blueirissoftware.com website down (2023.07.07)

[wittaj]

I'm not sure if that's true. I thought it was just me until I Googled my issue yesterday. I've never posted on here until I found out it was BI that had the issues. There are plenty of people out there that have never used IPcamtalk.com.

That is why I said "such few number of instances posted here and on other platforms" indicating the other social media platforms that talk about BI. There are lots of other platforms and it isn't a large large number of people talking about it.

 

[SpacemanSpiff]

Irregardless of how many other platforms exist, you are making a generalization based on a relatively small number of data points. The only way to really know is for blue iris to admit how many people it affected, and I don't see them doing that anytime soon. I wouldn't expect any company to do that.

And not once did you even ask the extent of his research before he made the comment.

 

[Mike]

I have been working nonstop on the website portion with Ken, he is working on the backend stuff. The website is up and stable, I am finishing up some minor fixes and adjustments but everything is on the right track. All things considered, this was remedied very fast and I am very proud of Ken for working day and night on this since the issue started.

Please just have patience and understand that BI is Ken's baby, he will do whatever it takes to keep it going and keep every BI license owner happy. I will also do whatever he needs from me as far as the website aspect goes. Jennifer is great at tech and he really has built an awesome team.

Thanks everyone for your patience, and a big thanks to KEN for being on top of this.

 

[Ri22o]

I'm sorry that so many people have had problems. I guess I am one of the lucky ones that has not. I assumed it was because I have my system set up to NOT install updates automatically (but it does notify me of updates), but it appears others have been affected that had updates turned off.

I don't know what I did right, or wrong, but I have not had any issues with my BI machine during all of this.

 

[wittaj]

If he expected people to take his comment as something that was heavily researched and not as a generalization made on a public forum, he should have cited his sources.

But, hey, I'll ask...
@wittaj Can you show your research for your comments above? I am interested to see what platforms you are talking about and I would like to browse them myself. There might be other information on those websites that will help me work with my blue iris install in the future.

Why would I want to provide links to "competing" platforms to this site (and they may get scrubbed out like Amazon will do to links)? We have seen that happen before, so I am not going to waste my time putting those down only to see them removed.

You mentioned you found this site when you Googled your issue, so use Google and you can find many other platforms where BI being down is being discussed. None of them reach the number of posts to this thread, and I suspect many of the comments are the same individual across other platforms, and most of the replies are not "hey I am in eval mode".

You are correct in that only BI has the actual number and they may or may not provide that, but regardless, there is not a lot of internet chatter of people saying this happened to them.

If I wake up in the morning and my Spectrum TV is down, the first thing I do is go online to see if it is an issue before I start screwing around with stuff. If I see no internet chatter, then I unplug the box, modem, etc. and reset it all as it is probably then an issue on my end.

Same with BI. If I wake up to my system down, I am going to the internet first before I start uninstalling, deregistering, re-input my key, etc.

Maybe I will be proven wrong, but the chatter across the internet just doesn't seem like a large percentage of BI users had an issue. Maybe a poll needs to be started LOL.

 

[jepster]

It's a coincidence. He has issues with home Depot as well. This is akin to self diagnosing diseases off WebMD..

I just logged into mycommerce fine with no problems. I dunno, I was probably typing crap backwards. >Insert "Emily Litella" verbiage here...<

 

[SpacemanSpiff]

If he expected people to take his comment as something that was heavily researched and not as a generalization made on a public forum, he should have cited his sources.

See? There it is. Your ipso facto is, in reality, generalizing whilst you complain about people generalizing. Moving forward consider incorporating some respect instead of engaging in the very practices you judge others for.

 

[wittaj]

Ok, you're right. Doing that might lead people away from this wonderful community. And that's not good for business.


How about some data points? If you researched, can you show your work? The internet is a vast place and there's a lot of chatter. How many posts have you seen and how many different platforms? Was your research solely based on "social media" platforms, or did it include other online forums?

It's OK to admit that you're making a generalization. We both agree that the only way to know the true extent of the screw up would be for BI to publicly reveal those numbers.

One social media site I looked at had 12 different "threads" of posting about it and the most comments on any given thread were 32 comments. Many of the comments people referred to this forum to get info on how to get it going.

One online forum site had 15 different "threads" of people posting about it and the most comments on one of the threads was 150 comments. Again many of the comments people referred to go to this forum.

There are several sites that shows if a service is down and they all showed the BI was experiencing an issue and was down and there were zero comments on any of those sites I found.

Let's look at some numbers. This site has 145,447 members. Granted not all of them use BI, but I bet it is a majority percentage and we are what maybe less than 20 (or less I didn't count) that have said they experienced this problem.

Another online forum discussing BI has 10,000 members and again in the low double digits saying they experienced a problem.

Another online forum discussing BI has 4,100 members and nobody mentioned anything about experiencing a problem.

A social media site discussing BI has 5,000 members and again in the low double digits saying they experienced a problem.

And many of the posts I saw across different platforms were "cut/paste" where the person is a member of multiple sites and simply posted in each one.

So I think based on this we can conclude that this impacted a small percentage of the total users.

 

[Ri22o]

 

[brcarls]

^^^^THIS!

View attachment 167473

Is that a pirate? I am sure that his NVR can't be remotely disabled, but there are plenty of better options than going that route.

 

[Coldair]

Success I was able to get my license to install in both machines but I still have one camera I can not get back on line

 

[wittaj]

Again, we are making generalizations. Based on your research, we don't know how many people hold licenses for BI. We also don't know how many people that hold licenses have their servers actually connected to the internet. Based on your research, All we can conclude is that there is a small percentage of the total users posting on internet forums and social media about whether they were impacted or not. Furthermore, we can't assumed that everyone who is affected by this is willing to post on an internet forum or social media about the issue. All we can do is make a generalization about the number of people posting on the internet about it.
I'm not saying you're wrong, and I never did. You did "research" and you showed your work without citing your sources (as we have discussed would be bad for business here on IPcamtalk.com). All I was trying to say was that there's no way we can truly know without blue iris telling us.

Here is another indicator.

Every week, Blue Iris Update Helper (version 1.6+) submits anonymous performance data to the BI database.

Less than 5% show an uptime of less than 5 days. Even if every one of those instances were a result of this issue (which some may not have been and could have been a brand new install), 5% is certainly not widespread.

But alas you won't like that either LOL. Maybe that sample size meets the requirements of being statistically relevant (or maybe not), kinda like how Nielson ratings are based on less than 1% of the total TVs in the USA.

But have you not seen social media - folks will complain about every little thing. Sure there are some that woke up and saw eval and came to this forum and saw the fix and did it and didn't mention a thing, but again, the complaint numbers are small in complaining society.

Basically all I am saying, and lets call it a generalization to make you happy LOL, is that on several sites (social media, other forums, BI own statistical database) it appears that a low percentage of people actually experienced a problem.

 

[wittaj]

I'll be your exhibit A... I was affected and didn't post because the remedy has already been discussed and there's nothing to add.

Maybe I could instead pile onto the surprisingly few who are quite peeved with the idea that my paid application can be switched off at any moment if my system is connected. And my fault for not doing research on the fact BI requires a connection once a year... what an awful requirement for a "security" program that's more or less advertised as "works fine forever if you don't mind not getting updates."

Here is another generalization I am sure some won't like LOL.

I suspect more people have had an NVR die on them and they were completely screwed with no footage than the number of people impacted by this issue. At least with the evaluation watermark you still had something.

I have had surveillance systems for a long time.

I have had whatever the NVR operating system is running on go out. TWICE. Got to buy a whole new NVR - TWICE - was without anything until I got a replacement.

I have had the ethernet port go out on an NVR. Got to buy a whole new NVR.

i had the HDMI port go out on an NVR. Got to buy a whole new NVR.

Most I ever got was 2.5 years. The only working part was the HDD that I simply moved from the old NVR to the new one. I got to the point of realizing that an NVR is simply a stripped down computer, so I went to BI and never looked back. I got tired of buying a whole new unit.

So in my BI Computer, at least if the SSD goes out, I can just replace it. If the ethernet card goes out, I can just replace it. If the HDMI port goes out, I can just replace it. etc.

Knock on wood I didn't experience this problem, but my BI system has been more stable and reliable than any NVR I have had.

And it appears this is one of those failures nobody could have predicted and it has been indicated that the developer is taking steps to make sure this doesn't happen again.

 

[Maniago]

Is there a fix yet? It's hard to wade thru the bickering

 

[jmagill]

Is there a fix yet? It's hard to wade thru the bickering

Put in your Code from when you purchased BI. You will then need to put in your code for yearly updates. If you run it as a service you will have to redo that as well.

 

[wittaj]

You're assuming that everyone who is using the software and is connected to the internet is using Blue Iris Update Helper. I honestly had to look it up to figure out what it was. I don't use it so my data isn't being sent to them. Also, is there a way to opt out of the "anonymous performance data?" I know the option exists for BI and I opted out of that. I'm not familiar with the Update Helper tool, so I don't know what it does.

Additionally, my server didn't go down, it just switched to eval mode. It's still connected to the "mothership" (for lack of a better word). That doesn't count as "downtime." The software is up, it's running, it's just in a non-useable state.


I am very happy that you are willing to admit you are making generalizations. Thank you.

I qualified the statement with the BI helper that I have no idea if it is a statistically relevant sample pool, but knowing how small of a sample pool is used for measuring poll numbers, Nielson ratings, etc. I doubt the BI numbers are +- 65% lol.

So is video with "evaluation" watermark better than an NVR dying and having no video at all LOL? Is it so non-useable that it couldn't be used for anything?

 

[wittaj]

That's not even relevant. You're comparing reliability to bad design

+1 on the person not liking my generalization LOL.

One chooses a vehicle based on reliability. Inherent to that reliability is the design of said vehicle. Reliability and design are tied together.

Since you are saying my comment isn't relevant - are you referring to the NVR as bad design or BI as the bad design LOL?

Regardless, in my experiences BI is more reliable than an NVR. That is my opinion based on my experiences. Maybe you have another opinion.

In my opinion, I would rather wake up one morning to BI in evaluation mode but still captured the door checkers than a dead NVR that captured nothing.

 

[wittaj]

Evidently you haven't experienced evaluation mode...

Actually I have as I test the new versions and new cameras on a different computer that runs a trial version with the watermark before I add the camera to BI or update my system.

As I said, I would rather wake up one morning to BI in evaluation mode but still captured the door checkers than a dead NVR that captured nothing. I have ha d that happen.

 

[wittaj]

I'd rather a program that isn't reliant on the good graces and competency of a single person, to be quite honest. My locally managed system shouldn't be vulnerable to someone effectively nodding off on the big red button elsewhere

When you find such a system for the price of BI and with the same features, please come back and let us know so we can all change.

Almost EVERY product has had an issue at some time. Heck both my vehicles have active recalls at the moment. If I chose a vehicle manufacturer that never had a recall, I wouldn't have a vehicle. Oh wait that is a generalization LOL, but has there every been a car manufacturer that didn't have a recall? Has there ever been a food company that didn't have a recall on something? All of those companies are more than one person. $#!+ happens.

As the developer has stated, the "kill switch" was some freak thing that was never anticipated and he said he will address it.

And again, not everyone experienced this kill switch phenomenon.

 

[jmagill]

I have had BI for over 10 years. This was the first problem that was not my fault.

I bet they are already working on a fix so that this never happens again. All systems have problems at some time or another. I am curious about how long those that are super unhappy have been using BI?