Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

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Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby jeff000 » Sat May 18, 2013 8:38 am

I bought Mobilinc Pro on december 23rd 2012 (according to google). Now on May 18th 2013 (although it could have stopped in the last week as I have been out of town in camp for a week) it is telling me my subscription has expired and I need to spend 30 bucks to get another year. But I purchased the app, not a subscription. And on top of that I didn't even get a year out of it.
And if you are going to charge 30 bucks a year are you going to at least add a feature or two every now and then?

There are 3 Android devices for every iDevice, why not show Android some love if you are charging this much for it? Sure you think that there isn't a market for android, but with a lackluster effort how do you expect to get more than a lackluster response?
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby AdminWes » Sat May 18, 2013 1:30 pm

Jeff,

I responded to your email on our support account earlier this morning that is a duplicate of this post. For others reading this that might have the same question, here was my response:

Hi Jeff,

Your account should have expired in January per our 30-day trial of MobiLinc Connect. Around that time you should have received two emails from us. One about a week from expiration saying that the trial was about to expire and another one after the account expired. We recently discovered a bug in our backend that allowed a few accounts through after expiration that we fixed last weekend. It looks like your account was one that was inadvertently authorized which leads to the confusion as to why it expired now when it should have expired in January.

The MobiLinc Connect subscription is one way you can connect with your ISY. We think it’s the easiest and most reliable way to control your ISY in and out of your home, however, you have the option with our paid apps to make a direct connection instead if you are comfortable with network settings, firewall routing rules, setting up fixed IP addresses, etc. Some of our users really understand networking and would prefer to manage this on their own. For those that prefer this, the subscription isn’t required if MobiLinc is configured to make a direct connection to the ISY.

If you’d like to learn more about directly connecting to your ISY and setting up your network to allow this in and out of your home, please see the following link:
viewtopic.php?f=31&t=413

To answer your last question, yes, absolutely more features are coming to MobiLinc Connect and our paid subscribers. With our cloud service it puts us in a unique position to offer additional functionality like real-time push notifications not available any other way. This is a feature we are currently working on for MLC users.

Let me know if you have any questions.
Wes


In this post, this was added that wasn't in the support email we received:
There are 3 Android devices for every iDevice, why not show Android some love if you are charging this much for it? Sure you think that there isn't a market for android, but with a lackluster effort how do you expect to get more than a lackluster response?


We've never claimed that there isn't a market for Android. We've always stated that we have and will continue to support the Android platform as our resources allow. I take issue with the claim that our Andorid effect is "lackluster". If you feel this strongly about our Android effort, please email us at support@mobilinc.com to offer specific and constructive suggestions and feedback on how we can improve.

Wes
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby jeff000 » Sat May 18, 2013 7:52 pm

Thanks for the quick reply. Sorry for posting this in a couple spots, but I felt blind sided by the message.
I'm just going to copy and past what I wrote on the other forum.

InsteonNut wrote:
We've never claimed that there isn't a market for Android. We've always stated that we have and will continue to support the Android platform as our resources allow. I take issue with the claim that our Andorid effect is "lackluster". If you feel this strongly about our Android effort, please email us at support@mobilinc.com to offer specific and constructive suggestions and feedback on how we can improve.

Wes


A couple of your posts from other threads. I will just put them here for you to read again.



InsteonNut wrote:Hi Jeff,

The Apple and Google platforms are quite different and require us to rewrite the code for each platform. We invested in the iOS platform for IP Cameras due to the overwhelming demand for this feature and we are evaluating the effort/return on porting this code over to Android/MobiLinc.

Wes

InsteonNut wrote:Hi Nikki and arw01,

Nikki, you are right in stating that there are at least or more Android handsets. What we've witnessed over the last few years as iOS and Android duke it out is the home automation space is absolutely dominated by iOS devices and users. As a result we skew heavily to iOS as that's where the majority user base resides. There are enough Android users out there to keep us engaged and supporting the Android platform, but we're having to focus our energy and limited resources on features that we think the respective platforms will respond to.

Unfortunately for Android users, the Android tablet market is not competing well with the iPad. Especially when you only look at the home automation user market. Because of the lack of demand, we've placed out MobiLinc HD plans on hold for Android.

We do have plans for adding IP Camera support after our Tasker integration is complete.

Hopefully this info helps to explain our new feature decisions. If you want to discuss further, please feel free to contact us at support@mobilinc.com

Wes


Of the ~15 people I know with insteon devices and mobilinc only one is on an apple device. Either your stats are flawed or seriously outdated at this point. Apple is getting destroyed in market share. It's hard to think that with more than double the devices the home automation demand wouldn't be at least equal. Maybe you just don't see the demand in your sales because you don't offer enough to the android crowd and are incorrectly correlating that to having a smaller home automation market.
I've found that the iphone users just whine a lot more than the android users in general. There are certainly other ip camera options for Android. But would be real nice to have it all rolled up nice into one account.
There is also the Elk security that is ios only.


arw01 wrote:I agree with Wes here, you certainly have the option of NOT using the Mobilinc connect subscription service. You are talking $2.50 a month, skip a soda sometime when eating out.


Knowing where the cost is from now, I really don't care. But seriously would like to see some advancement of the app. In the least catch it up to the Apple app.
2.50 a month is cheap and I seriously almost literally throw away much more than than in a month. But that charge is ridiculous for a cloud service as small as they are providing. Added features certainly shouldn't be too much to ask for, especially since those features are in the ios app.
That or android charge should be significantly smaller.
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby AdminWes » Sun May 19, 2013 8:59 am

Jeff,

I'm actually not totally clear on your exact issue or complaint with us or MobiLinc/Android is at this point. We've tried to be clear on our position on Android. Let me restate:

- IP Camera support is on our roadmap for Android.
- We are working on specific Android features like Tasker integration. This is highly technical and is taking some time to implement for our Android user base. Once we get this out the door, we're looking at several more Android enhancements to make. Some will bring Android in line with iOS. Others are Android specific, like Tasker support.
- MobiLinc Connect works the same on Android as it does on iOS. There are no feature differences as you incorrectly claimed.

I do realize that our Android users are very passionate about MobiLinc and Android and I/we really appreciate that energy and feedback. The reality is, we have limited resources for Android and iOS developers and we have to walk a fine line to balance our internal priorities with what the market will support and respond to.

I ask for your patience as we put our resources to work on continuing to develop and support for these platforms and services.

Wes
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby jeff000 » Sun May 19, 2013 11:31 am

AdminWes wrote:Jeff,

I'm actually not totally clear on your exact issue or complaint with us or MobiLinc/Android is at this point. We've tried to be clear on our position on Android. Let me restate:

- IP Camera support is on our roadmap for Android.
- We are working on specific Android features like Tasker integration. This is highly technical and is taking some time to implement for our Android user base. Once we get this out the door, we're looking at several more Android enhancements to make. Some will bring Android in line with iOS. Others are Android specific, like Tasker support.
- MobiLinc Connect works the same on Android as it does on iOS. There are no feature differences as you incorrectly claimed.

I do realize that our Android users are very passionate about MobiLinc and Android and I/we really appreciate that energy and feedback. The reality is, we have limited resources for Android and iOS developers and we have to walk a fine line to balance our internal priorities with what the market will support and respond to.

I ask for your patience as we put our resources to work on continuing to develop and support for these platforms and services.

Wes



The tasker integration, seems interesting, but i'm not sure what it will do. And I will admit I haven't looked into yet. From the outside it seems like tasker will kind of bypass (for lack of a better word at the moment) the isy994 programming ability.

But that aside.
IP camera support would be real nice to have, and on the road map is a nice thing to say but is fairly ambiguous, and I am sure on purpose.

I understand that mobilinc connect works the same on Android and iOS. My point was that at this point the iOS Mobilinc Pro does significantly more. IP camera support is a large issue.
You posted earlier on the other forum that you guys took the time and effort to add IP cameras to iOS after you saw some demand. I am telling you there is at least equal demand for this feature on Android.

It's like buying a basic car vs a loaded car, you never pay the same for the basic car as you do the loaded car.
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby AdminWes » Mon May 20, 2013 6:50 am

Jeff,

Tasker is a pretty powerful way to bridge events that happen on your phone with actions. So for example, when your phone logs into your Wi-Fi (you just got home) you could have a Tasker event to turn your lights on in your home with our Tasker support. It's really nothing like the ISY programming at all. It's a whole new level of integration between your phone and your home.

We do see IP Camera integration demand on Android and that's why it's on our roadmap. However, I don't have a timeline that I can announce publicly.

Just to clarify, the iOS version does do more, however, those add-on are paid plugins. The base app is nearly the same on both iOS and Android. So yes, while iOS has more options, the iOS users are also paying more for those extra features.

Wes
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby jeff000 » Mon May 20, 2013 1:20 pm

AdminWes wrote:Jeff,

Tasker is a pretty powerful way to bridge events that happen on your phone with actions. So for example, when your phone logs into your Wi-Fi (you just got home) you could have a Tasker event to turn your lights on in your home with our Tasker support. It's really nothing like the ISY programming at all. It's a whole new level of integration between your phone and your home.

We do see IP Camera integration demand on Android and that's why it's on our roadmap. However, I don't have a timeline that I can announce publicly.

Just to clarify, the iOS version does do more, however, those add-on are paid plugins. The base app is nearly the same on both iOS and Android. So yes, while iOS has more options, the iOS users are also paying more for those extra features.

Wes


The only problem I see with using wifi signal to control lights or whatever else is what happens when you drop your wifi signal for a minute or two, all your lights turn on in the middle of the night?
What other things will it be able to do?

If I had to guess about the ip camera thing I would say it's not being actively worked on at this time.

The resource plug in would be nice to have on android too.

I feel like my fees are paying for the iOS device development, since there are 4 iOS plug ins to 1 android.
I don't mind paying for a good app or addition to that app.
And yes I understand the tasker addition is taking a lot of work and is Android specific. I still do not see the full benefit of it yet though.
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby hbsh01 » Wed May 22, 2013 1:42 pm

I am a bit fed up by all the talk & complaining about the Android version of Mobilinc’s so-called lack of “full support of the ISY” because it doesn’t have IP camera support.

Mobilinc is a home automation app to control an Insteon/ISY/SmartLinc network. Camera support has NOTHING to do with Insteon & home automation control. Would it be nice to have camera support within Mobilinc so when I switch on a light I can see it happening live? Sure. But so would be having Google Maps integrated in the app so on my way home while I adjust the A/C I should be able to see the traffic conditions on the road… Perhaps Mobilinc should also integrate email into the app so when I turn on/off some devices I can see the email notification within the app... Perhaps a music player should also be added to Mobilinc… You get the point. All of those things and more would be nice to have somehow in one app, but since they don’t really have much in common there are many separate apps available to do those things.

I speculate that the only reason it was added to the iOS version is because SmartHome’s app for the SmartLinc has it, so Mobilinc felt compelled to add it as well. But the bottom line is, that while IP camera support would be a nice feature, it really has nothing to do with what Mobilinc is all about. So if they are going to add this feature in the future, that’s great, but to knock Mobilinc for Android because it doesn’t have it now is not fair in my opinion.

Some have also added to the complaint mix the $20 price for the app which is relatively high compared to other apps in the Play Store. Well it’s pretty simple, as we all know home automation & Insteon so far are niche products, and the developer has to make up somehow for the low volume.

Finally, some have been saying in response to WES’ reply that he is working on Tasker integration, that they don’t understand what Tasker is, therefore they feel that IP camera support should have come before Tasker integration. I couldn’t disagree more. With tasker integration Mobilinc will open the floodgates for home automation sophistication on a level that could only have been dreamed of before. The possibilities of what could be done with tasker are really endless. The first thing I would do is to use tasker to open my front door for me automatically as I approach. Voice commands is also something I started looking into as it seems that the new release is approaching soon. So tasker integration –not camera support- is really what Mobilinc’s core mission is about: Home automation.

In conclusion: Mobilinc is an amazing app with excellent support, and is well worth its $20 price tag. I am looking forward & cannot wait for the release of Tasker integration.

P.S.
A while back I played a little with Tasker using REST commands. For testing purposes I set it up to send REST commands based on my phone being connected to my Bluetooth headset. It was amazing to watch how when I turned on my Bluetooth headset the light in the room turned on, and when I powered off my headset the light turned off. The problem was that I just couldn’t get REST commands to work with HTTPS so I didn’t go any further with it. Can’t wait for the official Tasker support within Mobilinc!
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby dlindamood » Fri May 24, 2013 4:14 am

I posted some feature requests on another part of this forum and never even got a response.
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Re: Mobilinc Pro..... Why do I have to pay again?

Postby AdminWes » Fri May 24, 2013 6:59 am

dlindamood,

We saw your most recent post, but haven't responded yet due to that feature request not really being possible at this time. We've responded to all other posts you've made on the forum.

Also, you might want to try emailing us directly or creating a new topic or better yet, "bumping" your old topic for a response instead of posting to an unrelated topic.

Wes
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