Unrelated to this (and sorry for highjacking this topic), but just want to say a big big thank you to ladyada for founding Adafruit.
When we decided to go fully open source hardware at AirGradient, I looked at the ‘business’ models of two companies: Adafruit and Arduino.
Seeing that both worked sustainably, made our decision much easier and it was probably one of the best decisions of our life. I just talked at the Open Hardware summit in Berlin about “50 devices later: The open source hardware advantage” [1].
Is it only me or are you guys also being disappointed when a very interesting article is heavily AI written?
I feel like not wanting to read it in depth, even though the topic is unique and something I like to learn more.
It’s a shame because there was probably quite some work that went into it: coming up with the topic, doing the research, polish it up etc.
I have also been using AI a lot for article writing but the last two posts I wrote I went back into handwriting. They are much less “perfect”, but they are me and 100% what I want to say and convey.
Even the imperfections matter.
Maybe like a piece of handmade furniture vs something from IKEA.
It’s actually a nice article if it wouldn’t be so obviously AI written.
In my opinion this really devalues the reputation I am having for a publication and is a pity especially in this particular case as home assistant is such a great community.
I guess for a lot of the Show HN posts, people could accuse of being Ads.
This was an honest account of my experience coding this. If you do a bit of research on our company, you might come to a different judgement. But obviously everybody is free to have their own opinions.
I actually think this could be the completely wrong approach.
By focusing on only one persona, you might focus on one that for reasons NOT covered in this questionnaire does not work out.
Practical example from us at AirGradient. Initially, we had a strong focus on selling air quality monitoring to schools.
Our strategy would have ticked all boxes in this article but selling to schools turned out to be extremely difficult. In our case, the problem was that decision makers are often not the people benefiting from the solution. Another reason for that persona being very difficult was that air quality is not a core competency of a school.
So I actually think that you should have a relatively broad approach because often the customer that you will be successful with you actually might not know when you start.
Achim from AirGradient here. Great to see this posted.
When we first heard about this new sensor, we were quite pessimistic about its performance but have been pleasantly surprised by its performance. It is something we consider now for potential future products.
We are also currently testing the energy consumption because we believe the fanless design should make it quite efficient; but not sure how much the laser needs. So we will keep the article updated as learn more.
You can use an air purifier. The Hepa filters are effective in eliminating PM. Gases like NO2 and VOCs can be reduced with carbon filters. Make sure that your carbon filter is large and different get saturated too quickly.
What’s important to understand is that PM2.5 is not PM2.5.
It only defines the diameter of the particles but can be composed of very different elements. From salt that dissolves in the lungs to toxic metals.
Currently it is extremely difficult to get a comprehensive understanding of the health impacts of these particles.
Much more research needs to be done to understand which particle compositions and thus what sources of air pollution (eg traffic, wildfires, factories, landfills, ports etc) have what kind of health effects.
If you are interested to see an image how different PM2.5 particle look like, have a look at the photo in this blog post that one of our in-house scientists wrote [1].
Achim from AirGradient here. Some thoughts on this.
Purely focusing on the display, I can see a certain logic to say: Display not working => Not recommended. And probably I chose the wrong title for this as it made the article too much focused on this aspect.
However, the main critique for me is actually the general subjective nature of the article and the lack of a systematic testing approach for the monitors. In my opinion this review should not to be called "The Best Indoor Monitors" if Wired has an intention to provide objective and a balanced assessment of indoor monitors.
Of course I am unhappy that our monitor got labelled as "Not Recommended", but the bigger picture to what extent these "Best ..." reviews do provide a fair and comprehensive assessment is in my opinion the much more important discussion that we should have.
Yes, I did not mention our outdoor monitor being featured because I don't see this as a success when I critique the whole methodology of the review.
As I mentioned above, we are working on a refresh of the indoor monitor. The display is also under discussion but so far with 10s of thousands of the indoor monitor sold, I am only aware of a single digit number of cases of a failed display.
A few thoughts from me on the discussion so far, which I find incredibly insightful. Many thanks to everyone sharing their perspectives. I truly appreciate it.
On subjective reviews:
I think there's absolutely nothing wrong with reviews based primarily on an author's subjective opinion. However, such reviews should be appropriately labeled. For example, "My Favorite Air Quality Monitors" rather than "The Best Indoor Air Quality Monitors". The title sets reader expectations for objective evaluation with consistent methodology.
On the defective display:
Important clarification: we did not ship a broken device. The display issue developed during the review period—this wasn't a QC failure on our part. Hardware can fail during use (as it can with any electronic device), which is exactly why we immediately offered replacement parts, a new unit, and detailed repair instructions when we learned about it.
On the tiny display and lessons learned:
We're well aware that opinions on our display vary significantly, as evidenced by this discussion. Some users love it, others find it too small. We actually have differing opinions within the AirGradient team as well.
We're planning a refresh of our indoor monitor next year and are currently testing around 10 different display types—including e-ink, colour OLED, touchscreens, and others. So far, we haven't found the ideal replacement, but we're planning to involve our community later this year to gather feedback on the various options.
When we decided to go fully open source hardware at AirGradient, I looked at the ‘business’ models of two companies: Adafruit and Arduino.
Seeing that both worked sustainably, made our decision much easier and it was probably one of the best decisions of our life. I just talked at the Open Hardware summit in Berlin about “50 devices later: The open source hardware advantage” [1].
[1] https://2026.oshwa.org/talks/100-achim-haug/