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Comment by wyuenho | Hacker News Reader

I'm going to go out on a limb here to point out the inconsistency of this entire thread. For the following reasoning, I'm going to use the word "ad" in the broad sense.

1. Everybody is excited with Github's new features that they promote on the dashboard. Sometimes popups and flashes too. Are they not ads?

2. Nobody ever complains about Github showing ads.

3. Github is a SaaS.

4. unify.ui.com is a SaaS

5. OP is complaining about ads on a SaaS.

6. Most people here don't seem to like this banner in question, but that's not how they phrase their responses.

Is this a case of some random Amazonian complaining about intrusive ads or or a case of ads, even for self promotions, aren't allowed in SaaS?

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Github makes it a single click to hide their intrusive notifications and such. They're rather tasteful at where and when they show you something. They have a notifications panel you can click once and then it won't bug you until the next time.

This screenshot shows the ad takes up a huge chunk of real estate and can only be turned off by presumably opting out of some new experience, which means it might become permanent. If enough of the internet protests, obviously Ubiquity might re-think their recent actions... but it won't change their overall product direction which is to try to encourage you to buy newer products by any means they can.

The proper equivalent would be if my Amazon Echo started showing me ads for a new Amazon Echo, or if I launched the Echo app and it said, hey, do you want to buy the new Echo at the top and I couldn't remove it. Perhaps another comparison: What if Nest suddenly changed to show an ad when you went to change your thermostat's settings such that you could learn about the new Nest that replaces your old hunk of junk? Or imagine if you opened System Preferences or About This Mac, and saw an ad for the latest and greatest MacBook from Apple? Like, do I really want to see stats about how my battery life is only 10% that of the newest Apple Silicon?

SaaS or not, there's a difference between advertising some new service I don't need and advertising new HARDWARE I don't need within my existing, perfectly good, management control panel for my existing hardware. Whether its hosted on a website or not is just an implementation detail. They could have used Electron, same result.

Apple is already pushing you ads in macOS, just click on the App Store menu item, or open Music, or News, or TV, or Podcasts.

I don't disagree much with what you said, I'm just not sure if people actually know what they are arguing for. If the Ubiquity ad is too intrusive, complain about that. If it's a sweeping stance against all ads in things you've paid for, argue for that. I'm not seeing people make that distinction here. It's always both, and you can't argue for both at the same time.

The first tweet argues against ads in SaaS, and the second tweet argues against intrusive ads. If you argue against intrusive ads, then that means non-intrusive ads should be okay. If you argue for a blanket no-ad policy in products or services you've already paid for, even if the ads come from the same company you've bought your goods from, you don't need to argue whether the ads are intrusive or not.

This is what OP and lots of people don't seem to understand, and I'm quite surprised that this kind of logic actually flies on HN.

I have previously, strenuously argued against ads in the App Store and will continue to do so until I manage to singlehandedly change Apple’s mind on this (yeah, not happening, I know…)

Outside of that, I’m okay with Apple showing ads for their music service or iCloud storage. As I said earlier, ads for services are one thing but ads for hardware are another. Intrusive or otherwise, I think it crosses a very big line to advertise your new hardware that replaces my old hardware from within a management control panel for said old hardware.

That said, I let it slide when it’s a feature distinction, for instance the management for the EdgeRouter X would mention features only in upgraded hardware or my AP management would have more features if combined with a Smart Firewall. That’s acceptable because I’m not asking you to fork your software to hide features I can’t use — it would be nice, but it’s understandable if you want to rub it in my face that there’s more you can do for me, like Premium Service upgrades or new software features (maybe).

Where I absolutely draw the line though is when perfectly good hardware advertises its replacement and I’ll stick with that, even if others are less consistent.

> 4. unify.ui.com is a SaaS

The Ad has shown on my locally deployed piece of software that's controlling hardware. It's not SaaS, it's a program for managing physical hardware running on my hardware.

And it has replaced USEFUL information (channel utilization and client counts) with a fullscreen unremovable ad.

How can you defend this crap?

> it's a program for managing physical hardware running on my hardware.

That's not what the article suggests. The article suggests an ad on a page with an ubiquiti url.

While it may be the same software under the hood, I agree that seeing an ad when I'm on someone else's hosted page is (somewhat) acceptable unless I'm a paying customer, but seeing it on my own machine isn't.

In the end since those are two entirely different things and the article seems to be discussing their hosted version, It's important to keep those things apart

I don't understand how can you keep things apart when it's the same software?

If I can self host it expect no ads (ie when I see that interface on an url that says 192.168...). If I pay a subscription for a service I expect no ads there.

If I buy a gadget and use the manufacturers’ cloud service “for free” (apart from the hardware purchase) then I expect anything.

I wouldn’t want to use a cloud service to access what’s on my own hardware. Apart from ease of configuration, what’s the point of it? Why wouldn’t I rather go to my own server?

> That's not what the article suggests. The article suggests an ad on a page with an ubiquiti url.

It's both. UniFi is product line of network hardware which is managed by a central controller. The controller is available as a software download, and Ubiquiti sells a few devices that are pre-configured to run it (the "Dream Machine" from the ad, and their "Cloud Key", which is just a PoE-powered mini-appliance that runs the controller). The controller's UI can be accessed either directly, or via a Ubiquiti-run cloud service. The tweet shows the latter, but having recently upgraded my controller, I can confirm that the ad also appears when directly accessing the UI. What's worse, there's a link offering to go back to the "Classic Dashboard" on my install, but it doesn't appear to work.

On my install, it worked when I went to settings and found "Use new interface in all pages" or something like that. Disabling that option kicked the UI back to the non-insane version.

> I can confirm that the ad also appears when directly accessing the UI.

This is vital information. This is definitely not okay for practical reasons.

They removed local management apparently.[1]

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26631513

> unify.ui.com is a SaaS

As far as I am concerned, UniFi is a set of compatible hardware products. Physical goods. Expensive, high-quality physical goods that I have already paid for. None of that is like GitHub.

But it looks like they want to be a SaaS instead, maybe because that's where the ad revenue is. But that's not what I as a buyer of WiFi APs want from them in any way whatsoever.

I think they’re trying to position themselves for a buyout. The massive effort to push everyone onto unifi.ui.com is the hint. The subscriptions tab in that portal is the second hint. Eventually they’ll try again and again and as soon as they have enough people locked into the cloud version they’ll pull the trigger and force subscriptions.

Even if they burn the brand, they won’t care. It’ll become SonicWall Cloud or some BS sub brand of a bigger vendor.

Look at the UDMP. There’s no reason that thing couldn’t have let’s encrypt integration for people that want external access without the cloud BS. Plus, local access over http is a bad design IMO. So if it’s a worse product and less secure, why do it? Usually when things don’t add up it’s safe to assume something is amiss.

I'm using Github for free, but I paid Ubiquiti a lot of money for their hardware. For me this is the major difference and the reason why I have different expectations while using their services.

> 3. Github is a SaaS.

> 4. unify.ui.com is a SaaS

One of those is not like the other. Unify UI is completely useless without a corresponding purchase of a physical good.

I don't care about Github's "ads" (quotes are intentional) because (1) they most unintrusive (2) not selling me an expensive piece of hardware

Either they are ads or they are not, whether they are intrusive or what they are selling, or even aren't selling anything are immaterial. If they are promoting something, it's an ad.

Lol. You are missing the point.

You pay Ubiquiti for the hardware and software to control the hardware. And they still show you ads in the software!

You're paying nothing to GitHub.

Github shows self-promotion even on paid accounts.

unify.ui.com is not just any software. It's a hosted management interface. They are selling you a service on top of some hardware. Services self-promote.

At this point, I'm willing to argue the issue at hand isn't even about intrusive ads or whether SaaS should self-promote. This is likely a case of people's idea of ownership has been challenged. They thought they bought a physical good, they hold complete ownership of it, and they didn't tell the hardware to sell them things. What lots of people have failed to connect is, Ubiquity routers are hardware/software/service bundles. Specifically in this case, they are trying to sell you "powerful insights and control", AKA some analytics and remote management capabilities that's only available on specific hardware/unify combo. People don't have a problem with SaaS running on some cloud hardware self-promoting, so logically why should people have a problem with SaaS attached to some hardware that you can touch self-promoting. Well, it turns out people don't like that. It's too drastic a change, it upends our traditional understanding of what purchasing physical good means. People still think they bought a piece a hardware, they can move it around and open it up, and therefore they own everything related to it. It requires thinking to process that in fact, you've bought some hardware, but the service is just a license, and you don't own it. None of these reactions are rational, it's just human psychology.

Github has ads? Not on the repository pages, which are the only ones worth visiting.

it's more like they nag 'bout this and that, i'm astonished everytime i use a browser w/o ublock.

From what I can see it takes up the space that would have been used by the stats from that equipment if you had it installed - so it's a lot less problematic than if they were taking up space that could have been put to better use.

I think some of the responses in this thread reek of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

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