[hau]

This screen comes with a subscription based cloud CMS. The only way to pass image to this display semms to be through a proprietary application which is this so called CMS. There are no other connectivity options mentioned.

You are unable to use this screen if:

- subscription is not paid

- company decides to terminate your subscription under any condition of your contract

- company decides to sunset software or a product

- company doesn't exist anymore

- CMS isn't compatible with your device anymore

[jayvoordemensen]

Hey! It's Jay, I'm a journalist and developer and I've done most of the work on the front and backend of Project E Ink. Happy to answer your questions!

So what we've done: we're indeed running our own Visionect servers these devices connect to. We've build a friendly and news-centered frontend so the display shows news, updates on new editions (or a user-set timeframe), or forgets about newspapers altogether and displays HTML on any URL you provide.

If we were to sunset or go MIA or anything else unforeseen and unlikely you will still have an awesome display that you can configure to connect to any other Visionect server in the world. And indeed: these servers are Docker-images you can deploy yourself https://hub.docker.com/r/visionect/visionect-server-v3/

So the deal is: a screen and our software. If you don't like our software you'll still have an awesome screen that'll work as long as there's Docker and TCP/IP ;)

[hau]

Hey, thanks. Yeah it seems it could be run just fine without some cloud based third party paid services, and the suite is nice and accessible, that's cool. I am just really confused by Visionect product page I guess.

[junon]

I don't think I'm your target demographic but I always appreciate folks who make their hardware accessible like this. Thank you :)

[sandworm101]

Who is the target demo? I'm old enough to have had actual newspapers appear on my doorstep. I ever saw anyone mount them on a wall, at least not in a private home. I would think a table/tablet orientation would be more appealing than an awkward wall mount. Is this thing meant to be art, a bit of faux-nostalgia decoration?

[happytiger]

I think it's not that dissimilar to people who have a rotary telephone in their kitchen in 2023, use records, play tapes, hack Commodore 64 systems, or who use old Panasonic handhelds. There's a degree of personal expression in vintage technology that exceeds mere nostalgia.

I can't speak for this creator, but often these niche products serve a community of like-minded, or in fact are the mechanism or way to find and connect with a community of like minded people.

I think of folks doing projects around old technology paradigms as similar people to those who grew up building hot rods and find building cars to be greatly satisfying. Hacking a newspaper on your wall is similar, but in more of a dick tracy watch ethos.

[unholythree]

I’ve seen newspapers hung above urinals as reading material. Generally the front page or the sports page under glass.

[nilram]

Back in the day, I'd flip it around to display the Fry's ad.

[oneeyedpigeon]

I think people definitely do mount significant newspaper and magazine covers. The advantage of this, of course, is that it changes daily.

It's part function, part art piece imo. I can imagine somebody who's fairly well off drinking their morning coffee whilst reading this on their wall. A statement piece for the guests at their fashionable dinner parties too.

[kbenson]

Yeah, my initial thought when someone said people don't mount newspapers was that yes, they do, even if not always in a personal or home context. It's exactly the type of thing you might see at certain bars, and there's no shortage of interesting famous front pages to display[1]. They're often about disasters, but there's notable very positive ones as well, such as the announcement of peace and the end of WWI and WWII, the famous newspaper announcing we arrived at the moon, etc.

Or you could just have it cycle through the most outlandish front pages from the Weekly World News about the latest exploits of Bat Boy[2]. Or switch to whatever your tastes are for the day! :)

  1: https://www.google.com/search?q=famous+newspaper+front+pages&tbm=isch

  2: https://www.google.com/search?q=bat+boy

[junon]

I think it's clear this isn't supposed to solve a problem. The article describes it pretty clearly as more of an art piece than something of function.

There are definitely people who would like this in their homes. Probably multiple.

[sandworm101]

If it is going to be art, I'd use some more creative content than daily newspapers. A series of fictional newspapers would be better. I would much rather it display a the front page of the Gothem Times with the latest Batman v. Joker news. Even realworld historical headlines would make for a better conversation piece. Older monochrome front pages would also probably look better on such as display.

[junon]

That's your opinion I guess.

[Popeyes]

You could tie it into a calendar app and have it as a family organiser sitting in the hallway.

[infotogivenm]

I would guess people who spend a lot of money on interior design. It’s a nice statement piece IMO.

[mym1990]

Harry Potter fans possibly :)

[sandworm101]

If they got the actual newspaper animations and such from the movies, THAT would sell. An e-ink Harry headline, or wanted poster, would be something that any potter fan would seriously consider.

[eli]

Is that compliant with Visionect's licensing? Their site says "A license is needed for every device." I don't doubt that it technically works.

[codethief]

Hey Jay, thanks so much for your work! The screen looks very beautiful but for me personally it would be much more attractive if it could also be used for reading the entire newspaper, not just the front page. Any plans to include (tiny) buttons to switch pages?

In this case, during breakfast I could put the screen on a stand on my table, and read the news without having to resort to a backlit screen / news app on my phone. Though, maybe 32" would be a bit big for my breakfast table, not sure. :)

[TheRealPomax]

> connect to any other Visionect server in the world

Okay but what if, like a sane person, I don't want to give it direct internet access and have my own data I want to put on the wall? Can I pay less to get less (e.g. just the screen with an HDMI or DP connector so I can connect it to literally any raspi, picture frame, nuc, etc. etc. in my house)?

[infotogivenm]

A pi in hostapd hotspot mode should work fine, right? Anyways I would guess most of the (“insane?”) target users of this device probably don’t want to mess with any of that.

[tohnjitor]

I once designed some outdoor bezels for your 13" and 32" displays. nice pieces of hardware! Wish eink prices were lower in general.

[michaelmrose]

Why doesn't it have a way to directly push an image to the screen like a $30 router from worst buy? It looks like the software to push an image to a display can be run on your own device but then you need an $80 box and if I read this right you need to pay $72 a year forever.

https://www.visionect.com/software/

[redroyal]

Well if you’re sold on paying 2000 euro for the display it’s a drop in the bucket. Who reads newspapers in 2023 anyway? Why not just get a subscription to a newspaper for like $50/yr? Then you can sit and read it instead of standing facing a wall. I don’t get this product. A solution in need of a problem

[michaelmrose]

If you or some future buyer want to keep it for 20 years and want to run your own hardware to deal with it you will probably end up sourcing at least 2 single board computers for around $160 and paying $72x20 adjusted up for inflation or 1440-2160. You will spend at least 30 minutes picking out a machine and some number of hours over the years managing each machine.

This is of course assuming it doesn't actually stop working or some aspect of the process isn't broken.

All this so you can run a docker container with postgres instead of pushing an image to an endpoint on the local network. It's both bad and unimpressive engineering.

Furthermore if it did need central management for business purpose THAT would be something that consumes the same simple process for showing something on the screen.

<COMPLEX SOFTWARE> => posts image => shows image

This would trivially allow you to build on the simple process if that is all you need. It's not so much bad engineering as gross engineering its engineered to be complicated to they can insert themselves into the process to stick their hand in your wallet.

[ThrowawayR2]

Because the Visonect devices and software are meant for commercial and business customers as information displays that are centrally managed, not for use as a consumer product, and is designed around those use cases. That somebody bought one and repurposed it for a hobby art project doesn't change that.

[kian]

Is there an email I can reach you at about something related?

[veegee]

If Docker is in any way _required_, it's still a dealbreaker.

[c0balt]

Docker is not magic, just extract the contents an OCI image[1] and run it with your favorite container runtime, like cri-o[2]. Or use the docker or OCI inage with podman[0].

And if containers are the problem then unpack the image into it's contents, take the binary, relink it and run it on bare metal.

[0]: https://podman.io/ [1]: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/73961256/how-to-convert-... [2]: https://github.com/cri-o/cri-o/tree/main

[javajosh]

That's an extremist view.

[danderoo]

You like to have it signed by RMS personally?

(Nothing against the FSF, but "dealbreaker" is a very relative concept.)

[callalex]

Docker is never required by anything, it just makes communicating software dependencies simple and concise.

[p10jkle]

No, this isn't true. I run the Visionect software suite (https://docs.visionect.com/VisionectSoftwareSuite/index.html) on a Raspberry pi and the screen talks to it over localhost. No outbound connectivity or subscription is needed.

[muki]

I would like to caveat that a bit. I'm running two Visionect screens at home (I really do love them, hardware-wise especially) from a similar setup (local Visionect server running on Raspberry Pi).

As far as I understand though, they have stopped offering support for non-subscribers, and they also seem to have stopped producing builds for ARM devices a couple of years ago (but the server software works even with new firmware versions). I am still betting on them supporting local installs for a while (based on my understanding that at least some of their corporate clients would want an on-prem solution), but am a little bit worried it might not be as openly available forever. I am therefore slowly researching my best migration path from a Raspberry Pi to some affordable and reasonably low powered x86 thing. Suggestions welcome.

P.S.: The biggest selling point for me compared with some other (more open) E-ink screens is the battery. I keep mine on the fridge with a magnet and can't really use one that needs to be plugged in all the time in the same place. If anyone knows of anything similar and controllable locally, I'd be very interested to read about it.

[BeefySwain]

> some affordable and reasonably low powered x86 thing

https://www.digital-loggers.com/api.html

[hau]

Thank you. I think their product page is pushing cloud subscription too hard, they call subscription the same way they call display itself, and subscription is paid and cloud based. Product page says: "Place & Play devices work on a subscription basis. Select a plan here.", and "A license is needed for every device." while describing software suite.

I'm still confused about the way it presented, but documentation and suite itself look quite decent.

[beheh]

You may be confusing purchasing hardware and cloud subscription from the vendor producing the e ink display (Visionect) with the Project E ink device itself, which merely sources it's hardware from Visionect. The linked page is about the Project E ink device (https://projecteink.com/products/e-ink-newspaper-art-display...).

The only place that page mentions a subscription is in reference to news paper subscriptions.

[Tempest1981]

hau might have followed the Visionect link, then clicked "software":

https://www.visionect.com/software/

[hau]

https://www.visionect.com/shop/place-play-32/

This is a product page I looked at. Hard to interpret "Place & Play devices work on a subscription basis. Select a plan here." near "Add to cart" button.

[eli]

It’s not clear that is still supported (or indeed legally licensed) or that it will be in the future.

[harper]

I also run visionect locally to power a couple of displays around the house. When I recently went to go buy a few more - it was clear that they require a subscription. I emailed them and they confirmed that they now require a subscription.

It’s a bummer because I don’t think there are as good quality displays to replace visionect with, but the subscription was far too much.

[stavros]

If you prefer something more hobby-grade, I made a similar thing with an ESP32-based screen:

https://www.stavros.io/posts/making-the-timeframe/

It fetches images from HTTP every half hour and shows them.

[paulcole]

That’s OK though right? As long as you know that going in you can decide if it’s worth it for you. Personally, I’d rather have something that works out of the box in exchange for a bit of money and risk that the company will go out of business one day than something that I have to spend time tinkering with to get and keep working.

[hau]

It's not OK in my opinion to have perfectly capable hardware and software be obsoleted by circumstances outside of your control. I consider it to be wasteful and unnecessary. It don't have to conflict with convinience and services provided by cloud CMS. As we've figured out in other thread this is not an issue with this particular display - apparently, you could make it work without touching external networks, and it's decently supported by Visionect way of doing things.

[thih9]

> As long as you know that going in you can decide if it’s worth it for you.

But it looks like there's no way to know that going in? I have checked the product page and found no information that the CMS is paid.

Based on the current description ("Comes with personal online portal to set up and change the content of your screen." [1]) I wouldn't expect an additional subscription.

[1]: https://projecteink.com/products/e-ink-newspaper-art-display...

[brentcetinich]

I have taken a look at the protocol between the software and the display and it is straightforward to hack, but the docker image is lightweight and reliable enough that I don't see the need to.

[thih9]

Is there a link to a page that shows subscription pricing?

[ar_lan]

Hey, isn't this the Peloton model?