That's my answer. I'll never own a "smart TV", just decent gaming graphics with a large monitor.
It's essentially impossible to buy a consumer TV that's not "smart" these days. There are commercial TV's/monitors, but those are both expensive and also typically not focused on image quality. Best solution is to "air gap" your TV by not connecting it your wifi or ethernet.
> Best solution is to "air gap" your TV by not connecting it your wifi or ethernet.
How long will it be before TVs embed a cellular modem with manufacturer-paid service to keep the smart features connected? “No setup, works straight out of the box” has to have at least some marketing value, after all.
I'm with you, and I prefer "dumb" devices, but you can still buy these blu-ray players and not connect them to the internet. The internet connectivity is sold as an additional feature so that you can use your blu-ray player to watch Netflix. I agree that I don't want logging on a device like this, but if I was going to connect one of these to the internet, I would at least want regular security updates.
> you can still buy these blu-ray players and not connect them to the internet. Unfortunately this is only a temporary solution IMO. Within the next decade I think you'll see these smart devices shipping with built in connectivity that's difficult or impossible to disable, especially if Starlink or other satellite based services really take off.
I don't think these kind ofdevices will use Starlink or an equivalent service any time soon. Starlink needs a "pizza box sized" satellite dish that constantly adjusts its position to stay in contact with the satellites. I assume they won't work inside, like other satellite based antennae.
If smart devices will have build in connectivity in the next decade, I think 5g will be a more likely candidate. But I don't see that happening either. Why would a company pay for the data of its users when most people will just connect it to their wifi?
Somewhat tangential, but Facebook’s average revenue per user was less than $9 in 2019. I can’t imagine TV manufacturers can eek out nearly that much revenue from the data they collect. Especially considering that almost everyone is streaming or using cable and all of that data is going to Hulu/Netflix/Cable providers and then passed on to advertisers anyway.
FB has 1.5B+ daily users. $9 * 1.5B = A LOT OF CASH. Is that per month, per year? Plus Insta, plus WhatsApp TV Manufactures may not sell 1B units (maybe they do), but it's still a large enough number that it will not be unnoticed in a balance sheet
In the case of Samsung and smart TVs, and to fully support the argument you are supporting, it is not sufficient that Samsung makes a lot of money. They need to make a lot more per user selling data than they would adding $20 to the price of that TV.
But that $20 price difference would probably mean that less people buy Samsung, so the maths isn't going to be that straightforward.
Programming errors happen, but thats why I don't get, that companies still use programming languages, where such errors result in a crash vs. an error which can be handled and recovered from. A faulty XML file shouldn't render the whole machine unusable.
Not sure if the language is at play, you can write shitty software in any language
Yes, you can create a mess in any language. However, a lot of languages protect you against a lot of potential mistakes and also give you means of safely recovering from errors. The XML parser might not be better when written in another language, but if it is called from within an error handler, the calling program could recover from the error.
Impossible is a big word :). But while a C or C++ program tends to crash in the presence of an error, like with a segfault, a lot of languages just throw an error which you can catch. So you could proceed with the default values, if the file cannot be read correctly.
Oh please. C and C++ programs can be coded to fail gracefully and "a lot of languages" fail in unpredictable and unfortunate ways and shitty programmers still don't catch those magic errors. This is a matter of crappy engineering, not per se crappy language.
You can have programs crash in any language. However, it is the question, how well a program can recover from an error. Having a concept of error handlers in the language, which can catch conditions occuring inside the code they are calling, leads to more robust programmers.
Think of it as airbags and seat belts. Drivers, who don't make a mistake, wouldn't need them, but in reality shit happens, and they give us more survival chances.
One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…
It's worse than you think - it's not just your DVD player that's spying on you, but your TV is too -- many TV's use Automated Content Recognition to detect what you're watching regardless of source (DVD, over the air, streaming app, etc). They even detect commercials, and which language you're listening to. https://www.adexchanger.com/ad-exchange-news/the-marketers-g...
"The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it, moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live -- did live, from habit that became instinct -- in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized."
> Does it revert the firmware to whatever it was shipped with (bugs and all)? Some vendors do, but most vendors do not. I think if it doesn't revert to the firmware it had when shipped by the factory , it shouldn't be considered a factory reset.
Just a guess, but I would assume the term factory reset referred to clearing user settings before devices commonly had firmware update capabilities. So the legacy name should not be used to imply how the function should work in relation to firmware downgrade.
It should restore all writable storage to factory configuration. It shouldn't matter a whit whether that storage has code or config on it.
One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…
It's worse than you think - it's not just your DVD player that's spying on you, but your TV is too -- many TV's use Automated Content Recognition to detect what you're watching regardless of source (DVD, over the air, streaming app, etc). They even detect commercials, and which language you're listening to. https://www.adexchanger.com/ad-exchange-news/the-marketers-g...
Please tell me there is a blacklist published somewhere that allows me to avoid ever purchasing a device which includes ACR?
It's essentially impossible to buy a consumer TV that's not "smart" these days. There are commercial TV's/monitors, but those are both expensive and also typically not focused on image quality. Best solution is to "air gap" your TV by not connecting it your wifi or ethernet.
> Best solution is to "air gap" your TV by not connecting it your wifi or ethernet. How long will it be before TVs embed a cellular modem with manufacturer-paid service to keep the smart features connected? “No setup, works straight out of the box” has to have at least some marketing value, after all.
That's exactly the point of 5G, if I understand it correctly.
if !parse(config) then reboot. Please, for the love of God.
I’m sorry but I find ruby „reboot unless config.parse?” much more readable here.
You can argue about which syntax is best. But irrespective, having a perfectly good boolean already, but then comparing it to true or false to unnecessarily create another boolean is always just wrong.