While I like my wyze cams they are starting to feel a lot like a “free” app. Low up front cost and just a series of micro-transactions after that. Having features removed and then pay-walled later isn’t exactly great service (even though I’m one of the 1.3M) . The line “we’ve also since hired an actual finance guy…” Is not a comfort. I expect that to mean more micro-transactions in the future.
How long before the app makes us watch a 10 second ad before we can see our feeds?
meanwhile I still have to disable the wifi on my phone to get it to connect to my cameras reliably… (Authenticating 2/3)
maybe I could pay a dollar per camera per month to get a “reliable connection” feature.
I assume Wyze is unable to create a duplicate of the Edge Cloud person detection thay had before Apple rained on the party? I personally think the Edge solution you had before was the ideal As new camera come out s with more memory and stronger processors, it would only get better. Why is it Cloud rather than Edge based now?
If I do nothing will my Wyze cams still work they way they do now. I do not remember installing person detection. But I do get video when something moves in the camera view.
I would have probably recommended making it free for all accounts up to the date of this announcement. Lots of people since November 2019 joined Wyze with the belief of free person detection. It was an important factor for me in going with Wyze over some competitors. The availability has been seen publicly this whole year too (that’s how I found out about it and chose Wyze). Not continuing that for everyone else who bought in with the same understanding as the Nov 2019-ers could be a potential cost worth considering as being worse than just offering person detection free to everyone up to the time of the official announcement that it may now no longer be free.
Don’t get me wrong, I understand it actually costs money to do it, and there is now a lot of pressure from recent “investors” who demand high returns, so Wyze has to figure out how to increase profits to pay off the investor demands now too…
Hopefully the volunteer system works out okay to balance things enough. It’s a tough spot to be in… Especially when past court decisions have sometimes been inconsistent.
I’ll probably chip in to help out. Might wait on buying any more cams until we see what the prices will actually be in September.
@lowe.brian, we’re sorry for the disappointment and understand where you’re coming from. We’re still going to be adding new features to our products. We’ll be careful when selecting which ones have subscriptions.
@8043c9b245a0d18ab05c, I’ll share this with the team! Though I believe we discussed both of those suggestions earlier. It’s neat seeing them come from the community, too.
@dteck04, we hear you and we’re sorry. We’ll be VERY careful with future promises and making sure that we plan for paid features to be that way in the future. We don’t have plans to impact the base function of your Wyze products (such as viewing ads before viewing the stream). For the WiFi issue, have you contacted customer support? There’s definitely something funky there and we’d like to help resolve it.
@glfiske, we’re looking into Edge solutions but can’t make promises yet. XNOR.ai is very good at what they do and that’s probably why they picked up Apple’s interest!
@cmartorelli, yes, your Wyze Cams will continue to function as they do now if you do nothing (other than the features we’ll be adding with future app and firmware updates).
@carverofchoice, I’ll be sure to share this with the team. Thank you for the advice and considering chipping in.
I just saw this email. Not sure how I feel. I am going to be subscribing all my cameras to CamPlus which will be giving Wyze some extra money. I don’t know how this will actually work. I mean your basically just asking for people to donate money and hope they do. If this doesn’t work I really hope you don’t start charging subscriptions for person detection. It was said to be free so…
I’m with you. If I have to pay a subscription fee to operate, then I’ll probably start looking at other options. I can put up with the bugs and quirks when it’s a one-time purchase, but having a ongoing fee, I just will not tolerate a continual “beta” product.
We’re trying to find ways to avoid charging for person detection with people that received that promise last November. We are looking into Edge solutions but they are tricky and we don’t know what that would look like at this point.
In the latest newsletter that just sent out talking about Person Detection… what is the average cost/user (this would help people gauge how much to pay for the free subscription). PS — we love this idea, though kinda need to get a concept… like $1 or $3/month? Or is it like $50?
I don’t think the outdoor cam has person detection at all anyway (that’s my understanding), so this issue should be irrelevant to it and why they’re able to launch it regardless of this issue’s resolution.
If it does have person detection, will someone please correct me?
I have the same question. Let’s say half of Wyze users payed a monthly fee out of the goodness of their heart. How much would that need to be in order to keep Wyze going? @WyzeGwendolyn
