I wanted to test things for myself and had a budget that allowed me to do so, as a result I have installed multiple camera brands, ranging from Hikvision to Dahua to Hosafe to Reolink to Aliexpress $29 no-name cameras to several hundred dollar PTZ cameras. You definitely do get what you pay for. The cheaper brands often default to 'phoning home' and make it difficult to disable such behavior. They often do not work well with NTP servers. The cheaper brands lack settings and options that make communicating with
Blue Iris reliable (ie: iframe or oddball audio and video codecs, high MP but terrible sensors [it doesn't matter if it is a 5MP camera if the sensor doesn't allow you to tell a cat from a raccoon], non-standard (or non existant outside of their mobile apps) PTZ and audio support.
ie: Anything that uses the 'Net Surveillance' web interface belongs in the garbage....that is not to say that you cannot find a use for it (paperweight maybe?), but for the time and effort put into making it work and secure it, a more expensive, higher quality camera that can be set up more easily will make up for the time/effort costs and then some. The Reolink i was given to use was also nearly worthless and it didn't take long for it to end up in the dumpster. Thanks to this forum I have completely avoided Foscam and will continue to do so.
Accusing forum members, who have a great deal of experience with cameras and their setup, of hysteria and a conflict of interest without providing any evidence other than your opinion does nothing except reduce your credibility. Their attitudes are based on their (and others) experiences and, in my opinion and from my own testing, should be heeded as much as possible.