Google Plans to Reduce Nest Camera Quality to Ease Network Strain

[purpleparrotuk]

Is that really your argument? What's next - using your IP to locate your camera and then physically stealing it back? Nest has already said you can change the quality setting back to high if you want that, so worrying about that makes no sense.
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Right, with multiple cameras it absolutely adds up. Heck, some providers limit you to 1TB per month. JUST my cameras go over this, easily! Thankfully I have gigabit fiber with no data caps.

I don’t like them interfering with my camera settings in the first place.

 

[Steve121178]

in the world of “you get what you paid for” that logic doesn’t work. We all do not have to accept a drop in quality.

if Verizon can’t get you 1Gbps internet, they should charge for the lower tier. If T mobile starts throttling my mobile internet, I would ask for a lower plan where that happens anyways. And with these super high end cams, I’d ask for money back.

This isn’t some kinda internet socialism.

No, we're dealing with a global pandemic and there's billions of people streaming and using far more bandwidth at home than normal, which is why Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube etc etc etc have all slashed the bitrate to reduce the bandwidth people are using to help the networks cope.

You don't have a choice, it's happening for the right reasons & I'm ok with that.

I'm not going to cry just because the 4K streaming services I pay for have lesser quality if it keeps everything else online.

Some people need to stop being so selfish & understand the steps taken are for the benefit of us all. No one is entitled to a refund either, as they can lower the bitrate to ensure QoS for all.

 

[Val-kyrie]

No, we're dealing with a global pandemic and there's billions of people streaming and using far more bandwidth at home than normal, which is why Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube etc etc etc have all slashed the bitrate to reduce the bandwidth people are using to help the networks cope.

You don't have a choice, it's happening for the right reasons & I'm ok with that.

I'm not going to cry just because the 4K streaming services I pay for have lesser quality if it keeps everything else online.

Some people need to stop being so selfish & understand the steps taken are for the benefit of us all. No one is entitled to a refund either, as they can lower the bitrate to ensure QoS for all.

Streaming camera footage for security is not selfish.

Streaming games and video for entertainment is selfish.

One is essential for safety; one is non-essential in every manner.

Perhaps this will create a cry for better infrastructure—private and public / municipal.

 

[DEXTERITY]

Was a very sad moment when Google acquired Nest, would have bought their home cameras in a heartbeat if it wasn't the case. Will probably go down the route of Ubiquiti's offerings instead (and have the data kept safe on-site).

Why their cameras and support are awesome. IF, I ever have an issue they responded almost instantly via twitter DM
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I’d be pissed if I paid the really high prices for these IQ cams, spent time and money drilling holes in exterior walls, and then got hit with “sorry, you’re not getting what u paid for”.

Some of these cams are like $400 each! You can get an entire Arlo 2 $1080p wireless system w/ 3-4 cams and free 1 week recording for that much.

Did u read? YOU CAN CHANGE IT BACK!!!

 

[harriska2]

It’s why I spent $1100 on my own server (Nuc running Blue Iris) and run my own system with Hikvision cameras. Been humming along for about 4 years now.

 

[DownUnderDan]

Brave new world, it’s the small steps all people around the world do, limiting our privacy and democratic rights.

lots of people cheering google for intruding your home and changing your inventory, strange ....

And here I was thinking we were dealing with the impact of a global pandemic on our IT infrastructure! boy you sure saw through that charade Mr liberty and freedom.

 

[haruhiko]

Suddenly socialism kind of makes sense to everybody. 🤣

 

[szw-mapple fan]

It’s hard for me to believe that decreasing the quality of Nest footage moves the needle at all.

The average nest cam uses 400GB per month on high setting or 300GB per month on standard. I'd say that's quite significant for areas wth less bandwodth.

 

[mike...]

I don't know what the situation is in the US but in the UK the daytime peak in traffic is lower than the usual evening peak when people come home from work and school. In other words, the lockdown is not having any noticeable effect on our ISPs and they're coping with it extremely well. We don't need companies to be reducing the quality of services that we pay for. It only helps those companies, and not the people.

No, we're dealing with a global pandemic and there's billions of people streaming and using far more bandwidth at home than normal, which is why Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube etc etc etc have all slashed the bitrate to reduce the bandwidth people are using to help the networks cope.

In some places, as I mention above, it doesn't make any difference. I'm sure these companies can do it on a country-by-country, or even ISP-by-ISP basis. They could reduce quality only for those who were actually suffering with capacity problems.

 

[zubikov]

No, we're dealing with a global pandemic and there's billions of people streaming and using far more bandwidth at home than normal, which is why Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube etc etc etc have all slashed the bitrate to reduce the bandwidth people are using to help the networks cope.

You don't have a choice, it's happening for the right reasons & I'm ok with that.

I'm not going to cry just because the 4K streaming services I pay for have lesser quality if it keeps everything else online.

Some people need to stop being so selfish & understand the steps taken are for the benefit of us all. No one is entitled to a refund either, as they can lower the bitrate to ensure QoS for all.

It’s a stretch to call people selfish because they insist on getting higher tier services when paying higher tier prices. Thank you for explaining that we’re in a pandemic and that we all need to stick together, but last I checked Google is a trillion dollar company that will not be sticking by me when I fall on hard times, so I owe them nothing. If they reduced service, they owe a partial refund.

 

[szw-mapple fan]

I’d be pissed if I paid the really high prices for these IQ cams, spent time and money drilling holes in exterior walls, and then got hit with “sorry, you’re not getting what u paid for”.

Some of these cams are like $400 each! You can get an entire Arlo 2 $1080p wireless system w/ 3-4 cams and free 1 week recording for that much.

Had you read the original article, you'd know you can bump the quality back up in settings, just as you can for Youtube. It's not a hard quality cap, just a change for the default quality. Not to mention the $400 cameras are 4k at the highest settings. I doubt most people would notice or care if they got 1080p instead of 4k footage for a few weeks.

 

[4jasontv]

Had you read the original article, you'd know you can bump the quality back up in settings, just as you can for Youtube. It's not a hard quality cap, just a change for the default quality. Not to mention the $400 cameras are 4k at the highest settings. I doubt most people would notice or care if they got 1080p instead of 4k footage for a few weeks.

They won’t notice unless they need the footage and they can’t make out a face or read a license plate.

 

[WilliamG]

Had you read the original article, you'd know you can bump the quality back up in settings, just as you can for Youtube. It's not a hard quality cap, just a change for the default quality. Not to mention the $400 cameras are 4k at the highest settings. I doubt most people would notice or care if they got 1080p instead of 4k footage for a few weeks.

FYI they're not 4K. They're 1080p with a 4K sensor.
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They won’t notice unless they need the footage and they can’t make out a face or read a license plate.

You pretty much can't make out plates anyway unless the camera is pretty close to the car in question.

 

[recoil80]

Had anyone, anywhere set up excess capacity in anything on the expectation of world wide lockdown? (Home working and studies probably™ accounts for a tiny fraction of the internet's bandwidth compared to video streaming.)

Many people working and studying from home are streaming video lessons or having video calls. The difference is that you are sending a lot of data instead of just receiving it as when you're watching a movie.
And there are also people streaming stuff during the day as they're forced to stay home, so you have to sum that traffic with people working from home.
I said it is carriers fault but I know they couldn't predict a complete lockdown. Their ads were all about people enjoying high speed networks on the go and all day long though, and clearly it is not what is happening right now. My connection is pretty good, but some of my coworkers complain about their network all the time.

 

[WilliamG]

I don’t like them interfering with my camera settings in the first place.

Come on. We're experiencing a pandemic. This wasn't underhanded or sneaky in any way. Emails went out to all Nest camera owners explaining the change, and very clearly stating you can change that setting back immediately if you want. I have not a single problem with this.

 

[4jasontv]

Streaming camera footage for security is not selfish.

Streaming games and video for entertainment is selfish.

One is essential for safety; one is non-essential in every manner.

Perhaps this will create a cry for better infrastructure—private and public / municipal.

1. Online games already use almost no bandwidth.

2. Who are you to say what uses have value and which do not? It doesn’t matter if it’s security footage, movies, pornography, video games, or email.

3.This is 100% on the ISPs for trying to maximize profit by not having enough bandwidth to sustain a deviation from predicted loads. Either they deliver the product they sold or throw them in prison. If anything counted as wire fraud this should be it.
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Come on. We're experiencing a pandemic. This wasn't underhanded or sneaky in any way. Emails went out to all Nest camera owners explaining the change, and very clearly stating you can change that setting back immediately if you want. I have not a single problem with this.

Than send an email explaining how someone could lower it. Don’t make that call and then send an email they might get and read that they can put it back.
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FYI they're not 4K. They're 1080p with a 4K sensor.
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You pretty much can't make out plates anyway unless the camera is pretty close to the car in question.

That only makes it more important that it not be changed. Going from maybe we can see to definitely can not isn’t good for anyone accept the person in the video.

 

[WilliamG]

1. Online games already use almost no bandwidth.

2. Who are you to say what uses have value and which do not? It doesn’t matter if it’s security footage, movies, pornography, video games, or email.

3.This is 100% on the ISPs for trying to maximize profit by not having enough bandwidth to sustain a deviation from predicted loads. Either they deliver the product they sold or throw them in prison. If anything counted as wire fraud this should be it.
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Than send an email explaining how someone could lower it. Don’t make that call and then send an email they might get and read that they can put it back.
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That only makes it more important that it not be changed. Going from maybe we can see to definitely can not isn’t good for anyone accept the person in the video.

So you're putting your faith in humanity that people are going to voluntarily lower their image quality settings after being asked to? YouTube is doing the same, you know, by lowering the defaults, but you can bump them back up. Would you rather they just ask users not to use the higher bandwidth settings, too? What percentage of users would actually do that?

Exactly. Don't rely on humans to make these decisions.

This is a likely once-in-a-lifetime situation we're facing here. Extraordinary times call for extraordinary/unorthodox measures. Some people are making a mountain out of a molehill here, if you ask me.

 

[parfy]

I don't know what the situation is in the US but in the UK the daytime peak in traffic is lower than the usual evening peak when people come home from work and school. In other words, the lockdown is not having any noticeable effect on our ISPs and they're coping with it extremely well. We don't need companies to be reducing the quality of services that we pay for. It only helps those companies, and not the people.



In some places, as I mention above, it doesn't make any difference. I'm sure these companies can do it on a country-by-country, or even ISP-by-ISP basis. They could reduce quality only for those who were actually suffering with capacity problems.

The daytime peak is lower but overall consumption is up as adults work from home using video calls and there’s more usage of streaming services. If the quality wasn’t lowered we would have had higher usage levels

 

[4jasontv]

Many people working and studying from home are streaming video lessons or having video calls. The difference is that you are sending a lot of data instead of just receiving it as when you're watching a movie.
And there are also people streaming stuff during the day as they're forced to stay home, so you have to sum that traffic with people working from home.
I said it is carriers fault but I know they couldn't predict a complete lockdown. Their ads were all about people enjoying high speed networks on the go and all day long though, and clearly it is not what is happening right now. My connection is pretty good, but some of my coworkers complain about their network all the time.

In part this is because the networks were intentionally built unbalanced so upload and download streams are not equal.

Technically, per most ISP T&S you can not use consumer internet to run a business. So they should be throttling people who are working from home for violations their service agreement. That is if they have a right to throttle anyone at all.

 

[Hodar1]

....It is their fault, but since they can't improve their networks overnight it is necessary to reduce quality wherever possible.

Remember when WorldCom crashed back in the early 2000's? WorldCom made gazillions laying Dark Fiber up and down America, and every time they completed a run from Dallas to New York, or Los Angeles to Denver - they would have a huge PR on how much bandwidth had been added. The issue was that all this fiber had indeed been laid, but there was NOTHING running through it. It was tested, it was laid, it was protected and mothballed - but it generated ZERO revenue.

But, WorldCom stock inflated, each and every time. The fiber is there - and we can do far, far more with the fiber we are are using today, than we could 20 years ago.

Don't kid yourself - we have Exabytes/sec of fiber laying dormant. The big companies just aren't inclined to add equipment to connect to this unused fiber at this moment, because they can keep jacking the rates up.

 

[Jason2000]

Was a very sad moment when Google acquired Nest, would have bought their home cameras in a heartbeat if it wasn't the case. Will probably go down the route of Ubiquiti's offerings instead (and have the data kept safe on-site).

You will not be disappointed going with Ubiquiti. I replaced my Nest cams with them about 4 months ago and have been extremely impressed. Went the the Cloud Key Gen 2 and 2 G4-Pro cameras. Will add some more as soon as I get my lazy butt up in the attic to run more cabling.

 

[4jasontv]

So you're putting your faith in humanity that people are going to voluntarily lower their image quality settings after being asked to? YouTube is doing the same, you know, by lowering the defaults, but you can bump them back up. Would you rather they just ask users not to use the higher bandwidth settings, too? What percentage of users would actually do that?

Exactly. Don't rely on humans to make these decisions.

This is a likely once-in-a-lifetime situation we're facing here. Extraordinary times call for extraordinary/unorthodox measures. Some people are making a mountain out of a molehill here, if you ask me.

Yes.They should ask. As I mentioned in another reply, the ISP, if forced to throttle data, should be doing it to the people violating their Terms of Service. You know the ones that say you can’t use your consumer internet for commercial purposes?

Hardware and software manufactures should not be changing things already purchased.

 

[purpleparrotuk]

Come on. We're experiencing a pandemic. This wasn't underhanded or sneaky in any way. Emails went out to all Nest camera owners explaining the change, and very clearly stating you can change that setting back immediately if you want. I have not a single problem with this.

I haven’t had any email for my nest hello

 

[icanhazmac]

Dear AAPL,

Please buy or create a home security system and take my money.

Thanks!

Why? Not google, not amazon and the cameras will already be 720p

 

[nebo1ss]

It’s hard for me to believe that decreasing the quality of Nest footage moves the needle at all.

Part of the problem is the movement detection. This is being constantly triggered by people being at home and of course video is a bandwidth nightmare.