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Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

arstechnica.com

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Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#171

Post by snackbroken »

noir_lord wrote: post #77
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's really too bad that Plasma's big picture mode is very WIP these days; once it's stabilized it should be a good option for this kind of thing

I just run it as a desktop and boost scaling. No one in my family has an issue with it, use a years and years old integrated wireless mouse/touchpad and happy days, everything works as you'd expect, you can use it as a regular PC (surprisingly handy sometimes) and I can adblock the crap out of everything/use unhook to decrappify YT. I happened to have an "old" Thinkpad (T470P, 7700HQ w/ 32GB RAM and the nvidia GPU) I…

With KDE Connect you can use your phone as a touchpad+keyboard. One less thing to get lost in the couch cushions ;)

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#172

Post by kstrauser »

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #117
kstrauser wrote: post #12

This guarantees I'll never buy a Samsung appliance. If they're this willing to screw with their customers today, they'll do it again tomorrow. Sadly, I'm including their TVs in this. I have one today, displaying the output of an Apple TV and not directly connected to the Internet because hah, no way, but I'll be shopping around when it comes time to replace it. Pity. They make nice stuff. Not nice enough that I'm wil…

I got a new Samsung TV recently, i don't get the huge hatred for their software. It has some free TV channels, it has apps for the streaming services, even a decent web browser and overall good features. It supports Airplay, Google Cast, bluetooth etc. The OS has some annoyances and rough edges, but its mostly fine. I let it connect to the internet but not any of my other LAN devices so it cant' snoop too much. I jus…

I've used the built-in apps at a friend's house, and they were awful compared to the Apple TV versions. Everything was sluggish, like it was running on something without enough RAM and swapping out to an SD card. If I hadn't used anything else but that, or maybe the Dish Network DVR we had years ago, I'd probably think it's just fine. However, I have used something else, and it made the TV's own apps feel unbearable.

Imagine you're using a brand new maxed-out MacBook Pro, and someone hands you a 2013 HP laptop. The HP is... fine. It displays web pages, lets you load a word processor, and otherwise looks and acts like a laptop. If you hadn't ever used another computer, you probably wouldn't think anything of it.

BTW, I bet a Fire TV or various other options would be fine, too. I just don't have the personal experience to vouch for those. I'm not using this anecdote to shill Apple TV specifically, just to say that there are much better options than the built-in apps.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#173

Post by neilv »

A lot of outrage in HN comments, but it's kinda ironic, because if you had to point at the single biggest concentration of people who built out surveillance capitalism and other facets of our digital dystopian future...

Maybe the people complaining are the ones whose employers don't even sell out people with third-party trackers on their Web site. But I see more than 3 people complaining.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#174

Post by nomel »

cma wrote: post #106
rcarmo wrote: post #46

I've managed to mostly excise Samsung from my digital life (except for phones that family buys without my knowledge and that I have to troubleshoot), and I have been happier for it for many decades now. (This was after direct exposure to their Tizen engineering team back in the early 2000s) I stayed away from their phones, SmartTVs, everything.

They were caught uploading screenshots from content played on smart TVs. Ostensibly to sell ad tracking info like a Nielsen TV, but I'm pretty sure it meant they were capturing people's desktops with confidential corporate info etc. if you used the TV as a monitor. https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/samsung-smart-tvs...

This isn't just Samsung! Nearly all of them use ACR [1].

[1] https://www.consumerreports.org/electronics/privacy/how-to-t...

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#175

Post by pixl97 »

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #62
kstrauser wrote: post #12

This guarantees I'll never buy a Samsung appliance. If they're this willing to screw with their customers today, they'll do it again tomorrow. Sadly, I'm including their TVs in this. I have one today, displaying the output of an Apple TV and not directly connected to the Internet because hah, no way, but I'll be shopping around when it comes time to replace it. Pity. They make nice stuff. Not nice enough that I'm wil…

The problem is that we are running out of alternatives. How long until there are no refrigerators, TVs, cars, whatever that will not work without some amount of baked in advertising?

Buy commercial units rather than consumer ones.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#176

Post by oh-4-fucks-sake »

FuriouslyAdrift wrote: post #116
kstrauser wrote: post #12

This guarantees I'll never buy a Samsung appliance. If they're this willing to screw with their customers today, they'll do it again tomorrow. Sadly, I'm including their TVs in this. I have one today, displaying the output of an Apple TV and not directly connected to the Internet because hah, no way, but I'll be shopping around when it comes time to replace it. Pity. They make nice stuff. Not nice enough that I'm wil…

My house came with all Samsung appliances and I can't wait for all fo them to die. The dryer already went (8 years old). I've been replacing with mid-range LG on advice of the local repair company and been happy so far. Quirky and very few features but seems well built. Can't wait to replace the massive refrigerator and swap the gas range for inductive. Fridge is slowly going (cracked and leaking ice maker, condensat…

Speed Queen for washing machines. Bosch for dishwashers.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#177

Post by southwindcg »

Beijinger wrote: post #149
FuriouslyAdrift wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My house came with all Samsung appliances and I can't wait for all fo them to die. The dryer already went (8 years old). I've been replacing with mid-range LG on advice of the local repair company and been happy so far. Quirky and very few features but seems well built. Can't wait to replace the massive refrigerator and swap the gas range for inductive. Fridge is slowly going (cracked and leaking ice maker, condensat…

8 years is pretty good. I personally like Bosch. Is a fridge with an icemaker not always problematic? How about biofilm? What is the advantage of an inductive stove? Will they even work in the US? I think in Europe they work with 360 V if I remember right. I realized two things: 1. You can cook nearly everything with a ricecooker. Just throw everything inside. Yes, even the minced meat on top. 2. An airfrier is bette…

Only eight years for a dryer is definitely not pretty good in my mind. It's barely acceptable unless you have a huge family and are doing laundry daily. I had a low-end Capri (Sears house brand) that was 21 years old and still going strong when I moved away. It was serviced once, by me, to replace a fuse. If I'd paid twice as much and gotten only eight years out of one, I'd be furious.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#178

Post by Nextgrid »

monkpit wrote: post #169
Nextgrid wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This nonsense keeps getting repeated over and over again for years now and I have yet to find a single documented case of it happening. You'd think that with all the attention, someone would've actually documented it by now. Enough people connect their TV/smart devices willingly to the internet that there is no need for adversarial approaches like this (which are not trivial to set up - they'd need to maintain per-co…

Hmm I thought I had read it on an article posted here at some point, I could be wrong.

I think it originated on Reddit and it's since been parroted here in the comments on basically every smart TV thread but I have yet to see actual evidence. It seems like a trivial theory to test - disconnect from your wifi or change its password, wait for ads to suddenly reappear on the TV (evidence it got a network connection from somewhere).

Similar FUD is being spread around HDMI's Ethernet channel; a way to carry network data over an HDMI cable. I have basically never seen it in the wild on any consumer device, but even if it were, it would still require the other device to cooperate and act as a switch/router to share its connection to the TV. Yet despite that every time smart TVs and privacy comes up someone mentions this.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#179

Post by Digit-Al »

FridayoLeary wrote: post #157
denkmoon wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Millions of people sit through minutes of the worst ads I've ever seen to watch mr beast exploit homeless people. We're boned.

How does anyone watch youtube these days? I wouldn't mind seeing an ad or even 2, but it feels like youtube is singling me out for special treatment. I'm not going to watch anything if i'm scared a 30 second ad will interrupt the video.

Use Firefox or Zen browser with uBlock Origin. I never see ads on Youtube anymore.

Re: Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update

#180

Post by teddyh »

netsharc wrote: post #125
noir_lord wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same they are off my list as well though I generally have less than zero interest in smart devices, I also have a Samsung "smart" TV as well, it asked for Wifi first time I turned it on, said "nope" connected a HDMI to a Fedora box and just use that. I control what devices in my house connect to the internet .

I'm going to sell this idea to Samsung and earn me some Wons: > When showing that the user has switched to HDMI input, show the full screen information: "HDMI1, brought to you by _____ [insert advertiser here]. Best experienced with Monster HDMI cables. Gold plated for the digital clarity."

Do not create the Torment Nexus.

(https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/torment-nexus>)

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