I just want a somewhat trustworthy organization to develop a "DUMB" certification. I will pay extra for a certified DUMB TV.
Look at digital signage monitors. Even with that classification they have HDMI and some have WiFi.
Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
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Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#132I just want a somewhat trustworthy organization to develop a "DUMB" certification. I will pay extra for a certified DUMB TV.
It will only be a matter of time until Congress realizes that among all the user tracking adtech companies there are also Chinese companies, at which point all user tracking including smart TVs will be banned.
That's... very optimistic. What evidence until now exists points to that outcome? You don't think they'll prefer the lazy route of targeting the Chinese companies themselves to avoid the real conversation?
Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Not to mention even the most expensive TVs come with baffingly slow hardware and software. $2k devices can take 10+ seconds to load the menu with 4 options, where you can modify picture settings. Incredible. Yes it's really curious how much worse technology has gotten in some dimensions in recent decades. Analog TVs would respond to inputs effectively instantaneously - if you changed the channel, the very next fram…
Analog tvs would change in the middle of frames if you swapped channels. Digital tvs are cursed to wait for the next key frame in the video to start displaying and providers are a-okay with very long waits for key frames as it improves their encoding efficiency and thus allows them to squeeze more channels on the lines. It's apples to oranges sadly.
It doesn't need to be that bad if they cared about it. If channel is on the same band as previous one it could keep previous data in the buffer and decode it at once when switching.
Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#134Just never connect them to the internet. I just use them as a display for my apple tv.
They are making this increasingly difficult, though. I bought a Vizio TV years ago that came with a physical remote. At some point the firmware was updated in a way that the physical remote could only perform limited function, and to do anything slightly advanced (changing the input, brightness, things like that) you had to use their app. Which, of course, required connecting to the internet. Obviously this could hav…
Vizio are GPL violators too BTW:
Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#135I’m still waiting for the EU to realize this is a privacy matter that needs to be heavily regulated.
Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#136Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
While a separate smart device makes more sense from an ecological perspective, it won't save you from ads, tracking, screenshots etc., as long as the same OS that would be running on the TV is running on the device. And, if you want to install apps from streaming services, you need one of the supported OSs - AFAIK most smart devices use Android TV?
One benefit of a separate device, especially a small one like a Roku or Firestick, is you can take it on holiday with you to access all your services while away (assuming your destination has a TV with HDMI).
I would be terrified of leaving such a device every time I go somewhere, considering the ports are invariably behind the screen.
Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#138Now that I found some old links... This began to be more public since Vizio published their 2021 Q3 earning reports and it was made public that their profits from advertising and users data was more than double than what they made selling devices [0]. Roku themselves have said that they are in the Ad business, not in the tech business, and they were getting around $40 per user a month (also in [0]). All these ACR (au…
Roku themselves have said that they are in the Ad business, not in the tech business, and they were getting around $40 per user a month (also in [0]). That is a mind blowing stat. Obviously advertisers are willing to pay, but I am curious hope much the granular information is worth. If someone watches anime/Hallmark/cooking genre content, do you need to know which specific shows?
Seems like nowadays they're still around that number, although a bit smaller in 2023 ($39.92, down 4% YoY) [0]. They think it went down due to the growth of international users.
Do they get less money per user because they can't legally do the same things in other markets or maybe advertisers pay less for data or reach to non US markets?
What I see from their 4Q2023 report [1] is that they sell devices at a loss. Their gross revenue in "Devices" is negative $20K. And I guess that also includes any expense on advertising or promoting the devices, not only the hardware price.
I can't find if there's any mention anywhere about what percentage of their platform revenue is advertising and what is subscriptions, but they say:
We generate Platform revenue primarily from the sale of advertising (including direct and programmatic video advertising, M&E promotional spending, sponsorships, and related ad products and services), as well as streaming services distribution (including subscription and transactional revenue, the sale of Premium Subscriptions, and the sale of branded app buttons on remote controls).
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0: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/roku-80-million-active-accounts-earnings-1235826274/
1: https://image.roku.com/c3VwcG9ydC1B/4Q23-Shareholder-Letter-Final.pdfRe: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Not to mention even the most expensive TVs come with baffingly slow hardware and software. $2k devices can take 10+ seconds to load the menu with 4 options, where you can modify picture settings. Incredible. Yes it's really curious how much worse technology has gotten in some dimensions in recent decades. Analog TVs would respond to inputs effectively instantaneously - if you changed the channel, the very next fram…
Analog tvs would change in the middle of frames if you swapped channels. Digital tvs are cursed to wait for the next key frame in the video to start displaying and providers are a-okay with very long waits for key frames as it improves their encoding efficiency and thus allows them to squeeze more channels on the lines. It's apples to oranges sadly.
> Analog tvs would change in the middle of frames if you swapped channels.
They'd get a little confused, as the next vblank (and hblank) would come at unexpected times, as channels wouldn't synchronize frames.
> Digital tvs are cursed to wait for the next key frame in the video to start displaying
This is very annoying.
Re: Smart TVs take snapshots of what you watch multiple times per second
#140Smart TVs are a curse (from a consumer perspective). A separate smart device makes much more sense. People usually replaced their TVs when they broke, which could be 6-8+ years. Nowadays as their already slow hardware becomes even more obsolete, streaming apps are no longer updated and start to break, new ones are not released, etc. they go ahead and buy a new one. You also have to accept all kinds of crappy agreemen…
While a separate smart device makes more sense from an ecological perspective, it won't save you from ads, tracking, screenshots etc., as long as the same OS that would be running on the TV is running on the device. And, if you want to install apps from streaming services, you need one of the supported OSs - AFAIK most smart devices use Android TV?
The TV will still spy on you, and may even send frames for upstream classification. The only way to make sure is to never connect it to the network. And even then, I'd try to remove any wifi antennas.