("edit on any device!"), and not the actually the problem.
  
  3 0 Reply
  1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 15:33 GMT Anonymous Coward
    
    Re: "Such as Photoshop, Lightroom etc as that's now almost entirely cloud based"
    
    No, both Photoshop 2018 and the new lightroom are both predominantly cloud based.
    
    0 4 Reply
    1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 15:50 GMT IsJustabloke
      
      Re: "Such as Photoshop, Lightroom etc as that's now almost entirely cloud based"
      
      @cornz 1
      
      No, they're not.
      
      4 1 Reply
4. Wednesday 6th December 2017 15:48 GMT IsJustabloke
  
  Re: Boom. Gotcha.
  
  "Such as Photoshop, Lightroom etc as that's now almost entirely cloud based. Fortunately there are ways to circumvent most cloud based lock ins.."
  
  No it's not. yes, there is cloud storage, no you don't have to use it.
  
  My images live on my PC, on my NAS and my backups live on my hard drives (that live somewhere else).
  
  5 1 Reply
  1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 17:11 GMT Anonymous Coward
    
    "No it's not. yes, there is cloud storage, no you don't have to use it."
    
    Depends on what subscription you buy.
    
    If you buy the "Lightroom CC plan", all of your photos are ~~belong to Adobe~~ uploaded to your cloud storage if you like it or not. You can keep a copy locally, only in a single folder on the C: drive (on Windows), and you have to activate it - yes, you can try to mount a NAS folder as directory under C, but that's not exactly what the average user is capable of doing.
    
    If you stop paying, IIRC you have one year to download all of them before they get deleted.
    
    The "Photography plan" allows you to use Lightroom Classic which can use any local storage you like, plus Adobe Cloud. Just the "Classic" moniker lead many to believe it will be killed in the near future, despite Adobe promises it won't.
    
    4 2 Reply
    1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 19:30 GMT IsJustabloke
      
      Re: "No it's not. yes, there is cloud storage, no you don't have to use it."
      
      "If you buy the "Lightroom CC plan""
      
      Lightroom CC was introduced less than a month ago and is in no way comparable to the Photography plan,it's aimed at the people that use their phones to take pictures.
      
      It's also included in the Photography plan but is completely seperate from the Photoshop and Lightroom classic applications, the only thing it sahres is a name.
      
      Compared to those two apps its a toy, its not even close to replicating Lightroom let alone photoshop and no serious photographer considers it to be anything else
      
      No, Adobe don't own your images they belong to you; not this bollocks again *really need a rolleyes icon*
      
      So in conclusion, Lightroom and Photoshop are not "based in the cloud" but they can both make use of cloud to sync images between applications and devices.
      
      I've heard a very few people complain about the name "classic" but it's just a name.
      
      4 5 Reply
      1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 21:57 GMT Anonymous Coward
        
        Re: "No it's not. yes, there is cloud storage, no you don't have to use it."
        
        If you buy the "Lightroom CC plan" you are bound to the Adobe Cloud and you have to use it. It was introduced last month exactly for that reason.
        
        And yes, it shares the name because Adobe decided so - trying to bring people there. It could have named it Lightroom Essentials - like other simplified products it self, but it decided against it and instead rebranded "Classic" the previous product. It is a clear marketing decision with a clear aim.
        
        Sure, the image belongs to you (but read the TOS...), just they are stored on the Adobe Cloud and you have to pay to have them there. Lightroom CC *is* cloud based - Lightroom Classic and Photoshop are not - as said you just need to be careful about what plan you buy and use - and if you use Lightroom "non Classic" even with the Photography plan your images *gets uploaded* to the cloud.
        
        It's less a toy than you think - it does miss some advanced features Lightroom Classic has - but it has enough features - and in Adobe plan it's not aimed at smartphone shooters only - those probably are OK with Google and Apple Photo, and aren't going to pay $10/month or more.
        
        4 1 Reply
        
        Thursday 7th December 2017 10:26 GMT IsJustabloke
        
        Re: "No it's not. yes, there is cloud storage, no you don't have to use it."
        
        "If you buy the "Lightroom CC plan" you are bound to the Adobe Cloud and you have to use it. It was introduced last month exactly for that reason."
        
        Yes, that single plan.... the rest of the Adobe suite is NOT cloud based, if for no other reason than they all generate huge amounts of data. And yes., compared to PS and LR, CC is a toy and no serious photographer I know (and I know plenty) would consider using it for their day to day photography. Even though it's included in the photgraphy plan, it shares *nothing* but a name. You cannot use a CC catalog AND a LR catalog; It's an either/or.
        
        I'm so glad you've finally agreed with what I was saying because you were begining to make yourself look stupid.
        
        No, they don't own the images, No they're not predominatnly cloud based.
        
        1 4 Reply
        
        Tuesday 12th December 2017 19:48 GMT Kiwi
        
        Re: "No it's not. yes, there is cloud storage, no you don't have to use it."
        
        no serious photographer I know (and I know plenty) would consider using it for their day to day photography.
        
        If they're using software for their day-day stuff, then they're not a "serious photographer" by any stretch of the imagination.
        
        A "serious photographer" will do it in the lens, or they won't do it at all. They'd not insult the name of photography with all this editing things later rubbish.
        
        0 0 Reply
        
        Tuesday 12th December 2017 21:18 GMT Anonymous Coward
        
        "CC is a toy and no serious photographer"
        
        It's such a toy it got tone curves and split toning today - and I don't believe Adobe has finished yet.
        
        You make yourself looking stupid trying to deny that Adobe introduced a cloud-only LR and a cloud-only plan, and its PR is promoting it full steam.
        
        And it's not aiming it at amateurs only. Sure, it's still a work in progress and not yet ready for many professionals, but it's a clear step in that direction.
        
        Sure, Adobe doesn't own your photos - I never wrote it, if you don't understand the joke "all your photos are belong to Adobe" you should be very young...
        
        Yet Adobe also introduced Adobe Sensei for "auto" settings - which, not surprisingly, works "by analyzing your photo and comparing to tens of thousands of professionally edited photos" - which is another reason why it wants photos in the cloud.
        
        LR CC does shares almost everything with LR Classic and Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) - they use the same processing engine, it's just the GUI and non-editing functions (tagging, printing, geolocation, etc.) which are different, or not available.
        
        And yes, you can use CC and Classic at the same time:
        
        https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2396946
        
        Maybe you know a lot of photographers, but your knowledge of Lightroom is quite limited.
        
        1 0 Reply
5. Thursday 7th December 2017 13:15 GMT DocD
  
  Re: Boom. Gotcha.
  
  "Such as Photoshop, Lightroom etc as that's now almost entirely cloud based. Fortunately there are ways to circumvent most cloud based lock ins.."
  
  Not quite true. I've got dozens of users all storing their Photoshop and other Adobe CC files on our servers, not Adobe's. If Adobe changed the terms of the licensing agreement so that we couldn't use it anymore, we'd use different software. Inconvenient, but not a lock-in.
  
  1 0 Reply
  1. Thursday 7th December 2017 14:02 GMT Anonymous Coward
    
    Re: Boom. Gotcha.
    
    The licensing is still cloud activated. After having 6 months of issues with a paid for licence and emails going back and forth for months our team subscription kept being deactivated by Adobe and we couldn't work. Eventually they managed to sort it out.
    
    Even if you pay, Adobe can decide if you are allowed to use the product or not and and do not expect help if they get it wrong - If your business relies on you staff to be able to use Adobe products then steer clear of the CC range if you can. It could cripple your company.
    
    3 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:32 GMT wolfetone

Was told the other day that Dr.Martens offer a lifetime guarantee on specific boots that are £200, after I said ones I bought 2 years ago for £100 had basically fallen apart. The person telling me got offended when I said companies can go back on these promises if it costs them too much, all they need is a good enough lawyer to make it happen. He said they couldn't.

I'm just happy to know that after reading this article my distrust of offers and promises from corporations isn't misplaced.

22 0 Reply
1. This post has been deleted by its author
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:34 GMT rmason

You can see it now

Marketing droids - FREE! LIFETIME!! CLOUD!!!!

IT - But...

M - FREE! CLOUD!!!

IT - but the AWS bill?

m - CLOUD! FREE!

(scene - 6 months later)

C-Level Person - what the actual FUCK is going on with this AWS bill?

Marketing - Dear Valued customers, as part of out world class service, we are having to introduce the following charges.....

38 0 Reply
1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 16:06 GMT vir
  
  Re: You can see it now
  
  You may have overlooked the bit where the question "why can't you just optimize the video compilation algorithm" got raised.
  
  8 0 Reply
This post has been deleted by its author
1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 20:48 GMT JohnFen
  
  Re: Free Now, Pay Later...
  
  "I do wonder how long this model will continue, before competition reverts to the one off sales approach."
  
  Me too. I do my part by refusing to buy anything that requires the cloud or access to someone else's servers to use. If it involves servers I don't control, then I can't trust that it will still work in a year or 10.
  
  10 0 Reply
2. Thursday 7th December 2017 09:36 GMT Michael Habel
  
  Re: Free Now, Pay Later...
  
  I do wonder how long this model will continue, before competition reverts to the one off sales approach.
  
  Forget it Electronic Arts* have shown us with their utmost comptempt, that this Ship has sailed.
  
  *As with both Linear single player Games, and their spamy Lootcrates.
  
  1 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:37 GMT Anonymous Coward

Keep this in mind when your Windows 10 subscription kicks in.

34 2 Reply
1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 18:56 GMT Dwarf
  
  Keep this in mind when your Windows 10 subscription kicks in.
  
  Assuming you fell for the Windows 10 con in the first place ....
  
  Remember, theres no such thing as a free lunch, free beer or free cloud storage.
  
  Now add the word unlimited to the front of any of those expressions would anyone realistically think its a genuine offer ?
  
  7 1 Reply
  1. Thursday 7th December 2017 07:04 GMT Tim Seventh
    
    "Now add the word unlimited to the front of any of those expressions"
    
    Unlimited free Windows 10!?!? Wow what a deal!
    
    /s
    
    6 0 Reply
2. Thursday 7th December 2017 10:50 GMT phuzz
  
  Wait, there's a free cloud based Windows 10?
  
  Ohh, my mistake, you were just being particularly uninspired in your choice of microsoft bashing. May I suggest you aim at something like their free cloud-based antivirus, it makes your joke actually work.
  
  1 3 Reply
3. Thursday 7th December 2017 12:56 GMT Captain Scarlet
  
  "when your Windows 10 subscription kicks in"
  
  I will just revert all machines back to Windows 7 as I no longer have to fear of stealth upgrade tactics and Solitaire will no longer require an internet connection to actually work.
  
  None of the machines I have built use MS accounts and they are annoying me when I see the "MEH SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH THE ACCOUNT" when actually its exactly the way I want them setup.
  
  1 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:39 GMT TRT

They're doing it wrong...

Keep the storage free; charge for access.

7 1 Reply
1. Thursday 7th December 2017 11:02 GMT Christian Berger
  
  Re: They're doing it wrong...
  
  "Keep the storage free; charge for access."
  
  Sell bulk access to 3rd parties! :)
  
  1 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:43 GMT DCFusor

Been warning of this since long before...

Nothing free is worth what you paid for it (Robert Heinlein).

I've been warning about IoT and Cloud generally for quite awhile now - the subscription model always hurts the end user. It's like trusting someone else to handle your money - no one cares about your stuff like you do. (and if they could make you rich, why didn't they do it for themselves first, and then lose interest in "investing" your money? Where are the customer's yachts?)

I developed a LAN of things framework and pieces for my own homestead, being a developer myself. It works fine and I don't have to depend on some 3rd party's benevolence to have my dwellings and grounds work.

Stuff "as a service" is a very fragile construct and usually the first to go when things get tough.

14 0 Reply
1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 22:09 GMT JohnFen
  
  Re: Been warning of this since long before...
  
  "Nothing free is worth what you paid for it (Robert Heinlein)."
  
  Heinlein was demonstrably wrong when he said that. Air is invaluable, but I don't pay anything to breathe. Sunlight is free, etc.
  
  However, I agree with the rest of your comment.
  
  2 5 Reply
  1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 23:58 GMT DCFusor
    
    Re: Been warning of this since long before...
    
    Depends on the timescale. Air in some places has been pretty hard to breathe of late - China comes to mind. Did we "pay" to not have a nuke war so we could have breatheable air and sunshine without nuclear winter? If not, all those taxes, I've got coming back, right?
    
    Perspective. An amount isn't a rate. Just because our ancestors didn't waste it all, doesn't mean it'll all be around forever.
    
    1 0 Reply
    1. Thursday 7th December 2017 16:17 GMT JohnFen
      
      Re: Been warning of this since long before...
      
      " Air in some places has been pretty hard to breathe of late - China comes to mind. Did we "pay" to not have a nuke war so we could have breatheable air and sunshine without nuclear winter?"
      
      Those aren't example of air costing money. Those are examples of paying to either clean up someone else's mess or paying to prevent someone else from making a mess. Two different things.
      
      1 0 Reply
  2. Thursday 7th December 2017 10:16 GMT hplasm
    
    Re: Been warning of this since long before...
    
    " Air is invaluable, but I don't pay anything to breathe."
    
    Get your ass to Mars!
    
    Then get back to me.
    
    1 0 Reply
    1. Thursday 7th December 2017 11:52 GMT Solarflare
      
      Re: Been warning of this since long before...
      
      Get your ass to Mars!
      
      And now I want to watch Total Recall (the real one, not the remake).
      
      0 0 Reply
  3. Thursday 7th December 2017 14:20 GMT nijam
    
    Re: Been warning of this since long before...
    
    > I don't pay anything to breathe
    
    You will, soon enough.
    
    > Sunlight is free...
    
    ...until someone can figure out how to cover everything in solar panels.
    
    1 0 Reply
  4. Sunday 10th December 2017 00:08 GMT kwhitefoot
    
    Re: Been warning of this since long before...
    
    See the Air Trust by George English.
    
    0 0 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 14:44 GMT LeoP

No sympathy - sorry

So you bought a gadget, that is by design locked into a cloud service you have no control over whatsoever.

So you seeingly made yourself dependent on a vendor's goodwill.

Not Sorry at all for you, this is like using Oracle software.

Might be a good time to grow up, though.

12 12 Reply
Wednesday 6th December 2017 15:03 GMT Lysenko

A little OTT

The cameras cannot store video locally, meaning Y-Cam's own service is the only option for storage...

They're bog standard IP cams. You can use anything that can stream MJPEG or FFMPEG to record the output.

11 1 Reply
1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 15:34 GMT Steve Davies 3
  
  Re: A little OTT
  
  You can use anything that can stream MJPEG or FFMPEG to record the output.
  
  until the next firmware update removes that option.
  
  /s
  
  13 0 Reply
  1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 16:06 GMT steamnut
    
    Re: A little OTT
    
    If they cannot afford their AWS bill then I doubt that they have the resources to upgrade thousands on IP cameras. If you firewall the camera then that cannot happen anyway.
    
    5 0 Reply
    1. Wednesday 6th December 2017 16:16 GMT Lysenko
      
      Re: A little OTT
      
      If you firewall the camera then that cannot happen anyway.
      
      ...and if you *don't* firewall the camera already you've got a dodgy old version of Linux/BusyBox on the open internet with (at least in some versions) a hard-coded root password. These things are almost all RALink (MIPS arch) SBCs with a webcam core on the USB port. DDoS or spam zombies just waiting to be recruited, aside from the privacy implications.
      
      On the other hand, they're perfectly fine on a closed LAN streaming to a Raspberry Pi type[1] SBC which motion detects and encrypts before uploading to the 5Gb S3 bucket AWS gives you for free.
      
      [1] Not an actual Raspberry Pi. Rubbish Ethernet. A Banana Pi or an OLinuXino A20 or one of the Nano Pis.
      
      6 0 Reply
2. Thursday 7th December 2017 08:16 GMT GruntyMcPugh
  
  Re: A little OTT
  
  "They're bog standard IP cams. You can use anything that can stream MJPEG or FFMPEG to record the output."
  
  We have a Synology NAS laying about that was bought for a project that never came off, it supports various IP cams, but you only get one license out of the box, then you have to pay to add more cameras. Know of any decent (cheap / free) software that will access multiple cameras?
  
  2 0 Reply
  1. Thursday 7th December 2017 08:43 GMT Huw D
    
    Re: A little OTT
    
    If you're using Windows, look at iSpy which will use any sort of storage you can point it to.
    
    https://www.ispyconnect.com/
    
    0 0 Reply
    1. Thursday 7th December 2017 09:16 GMT cmrayer
      
      Re: A little OTT
      
      Milestone, free for up to 8 cameras for 7 days recording. Http://www.milestonesys.com
      
      Uses the same code Base as their excellent corporate versions, that you have to pay for.
      
      0 0 Reply