The Fallout from OnSSI's Offensive Examined

The fallout has been spectacular. OnSSI's hate video triggered an unprecedented reaction for a social media post. Here are some take-aways we found:

• The level of interest was extremely high. For instance, in the first 12 hours, over 800 people read the update we posted (which is 10x the number common for a small update). This does not count the number who watched the video directly on YouTube.
• The comments (both on our original post and in emails to us) were overwhelmingly critical of OnSSI. [Update: OnSSI acknowledge themselves being "called a sales guy w/o a clue, a dime-a-dozen marketer and a junior marketing guy who doesn't get social media."
• OnSSI made their reputation even worse. Historically, OnSSI's reputation has been poor, driven by the impression that they covered up OEMing 'recorders' and their role primarily as resellers. They claimed to be far more but showed no proof (nor built any credibility given that they attacked pretty much everyone else who develops 'recorders').
• OnSSI showed itself to either (1) completely misunderstand the basics of video surveillance or (2) have no qualms about launching an attack without any basis in reality. Even the architect of their own Ocularis product called them "clueless marketing people [who] have too much time on their hands, or perhaps they simply don’t understand the business they are in." In our original post, we explained the specific deficiencies in OnSSI's argument.
• Specifically for us, everytime we spoke with OnSSI, marketing hype dominated and technical straight-talk was nearly non-existence. In comparison to over 20 VMS companies we have reviewed, they were the worst in this regard. To that end, this video was completely consistent with our experience of the OnSSI approach.

And yes, we found this funny but we were laughing at OnSSI, not with them. I doubt we are alone.