This Ring "commercial", disguised as a casual interview starts off well, but then around the 1 minute mark Shaq is describing the system and says "if a fly goes by, I will know about it, if a spider crawls across the lens, I will know about it".
Sounds like a poor endorsement for Ring, and likely to be generating a lot of false alarms if true (or, Shaq's exterminator is making a killing keeping the property bug free).
“if a fly goes by, I will know about it” is hyperbole.
“if a spider crawls across the lens, I will know about it" is also hyperbole, but what VMD wouldn’t be triggered by a spider on the lens?
IMHO, DIY - prospective first-time security system buyers are interested in catching events, not false alarms. That won’t change until they start to use it.
but what VMD wouldn’t be triggered by a spider on the lens?
It is well within the means of current products, especially more recent ones like the Ring cams, to set the equivalent of a max object size filter. That along with low contrast detection (the spider being blurry because it is right on the lens) could eliminate a lot of false alarms. That is without even getting into any kind of lightweight on-board analytics, or in-cloud analytics as a 2nd pass filter.
...set the equivalent of a max object size filter. That along with low contrast detection (the spider being blurry because it is right on the lens) could eliminate a lot of false alarms.
Rephrase: Name a camera that you would plug-in and turn on motion detection that would not be triggered by a spider crawling on the lens.
My point in posting this is not about which consumer cameras do or do not sufficiently ignore spiders, but that the false alarms are actually called out in the video.
You could look at it as a bad move, pointing out to astute buyers that the Ring cameras are really not that smart. Or you could look at it as brilliant subtle marketing, when someone calls to complain Ring can say "Shaq thinks that is a feature, not a bug".
And, if you want to make it a technical discussion, it is a mostly solvable problem in the current state of technology, IMO.
You could look at it as a bad move, pointing out to astute buyers that the Ring cameras are really not that smart. Or you could look at it as brilliant subtle marketing, when someone calls to complain Ring can say "Shaq thinks that is a feature, not a bug".
I have said how I looked at it, Hyperbole... Exaggeration. Shaq is not saying he has tested the Ring camera with spiders and flies and is happy with the results.
Its just humorous banter with and underlying message that you won’t miss real events. It is unlikely to make anyone think, “I don’t want that camera, it must not have a max_object_size setting to filter out false alarms.”
It's a weird way to praise it. I know Shaq's being funny, not sure why he would emphasize that.
Recently, he did a Dorito promotion on TNT and did a similar over-the-top response:
Though that seems to be more on point for a 'hot' dorito, i.e., emphasizing how how it is, which is presumably what customers want for such a product. The same cannot be said for spiders and bugs on cameras.
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