Comment 1 for bug 220924

I ran into this also. You can reproduce it without running an upgrade though: just install motion with a webcam plugged in. If the default settings in the new /etc/motion.conf script installed with the package will work with the webcam, the process won't return. It looks like the default should be changed to "daemon yes".

There seems to be another problem though: if I just set "daemon yes" and then do "sudo /etc/init.d/motion start", I get this:

Starting motion detection : motion
[0] Processing thread 0 - config file /etc/motion/motion.conf
[0] Motion 3.2.9 Started
[0] Exit motion, cannot create process id file (pid file) /var/run/motion.pid: Permission denied
[0] Motion going to daemon mode
.

It doesn't actually start: ps -e | grep motion shows nothing.