Everfocus Declares IPVM Anti-Everfocus

JH
John Honovich
•May 10, 2015
IPVM

IPVM does not allow manufacturer promotion. Everfocus is unhappy about this.

We did a test of a Tatung install tool chosen and bought by us because it is a wrist strappable IP monitor, unlike the typical approach of requiring a separate laptop, tablet or phone. Our overall findings from the test were mixed.

Everfocus has their own install tool, but requires a separate laptop, tablet or phone. In the comments to the Tatung test, an Everfocus employee declared:

"You can get the ISC 2015 New Product Showcase Winner in the Tools Category, the Everfocus Sidekick for $200, then use your smart phone to achieve the same or better results."

I told the poster I was deleting the comment but that he could post again making it less promotional and disclosing affiliation. His second try:

"Not sure how to make this less of an Ad, but you can also use the EverFocus Sidekick in combination with your smart phone for much less money and achieve the same or better results. It has won the 2015 ISC New Product of the Year award."

I deleted this second attempt asking him to disclose his affiliation, describe what the product did and not to mention nonsense awards.

His response directly to me was:

"For whatever reason, you are just anti-Everfocus. I didn’t post anonymously, it clearly states I’m from EverFocus. Also, how is the ISC, the largest surveillance show of the year, a nonsense award? We simply have a much better product for a quarter of the price and yet you choose to review an inferior product from Tatune and choose to only mention ours. You are the one doing a disservice to the members of this community."

According to Everfocus, I am 'anti-Everfocus' but evidently 'pro-Tatung', a company I literally know no one from.

Manufacturers, in the future, if you want to use IPVM to mention your products, save us grief and follow our basic requirements (we explained this first here).

1. Disclose your affiliation up front explicitly, i.e., "I am from Everfocus." or "I am X at Everfocus"

2. Do not say your product is better. If there are specific reasons you believe your product is better, just say that. We enable X, or we have Y or Z, which the competitor product lacks.

3. Do not tout your awards. All of these awards are based on little real evaluation and never any testing.

Or you can just get mad at us and say we are against your company. But the other way is more mature and more productive.

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UI
Undisclosed Integrator #1
•May 10, 2015
John, you are anti-IPVM. I have said it and now it's public.
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U
Undisclosed #2
•May 11, 2015

The SIdekick product actually got its own thread breakout a year ago when it was mentioned in another thread. I'd hardly call that anti-Everfocus (hey, if you want to know about IPVM's anti-vendor bias, contact me offline (LOL)).

The funny thing is, when I saw the Tatung monitor review I didn't even think about the Sidekick, or the updated Veracity powerpoint thing. Those seem like a slightly different class of tool, though they do have many similarities.

JH
John Honovich
•May 11, 2015
IPVM
In reply to Undisclosed #2

"The Sidekick product actually got its own thread breakout a year ago when it was mentioned in another thread"

I forgot about that. See: IP Sidekick - A New IP Camera Installation Tool. What is even more ironic I created that discussion from an Ari post on another discussion and commented favorably on that device. I guess last year I wasn't so deeply 'anti-Everfocus'.

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Undisclosed #2
•May 12, 2015
In reply to John Honovich

I guess last year I wasn't so deeply 'anti-Everfocus'.

You've hired a few more people since then. Ethan, Brian and Derek (among others) are doing more now, which has freed you up to expand from just hating Avigilon to hating other companies as well.

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EF
Eric Fleming Bonilha
•May 12, 2015
In reply to Undisclosed #2

Hating Avigilon?? As far as I can tell, John loves Avigilon... he actually hates Arecont :)

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JH
John Honovich
•May 12, 2015
IPVM
In reply to Undisclosed #2

The quickest way to get us to stop covering Avigilon is to not read or comment on our Avigilon posts.

Avigilon posts, good or bad, get a lot more reads and comments than almost any other manufacturer, prompting us to cover Avigilon more.

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JH
John Honovich
•May 12, 2015
IPVM
In reply to John Honovich

Update: the Avigilon EVP Quitting post is going to get more total reads than the HD Analog Usage statistics that took me a day to prepare and payout of ~$750 for members to answer the survey.

I think the HD analog statistics is a far more useful and important post but it would be silly not to spend 45 minutes to do a post on things like the Avigilon EVP quitting.

SM
Steve Mitchell
•May 13, 2015
In reply to John Honovich

I read both of them. But I'm sure you'll continue to cover topics you and your staff consider important and useful, not just the topics that get the most clicks. Afterall, if we let the world decide what to publish there would be no meaningful content, just Kim Kardashian's butt. Somebody's got to have the wherewithall to say "this is important" even if they know it's not going to be the most popular topic. There is an implicit trust relationship between you and your customers regarding what deserves attention and what doesn't.

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JH
John Honovich
•May 13, 2015
IPVM
In reply to Steve Mitchell

People moving in the industry is clearly relevant. It's just that some companies are more meaningful to our members than others, i.e., Ranking 95 Surveillance Manufacturers Interest

If I did a post about Brickcom's EVP Engineering resigning, the reads wouldn't even be a fraction.

Avigilon's EVP Engineering resigning is important. The reads show it.

I think it's unfair to compare this to Kim Kardashian. When IPVM does "13 Hottest Security Executives" and "Find out which Manufacturer CFO is Cheating on His Wife With an RSM", then you can surely make such a comparison. Until then, we are picking from genuine security events / trends that our members show the most interest in reading.

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Luis Carmona
•May 11, 2015
Geutebruck USA • IPVMU Certified

This is what happens when sales people think as sales people and not as public relations. They are two different things and appropriate for different circumstances.

I'm a systems engineer by trade. Sometimes I have to put on a salesperson hat, and sometimes a PR hat, among others. Wisdom is knowing the difference.

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Kyle Folger
•May 12, 2015
IPVMU Certified

Sometimes first impressions last forever. My first DVR I ever installed was from Everfocus (mpeg4). Even though it lasted 6-7 years before replacing it due to having bad PATA hard drives and were hard to even find replacements for, it was the worst and my least favorite DVR I have ever installed. I never found a way to navigate back and it was text driven. About 3 years ago, I was asked to repair a persons install where coax cables were run in the gutters with cat5. It had a newer Everfocus. My opinion didn't change. It was h.264 and mouse driven, but I didn't like it and it was hard to use. The installer had used a PTZ controller which the owners could never operate properly. This was in their kitchen on a shelf with a flat panel above it. The location made me think of Scarface.

Point being Everfocus, if you want to be known by IPVM, create inovative products that rise above the rest. The Sidekick looks rather interesting but the banner on your website shows a guy standing on what is perceived as the ground. Please show me him holding the handheld device and the other hand focusing while on a ladder. I've done the laptop thing and I've looked into other solutions for doing it yourself. However, I have found two way radios with a security earpiece to be the most effective way of focusing. The person on the directing end has a much larger monitor than anything you could hold in your hand, so that person would be the best job at determining FOV and focus. With the auto focus cameras, this becomes even easier; aim, focus, tighten, put cover on, focus again, done and no broken latops or electronics.

I don't hear much about Speco on IPVM but I don't believe IPVM doesn't like Speco. It must simply be the fact that it is IP Video and Speco believes IP is hard to install and anything contrary to that is "bull***t."

As I said, first impressions...

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Undisclosed #3
•May 12, 2015
IPVMU Certified
In reply to Kyle Folger

Speco believes IP is hard to install and anything contrary to that is "bull***t."

Related.

Avatar
Jon Dillabaugh
•May 17, 2015
Pro Focus LLC
In reply to Undisclosed #3

Yes we attended that ASIS show together.

SM
Steve Mitchell
•May 12, 2015

Trust me, I'm pretty sure every manufacturer out there thinks IPVM is anti-them. ;)

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GC
Greg Cortina
•May 13, 2015
What if Kanye does a kickstarter for $30.00 HD SDI cameras?
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Undisclosed #3
•May 13, 2015
IPVMU Certified
In reply to Greg Cortina

'ye is old school: fat analog.

besides, yeezy and todd? talk about incompatible... ;)

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JB
John Becker
•May 21, 2015

We certainly understand and appreciate the independent stance that IPVM must take. We consider them to be niether pro-Tyco nor anti-Tyco. And, while we may not always agree with posts about Tyco, we do believe that the posts are done with no emotion or hearsay. Keep up the good work Team IPVM! -John Becker, Tyco Securiy Products - Video Portfolio

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