One way to get Congress to act on this would be to remind them of how Robert Bork’s video rental history got released. They very quickly realized that they all had the same sleazy movies on their rental list and passed a law making it illegal to share them.
Call your Congressmen and tell them that their smart TV is sending screenshots of whatever they’re watching back to home base, including stuff that’s not streamed, and there might be swift action.
Better yet, hack Samsung and leak it to the press. That’ll definitely light a fire under them.
I blocked my two TVs from phoning home via my pihole. They are the two noisiest devices on my network, by leaps and bounds.
On a day of heavy usage, my phone and desktop may get ~2000 blocked requests combined. That’s high, but not unheard of. It just means I did a lot of browsing, with a lot of blocked ad requests. My TVs average somewhere around 7500 blocked requests per day, on days that I haven’t even turned them on. That’s an attempt to phone home every ~12 seconds. And it is much worse on days that I actually use them.
To be clear though, that’s largely because it is just repeating the same request over and over as it times out and retries. They’re a lot less noisy when they actually connect successfully, though it is still undesirable for them to do so.
Jesus dude, what brand TV do you have?
My LG issues a few hundred blocked requests throughout the day with heavy usage. I’ve never seen it wake up and phone home (my Nintendo Switch does it every hour for some stupid reason)
One is a Samsung, and the other is a Roku. The Roku is a little bit noisier, but not by much.
Maybe i’m stupid, but why would a TV even do that? All it’s know is what you’re watching today, right? How is that information useful? If you’re living with other people, the TV couldn’t even know who’s watching, that would make the data useless.
Data mining. They know what you watch, when you don’t and any other habits you have.
If you have a microphone on your remote or tv, then they also send that data over.
Knowing the distribution of what entire households watch is very useful. It’s not about spying on you personally.
…seems rather personal to me.
And what other devices are on the network, and what they’re chattering about
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I’m more than happy to buy a TV that uses post-purchase monetization, because I am never going to connect that fucker to the internet. It’s a display. I shall use it as a display. I do not care that it can replace my streaming box. I fully control my streaming box, and I will use that.
If I catch it doing any sketchy shit like trying to use unsecured/Comcast/etc WiFi to phone home, it’ll be time to pull out the screwdriver, though.
What happens when it no longer needs your WiFi and uses something like LoRa to phone home with your data and location? It may not know who you are exactly but it’ll have a good guess.
Screwdriver.
on whom?
What happens when it no longer needs your WiFi and uses something like LoRa to phone home with your data and location? It may not know who you are exactly but it’ll have a good guess.
I mean…what happens when it becomes sentient, sprouts legs and you catch it sleeping with your spouse?
Let’s deal with the here and now.
You know LoRa hardware is getting cheaper and the reliability of these TVs are just terrible. This is likely to happen sooner rather than later. For now just don’t plug it in to WiFi unless you’re willing to go further and desolder its module? I don’t think we can do much via legislation other than write to our congressional reps.
What’s Lora?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LoRa (Long Range)
It’s a low power, large range connection technology, working a bit like a mesh network. It can achieve data rates between 0.3 kbit/s and 27 kbit/s and enables geolocation services. According to the LoRa Development Portal, the range provided by LoRa can be up to 3 miles (4.8 km) in urban areas, and up to 10 miles (16 km) or more in rural areas (line of sight).
As soon as your LoRa-Device is in range of another LoRa-Device, it will probably be able to phone home.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LoRa
Long-range radio protocol
Fuckingcapitalists
Ahh yes, unlike all those non-capitalist modern nations with their complete lack of widespread insidious surveillance.
The non-capitalist solutions have been here all along, mostly things licensed under copyleft. But people just need to have the wherewithal to actually use these solutions.
Why do we continue to be ok with this? Where is the outrage and call for change?
Because it works and provides a use case. Most “simpletons” do not want to invest any more time in than putting some Account Data and start watching netflix or whatever. “We” (e.g. the people that care about data privacy and stuff) never have been okay with that shit…
Simpletons LOL get a grip
the overwhelming bulk of humanity cant be fucked to care about shit like this… until it personally affects them.
Then they will wail like banshees about the great injustice of it all, and how could anyone let it happen to them.
It’s there, but people forget about it when they can get a 4" bigger TV for 100 bucks less.
They called me crazy.
My current tv is a 42” I got in 2012. I would love to upgrade to a bigger one, but I don’t wanna get a lame smart tv.
I’m on the same boat 44" tv, from ages ago. Connected to my linux reinstalled asus chromebox. Freedom baby yeah!
Don’t forget that if you connect external devices to them, they’re also taking snapshots of the content “so they can serve targeted ads”.
Do you know a credible source to read about it, please?
Roku’s patent
can we just ban online features from tvs, cars, printers, light bulbs etc.
Cars being online has some tangible benefits in that they can transmit location data to emergency services, especially if the driver is unresponsive. Might save someone from dying in a ditch in the middle of nowhere.
Arguably, some of the data collected while driving is also very useful for maintenance and development (e.g. if a lot of vehicles start having a similar issue after X miles).
That said, this data should be limited in scope and use (e.g. must not be sold, especially not to insurance companies), as well as anonymized as much as possible. Which is currently not the case, and that definitely needs regulation.
You don’t need a high bandwidth connection to do emergency notifications, and considering it might be in a remote area satellite would be better than LTE.
For the diagnostics you could log events internally and then collect them with OBD-II readers, though I’d like to force car makers to use open data formats so people can see for themselves what’s collected.
That said, this data should be limited in scope and use…
Yep, anonymized, limited, non-distributable, and secured, with severe penalties (on the order of tens of thousands of dollars per person, paid to the harmed party) for failure to adhere.
That ship, my friend, has already sailed.
Civilians used to own canons. For blowing up ships. And the occasional home invader. Doesn’t matter if it has sailed if we sink it. We should sink that ship.
My next purchase will be a dumb tv with a media stick.
Unfortunately it’s very hard to buy a decent dumb TV these days.
For smart tv, they recommend just never give access to internet. And look if it has some kind of monitor mode so it always launch display on the hdmi port.
They still keep searching for some open wifi to send their stuff through.
This has never been proven in any way. It would be really easy to show that a smart TV will automatically connect to an open WiFi connection and send data, but nobody has done it.
I wonder if a software that just generate gibberish data could be made, just to fuck with them.
Meh, it’s not like the data is monitored by people, it would probably just be like dropping a needle of bad data in a haystack of automated data.
Video projectors are available, though.
yup, this is what I do. costs about as much as a good TV.
They’re all smart too, unless I’m missing something?
not the optoma uhd35, it’s the one I have. 4k60fps or 1080p240fps for when I game.
we have to support the companies that give us what we want, and I voted with my wallet. Im very happy with it
Aorus fo48u here. Dumb as fuck, sometimes too dumb (no remote input processing without hdmi signal), but I’d rather have that than a smart monitor with all the bullshit
Not at all. The better ones are dumb. You have to stay away from cheap chinese drek, of course.
Buy a monitor, not a TV
Lemme just pluck a 52" monitor from the 52" monitor tree where 52" monitors grow bountifully.
Plenty of 48inches though, so compromise
I just checked. In the online stores of the 3 largest tech chains in my country, there’s exactly one 16:9 40+" monitor model available, and that’s a 43" VA panel. The other 40+" stuff are weird absurdly wide curved monitors and some smart whiteboard type thing. So forgive me if I am extremely doubtful of your claim.
If only our fucking government would do something about this and actually regulate these evil bastards.
But their
constituentscorporate donors would not profit as much. Won’t someone think about my profits? 🙃First you’d need to ban money from politics and change the voting system to better represent the people living there instead of wealthy elites, but that would just be the start.
Whenever wealthy elites have even a tiny bit of power (as they do in any capitalist system, including social democracies like what the Nordic countries have), they will seize as much control as possible. We saw this happen many times.
Nico Semsrott (Kabarettist and member of the EU parliament. Yes, both) proposed in jest sponsoring placement on the jackets of the political members that got donations by companies.
The jackets should then look like the race overalls from Formula 1 or (not US) football players.And I am fully supporting this.
Edit:
Like this:
but then the market would be ever so slightly less free. the horror!
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What would you guys recommend for a dumb TV with a good quality panel in the 65-75" range that’s a available to buy in the EU? My intention is to hook it up to my own device (probably a mini PC running some Linux distro with Kodi and some other stuff).
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Eizo or iiyama monitors are very good imo. The other use raspberry pi ( or anything else ) + tv card
Thanks. Anything more specific in mind? I know Eizo for their monitors for colour-critical work and from looking on their site I’m only able to find a 50 something inch model that’s probably very expensive (I think it was in their medical lineup). As for iiyama, they have some 65 and 75" models for e-signage, but they’re running Android.
For example, Amazon Web Services and ad-tech company TripleLift are working with proprietary models and machine learning for dynamic product placement in streamed TV shows. The report, citing a 2021 AWS case study, says that “new scenes featuring product exposure can be inserted in real-time ‘without interrupting the viewing experience.’”
Peacock is also working with TripleLift to develop “In-Scene” Peacock ads that owner NBCUniversal says it’s currently testing:
When a user plays episodic content, your brand’s product or message is dynamically placed in the frame of targeted scenes, creating a non-interruptive ad experience that aligns the programming with your campaign theme/goals.
This could be hilarious when your omegaverse softcore porn drama gets plastered with prune juice, old people pill adverts, and trump propaganda on everyone’s shirts, tattoos, jock straps, voice lines and whatever else the AI can scrounge up. “It totally fits with the narrative!”
Kind if reminds me of the scene in The Truman Show when they talk about the cereal to the hidden camera.
Am I reading this wrong or are they literally hijacking a shot in the content by placing a product in there?
Sounds like they could literally go in there and replace the kid watching tele-shopping in a movie with watching a literal ad made to look like it’s genuinley in the movie.It’s exactly that. Detect where there are ads in a scene ( a panel for example) and replace the space with their own ads.
Tbh could be worse replacing an ad placement with another (say adidas to nike).
Personally actually be worse would be replacing an ad relevant to the movie (like an advertisement for the newest tool the protagonist always needed to progress)
omegaverse softcore porn drama
😏
I just use an Apple TV connected to my TV which isn’t connected to any network. I hook it up every now and again to update the software when there are new features available related to picture/sound.
I also run a Jellyfin server for most of my streaming needs.
Apple TV most certainly collects information too…
Do most smart TVs still allow performing updates via USB? I have an older LG TV which does this.
Just disconnect your TV from the Internet and get an Apple TV.
First yes, second no.
The dumber the device the happier the user.
Apple TV doesn’t try to do much other than being a very technically capable passthrough. You get pretty much every streaming service, multiple Plex clients etc. And no ads.
My 1st Gen ATV4K is 7 years old now and was buttery smooth until last tvOS update, now it’s only slightly smoother than most high end TVs. That’s quite a good run.
You mean the same Apple that was found guilty to artificially slowing older devices with software updates?
Yes. Have you ever used Apple TV? This thing is leaps and bounds ahead everything of else, even Shield in terms of pure performance.
I always found it tough to get upset with them much for that one. They had to deal with battery aging because they were the ones to support their devices long enough for it to matter. Plus I had a Nexus 6P at the time, and when its battery started getting weak the damn phone would just shut off while at 30% or whatever.
Them sneaking it in was obviously bad though.
Why do I doubt this.
Why do I doubt this.
Because you hate Apple (for likely justifiable reasons) and thus at a basic level of intuition assume everything Apple does is bad.
But while Apple certainly isn’t good (there is no “good” when it comes to the way corporations monetize their customers), Apple is significantly better in some areas than their competitors (while being worse in others). iPhones are much better than Pixels for privacy, for example.
The Apple TV is a product that needs to do very specific things: show media, and run a few types of apps. This isn’t very computationally heavy. My smart TVs were always great until future updates added advertisements and features that slowed them down. The Apple TV doesn’t get bogged down by shitty advertisements.
My experience with Apple is that it doesn’t play nice with other ecosystems. Cludgy workarounds are usually possible but if you are doing that you may as well go for Linux.
Yep. Like I said, likely justifiable reasons to hate Apple. Despite now being thoroughly in their ecosystem, I still hate them for iMessage exclusivity and it being easier for me to confirm than convincing 20+ people across my family and my wife’s family to switch to WhatsApp or something. Fuck them for that.
But there are things they do well. Apple TV is one of them, in my experience.
What other ecosystems do you need your TV to interface with? It has a remote, or you can use your phone to control it. And it has all the major streaming apps you would want in a smart TV.
Plex, cable, ps4, Wii, switch, NAS drive, android phone, PC, DVD home theatre, pi-hole + all existing and future streaming services.
Agree, of all the companies out there, Apple isn’t the one I entrust with my data. Pretty happy with my Nvidia Shield instead, the OS is open enough to allow monitoring all telemetry, and I’m happy to say that after switching everything off that Android enabled by default, nothing really gets out there. I’ve sniffed connections on my router as well, and it only really connects to where it should.
Edit: Aww look, I’ve triggered the fanboys ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Apple TV 4K:
- no ads on homescreen
- updated near annually, last hw refresh 2023
- HDMI 2.1
- WiFi 6 / gigabit Ethernet
- 128GB internal storage
- $149 retail price ($129 for 64GB model that loses Ethernet for WiFi only)
Nvidia Shield Pro:
- ads on homescreen via google tv
- last hardware refresh 2019 (5 years)
- HDMI 2.0b
- WiFi 5 / gigabit Ethernet
- 16GB internal storage (USB 3 port for ext hard drive if desired)
- $199 retail price
Both support 4K, Dolby vision, atmos, etc. Apple’s dynamic frame rate switching actually works whereas NViDIA’s has bugs and been in beta hell for years.
For your average person without very specific needs like running a Plex server off the same hardware the Apple TV4K is as or more private than the shield at a cheaper price and under active development.
I wouldn’t really compare the pro version, when the regular one works better and has extendable storage via SD card and comes at $149 retail, with offers as low as $129 around.
Annual hardware revisions are nice and all, but in my understanding they don’t actually improve what the end user get to experience.
The main advantage I see in the shield is the ability to sideload apps, such as SmartTube for adfree youtube with integrated sponsorblock, ftp server, torrent client etc., and not least use VLC as a media player. Plus you can customize the launcher or replace it as a whole to tailor the UI to your exact needs.
I use the pro in comparison because the non-pro version is even more dated on lesser hardware and going to be sluggish, lesser in capabilities than other alternatives in the android space.
For one it can’t (reliably) run a plex server or other services so there’s really no advantage other than brand loyalty to NVIDIA to buy the non-pro shield over say a Walmart Onn 4k for half that price. (And that’s the truth, you can’t reliably run other services on the non-pro shield without incurring a noticeable performance penalty and degradation if it’s even possible in the first place)
I compare apples to apples here or tried to be honest. ATV4K has 4GB RAM, Shield Pro has 3, there are various other reasons to compare them, they’re both the top of the line. Though as I mentioned if you want to compare the non-pro shield then there’s the smaller ATV4k which still has without buying an SD card 64GB of storage for $129.
As to “offers”. I used retail prices you use this which I consider dishonest and desperate. Not a credit to your side. Apple TVs regularly go on sale multiple times a year via official dealers like Amazon, Target, Costco. Shield’s rarely go on sale, if you’re talking about used or shady third party dealers then you’re not doing an honest apples to apples comparison.
Shield promoters are strange people to me in 2024. I don’t think you’ve taken a proper inventory of the landscape. People call apple users shills and so some of them are, but I see shills for various brands and people unfortunately taken in by them.
Yes it was revolutionary when it came out, now it’s not. That’s life when a company decides to abandon a product line for all intents and purposes and yes no hardware updates, not even a revision in 5 years signals stagnation. They don’t need a major processor upgrade but not bumping a few minor aspects of the hardware like the HDMI ports version or the WiFi for instance just shows they don’t consider it an important part of their brand and I’m not sure why you’d buy into something that could be sunsetted without any surprise come January.
And not dropping the price which is rather hefty and high considering costs should have gone down over time is also a not so nice sign of greed and inattention. Apple dropped their prices. No reason NVIDIA with its scale and buying power doesn’t have the ability to drop the price if they’re not going to at least actively develop it to justify it.
VLC is awful for network playback. It’s fine for local fines (though mpv is better) but playing network files you’re going to have pixelation, stuttering, all kinds of problems I can say from experience trying it on both wired and wireless connections. I strongly recommend Kodi, Plex, Emby, Jellyfin, etc over VLC for non-local playback that’s smoother and better.
Ad-free youtube is likely soon to go the way of the dodo given the aggressive moves by youtube to stop it and most people don’t need or want that on their TV because they’re interested in paid or FAST streaming services. You have eclectic tastes and needs and that’s fine but recommending that to your average person isn’t doing them a service. And it’s nice to think of others, not your own biases and unusual needs.
And most people don’t need an FTP server (an FTP server, serving what exactly given you’re talking about the non-pro and SD cards, that’s not a great experience compared to an ext hard drive, if you’re going to do that, go for the pro and connect an external spinning disk HDD or SSD via USB).
Most people don’t need a torrent client (and again on the non-pro you’re talking about downloading onto an SD card, major yikes don’t do that, again if you want to do that please recommend people the pro for USB drives and use that in your honest comparisons here).
Both the above also require investing in an SD card (or an external drive via USB for the pro which is the better way to go). Reliable non-trash (good brand, good speed) SD cards are going to drive up that cost you stated another $15+ dollars which puts even your non-pro “on sale” (good luck finding it) shield within $5 spitting distance of the ATV4K higher end 128GB model (to get that much storage on the non-pro shield via SD card of a decent brand and speed would absolutely put your costs in line with the ATV4k 128GB model).
You mention alternative launchers, most people don’t want to do that. Apple TV is ad free out of the box without mucking about with ADB and other things. Again consider the average user and how they’re not going to do that.
Fact is Apple TVs are likely to get better and more features including new ones because they’re under active development and most will get 6+ years of tvOS updates with those new features whereas the NVIDIA shield is stuck in time, no new development has been apparent for years.
Unlike AppleTV which is important to Apple’s home ecosystem of devices (including homepods, various home devices, iphone integration with on-screen video calling) and thus less likely to have development stopped, the shield is just another androidtv platform among a sea of them and poses no larger risk to NVIDIA products and loyalty if discontinued. And likely the only reason it isn’t discontinued is they can sit on it, reap increasingly lowered costs as profit and just sell it at the same price without investing anything in it further.
If NVIDIA shields were at least permanent price-dropped by 30% they’d at least be competitive on price even if stagnant but the asking price is unacceptably high.
If you want expensive, premium non-Apple streaming products then buy a Dune-HD, they at least silo things like a plex install via virtualization away from the androidtv google stuff so privacy is maximized via their customized linux container. They also have excellent support and are constantly and actively improving their products including offering AV1 support, frame-rate switching without flicker, and so on. They have a model at $199 for equivalent product to the shield pro but it comes with WiFi 6, av1 support, and the ability to run all kinds of services with absolute ease as well as an internal bay for a 2.5" hard drive and optical audio outs. It has a linux container which has the ability to install and run a torrent client, various other services, including I believe plex, SMB sharing (already present by default I think). You can also install android apps on the model I mentioned.
