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The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

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Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#221

Post by xeromal »

Daedren wrote: post #143
thunky wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I thought we well, but TFA seems to suggest that some TVs may overlay ads on top of any video source: "Vizio collected a selection of pixels on the screen and matched them to an existing database of content to find out what a user was watching and when" "pop-ups would reportedly appear halfway through the show and be injected into the users' own content, such as home videos"

Yes, but the moment you plug in an Android dongle, Apple TV or similar, you can just disconnect the TV from the internet, which should solve this.

You're going to have to put it in a faraday cage when they start including modems into the TV. lol

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#222

Post by coldpie »

jtbayly wrote: post #155
nesk_ wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However those TVs are not easy to get and, like you said, they come with an increased price. I couldn't recommend enough to buy an Apple TV (or equivalent) and block all Internet access to your "smart" TV. I did this and everything was instantly better.

How do you block internet if it will join open networks automatically?

Has there ever been any evidence of any TV doing this, ever?

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#223

Post by pnut »

ValentineC wrote: post #22
brightball wrote: post #5

This type of expectation is why I've always gravitated towards Roku sticks. They're cheap, really well designed, centrally controlled on your account and you avoid any need to over-invest in specific TV vendors to have the same experience across the board. And it can't do anything that the HDMI port can't do.

> This type of expectation is why I've always gravitated towards Roku sticks. I like Roku's interface and price, but it's a shame that they're nigh-useless outside the US.

I can do youtube, Netflix, and Amazon prime with mine, plus BBC and ITV etc here in the UK.

What else can they do that I'm missing out on?

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#224

Post by delecti »

jtbayly wrote: post #155
nesk_ wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However those TVs are not easy to get and, like you said, they come with an increased price. I couldn't recommend enough to buy an Apple TV (or equivalent) and block all Internet access to your "smart" TV. I did this and everything was instantly better.

How do you block internet if it will join open networks automatically?

But will it join open networks automatically? It is of course entirely possible, technically speaking, but would get any company actually doing that in a lot of trouble in most developed countries.

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#225

Post by jbverschoor »

SayMyName wrote: post #142
xoa wrote: post #87

FWIW, it is still possible to get TVs without this stuff, albeit at a premium. TVs are still made for business usage in areas like conference rooms, wall displays etc. They're often found under labeling like "commercial digital signage" or "business display" or the like, they seem to often try to avoid using "TV" (if being cynical maybe to make them harder for normal people to discover and confuse them if they do). B…

You can still get cheap ones. And by cheap I mean TLC/Hisense level quality displays. Walmart sells Sceptre's for low prices and have no smart features, best purchase I've made in years. We use a lot of Rokus here and my issue isn't the ads, its that every Roku built-in TV gets REALLY slow after a few updates, so now it's just easier to chuck a $20-30 device instead of having to buy an entire $300+TV. Sure I don't ge…

The cheap ones also have a blazing fast non-android menu. This was my last samsung

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#226

Post by blibble »

jtbayly wrote: post #155
nesk_ wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However those TVs are not easy to get and, like you said, they come with an increased price. I couldn't recommend enough to buy an Apple TV (or equivalent) and block all Internet access to your "smart" TV. I did this and everything was instantly better.

How do you block internet if it will join open networks automatically?

if it's that insidious let it connect to a dummy SSID that appears to be working but can't do anything useful

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#227

Post by blibble »

psy-q wrote: post #124
jokowueu wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or just get any smart tv and add a android tv dongle . They don't cost much

Android TV now also comes with forced ads (since rebranding to Google TV). I was pretty upset when the very expensive Android TV gadget I bought (Nvidia Shield TV) specifically to have an external device without ads suddenly had them. They take up the upper third of the home screen.

if it's Google it's always going to have ads at some point

sad

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#228

Post by LeifCarrotson »

xoa wrote: post #87

FWIW, it is still possible to get TVs without this stuff, albeit at a premium. TVs are still made for business usage in areas like conference rooms, wall displays etc. They're often found under labeling like "commercial digital signage" or "business display" or the like, they seem to often try to avoid using "TV" (if being cynical maybe to make them harder for normal people to discover and confuse them if they do). B…

OMG it has a carrier board for an RPi Compute Module built in:

https://i.imgur.com/D3p8bCA.png

That's amazing!

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#229

Post by blibble »

rendall wrote: post #57

> Some may argue that there's no need to be dramatic and that there's nothing wrong in seeing an occasional ad every now and then. Oh, no, I am very dramatic about this. I will go to any lengths not to see advertising. I will entirely forgo any platform that shows me even one ad, especially when I pay them. Amazon Prime video is already pushing it with their preroll previews. The second it's something else I'm cancel…

I cancelled prime due to those prerolls

I've already bought the service... why show me ads for it?

Re: The downfall of smart TVs: From promises of seamless viewing to ad tool

#230

Post by jacquesm »

dylan604 wrote: post #201
nesk_ wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just allowed my Samsung TV to connect to the wifi (to access the local network, because the Steam Link client is better on it than it is on the Apple TV) and then, on my router, I blocked all Internet access coming from the mac address of the Samsung TV.

At some point, these devices will be smarter than you about this. They will recognize a WiFi connection that cannot access the internet, and prefer an open network instead.

They will simply come with a cellular modem built in and you won't be able to block it. These things are so cheap now, and with virtual sims I think this is pretty much inevitable.

At some point everything will be internet connected just because the tech will cost pennies. We're not there yet, but for a big ticket item such as a TV or a car it's either already there or about to happen.

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