Yeah, but it’s like you bought the ponies at Shit-R-Us

Yeah that was kinda my point :) A cloud controlled device from a tech giant is supposed to shit on the floor start doing ads and invade your privacy. It’s what they do. Like ponies pooping, you should expect it on purchase.

No. It’s more as if you had to pay for the pony to get it, and then:

If you want to ride the pony, that’s $2. The saddle has a coin slot to pay. It also has spikes poking both you and the pony if you don’t pay. Any time you get off, the spikes relock, requiring another payment to unlock.

This is the exact same situation minus the animal cruelty part and with money being swapped with time.

You mean besides sell it to American companies? Or insert whatever country you’re afraid of currently

Or just don’t buy products from companies that don’t respect you…

Buying chinese is like going to the guy who beats you less because he spending half the time at his other girlfriend’s house.

Laughing at my farts?

Wow you are so cool and unique to comment on an opinion.
No one asked your opinion on people’s opinions.
At least their comment wasn’t a waste of time and now I’m wasting more time.

Seriously 😒

People will go to great lengths to excuse and justify their own idiocy, rather than suffer the simple acceptance they they could have been wrong… and one of these idiots suggested it was me who had ‘hubris’ :)

I did, but that’s not something that can easily be used in the wild… As for plans and layouts… those plans are located with local planning depts anyway. Proof of concept and a practical use for them are often very different… But yes… criminal charges need apply, not civil ones… and as I’m in the UK, perhaps they could bring terrorism charges against them too… they like doing that to people not actually committing acts of terror these days.

it doesn’t take much critical thinking to conclude that smart tvs are bullshit, but apparently too much for most people

Whatever accelerates us getting off our asses and seizing the means of production quicker, I’m all for it. Take the TVs, I fucking dare ya

they’ll lobby these techs as unsafe and dangerous and potentially ban their use outright, or require special licenses and degrees.

They have a strong foundation in the DRM built into HDMI. I suspect this is exactly the real reason it is there.

Cool, I have a degree and multiple technology certifications. Happy to help people with tech that pulls them out of oligarchs fiefdoms.

Today buying doesn't mean owning anymore.

Set him up with NextDNS then.

<img alt="" src="https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/30320886-203b-47ab-b3c6-453495dafbd9.jpeg">

We’re talking about ads (and maybe privacy) on TV’s mate…

No. As a user of both Amazon and Google devices (with screens/sticks), Amazon is far more aggressive in their advertising practices. As the other guy said, neither is ad-free out of the box, but Amazon devices will literally make your screensaver/lock screen a full screen ad (even on your TV). Google just has a home screen ad about something that’s going to play on streaming, usually.

If you want NO ads, set up DNS ad blocking or get an Apple TV and use that for streaming. But again, Amazon’s devices are FAR more aggressive about advertising as much as possible. My father has one of those Echo Show things that’s a speaker with a rotating screen attached to it. It’s playing ads almost all the time.

Back in the day wed hook up old desktops straight to living room PCs. There was no apps so we’d just go to websites.

I’d be surprised if there isn’t some kind of raspberry pi mini PC with a good guinerap around Linux.

Some people will use a PlayStation/Xbox as well.

Eh, I gave up and bought cheap used Apple TVs to replace all the Android / Google TVs and Rokus in the house.

I assume that there’s a segment of the population that:

• Does vaguely like the idea of at least some home automation.

• Doesn’t have the technical expertise and/or time to wrangle with something like HomeAssistant. Wants something that works off-the-shelf.

• Doesn’t want to spend much money up front on a system, which creates pressure for an ad-supported model.

I will say that I’m still more than a little fuzzy on what substantial practical benefits people are actually getting from their deployed systems, though.

For at least some of this, like having a voice command to check the weather, a smartphone has to be pretty widely-deployed competition.

Even without having other Apple products. The only real benefit I see with the Apple TV — I do have other Apple products — is I can AirPlay to it. But, it isn’t very stable for whatever reason. The connection will just drop. So I AirPlay to the TV itself instead, and that works, though sometimes the audio doesn’t, so I just route it back to the MacBook, which has very good speakers, and it’s fine. Or I grab my Thunderbolt to HDMI and plug in directly, turn the TV into a monitor — but, this bypasses the Apple TV (but, so does AirPlaying to the TV itself). Oh, and I can use my phone or watch as a remote. All in all it’s perfectly fine if you don’t have any other Apple stuff.

The one thing it’s really lacking is some Dolby codec that people need to play Blu-ray rips. People in communities like Plex and Jellyfin complain about that. But those are like 50GB+ per movie, I don’t have that kind of storage to even come close to caring about that issue. It can still play 4K content, just not with that one codec.

In fact, it’s probably one of the best Apple devices out there, just because the competition is so much worse. I’d also say the same thing about the iPad, and the MacBook. You can make a case for a gaming PC, but for a laptop that isn’t gonna game because battery is an issue, you’re going for efficiency, it’s really hard to beat the MacBook. As for the iPad, it’s hard to tell which Android tablets are good and which ones aren’t — or which ones will never get updated. And iPad got a lot of love this year, it’s basically a desktop OS now (it’s like macOS lite at this point). No, you still can’t install whatever you want — need an actual computer for that.

excuse me i’m on an hp they’ve never ever ever done anything wrong

why yes i buy brother printers why do you ask

In this case, they are explicitly talking about serving ads on the device. Apple has a much less problematic track record for that particular issue.

Look at it this way - how does a business make its money?

• Google makes nearly 100% of its revenue from ad sales that are juiced by collecting every detail they can about as many people as possible.
• Amazon makes most of its money off of AWS because physical logistics are extremely expensive but they commit endless amounts of federal crimes by ripping off consumers and sellers to subsidize their total market takeover of physical goods. Oh and they make money by selling ad spots to their sellers that are juiced by stealing as much information about its users as possible.
• Apple makes most of its money on the app store subscriptions to apps it didnt write - like if you subscribe to spotify through the app they take a cut. It makes the rest of its money by selling devices that tend to have higher build quality than competitors. A very small sliver of its income comes from advertisements. Not even 1% and it is publicly declared as non-targetted advertising. They dont really have a financial interest in collecting your data.

That’s the difference. They’re all shit companies from multiple angles. But at least Apple doesn’t actively disrespect you with unwanted advertising targetted to you by spying on you. They disrespect you by removing headphone jacks and making silicon valley executives behave like steve jobs who was notoriously a horrible person.

Hey! I resemble that remark.

Lemmy is structurally just super reddit. It just hasn’t been flooded by children yet so the discourse is still college level.

UI is too difficult for iPad babies but as the apps catch up the dumbass summer children will flood here too.

Or contact support and ask nicely.
Did that and they removed the ads for me.

I may remember badly but I think in the days, the small one was only with ads and tiers were for the bigger tablet 🤔 (more than 10 years though so my memory is hazy)

Well, kindle e-ink e-readers are different from kindle lcd ipad knockoffs. The ereaders do have a subsidized tier that is cheaper by like $30 and shows ads on the lock screen. The ipad knockoffs are trash that arent worth looking at in the first place so I dont even know if they show ads but I bet they do. Dont buy either.

I feel like for all the effort you may spend pissing about you could just go to an electronics recycling center buy a relatively new laptop with a busted screen and just use that. Just get a Bluetooth mouse and keyboard, hell I think there are remotes specifically made for this purpose.

Yes but I have done zero maintenance on my light switches in over 30 years. No downtime either or updates.

Exactly. It’s not the smart part of a device that is the problem. That’s an extreme overreaction.

The problem with most smart devices today is that they are proprietary, non-fully libre and open source, for-profit, cloud-connected, corporate committee designed spyware, adware, and bloatware.

Devices that are fully FLOSS (firmware, hardware, software) and based on open and free standards and protocols are awesome, but they get easily forgotten.

The Internet and your technology can be so much better. Demand it.

Oh, you own a house, I see, ok, that explains that.

I’ve been wanting to set up something like this for a while. Have any guides or a good place to start?

Actual tech nerds love the tinkering to make it work again until the moment they are tired of it and just want something that works. I’m in the tinkering phase.

The Alexa division is struggling so they are well into the extract phase of the product.

Google will get there in time as well.

They don’t play ads on Google home/nest devices like this says Amazon do.

I would know if my Google home hubs played ads on them.

Home assistant is the way to go, all run locally on a homePC, I have ZigBee lights and switches automated

An example is my front deck lights turn on at sundown, at 10% brightness, at 11;00 pm they drop to 1%.

If motion is detected they brighten up for a bit. On holidays they have appropriate RFB effects.

All of this is automated, none of it talks to the internet.

My current project is making a harry potter style “clock”, with hands for me, my wife, and kids. Can set up some geofencing. Run off some ESPhome and the HA app, which reports directly to my install, without releasing tracking info.

Smart Home is really good for me bc I have trouble remembering things, but I’m for building my own and running it on my own server vs using corporate bullshit.

I did once, sadly. Before I knew better.

We’re in a sad state of affairs in this world.

I didnt see it coming. I assumed that having a device always available to add shit to your shopping basket and listen to everything you say forever would be enough for them.

Honestly it should be more than enough.

Yeah, ppl say ‘if it’s free, you’re the product.’ and that sentiment feels like it applies here.

I was falling down that hole about 2 years ago. I’ve always been a tech nerd, big scifi fan, etc so the tech advancements lately were really cool to me. Integration was such a cool concept. A fridge that could see inside itself, track what was in it, and suggest when it’s time to get more of something just seemed so futuristic. Screens everywhere with weather and useful info really played into my childhood dreams watching scifi movies and tv. I’ve since done a complete 180 and as of 2 months ago finally completely cut out all big tech, but there’s a big push for people like me to fall into the trap of “I don’t need it, but it’s so cool”.

I can see the logic of being able to set certain items that you always want in stock, and your fridge being able to tell you if you’re running low or if it’s beyond its expiry.

Can smart fridges do that? I don’t think so.

Even if they can, it’s probably not worth the extra expense, complexity, data mining, security concerns, or the fact that Samsung or whoever can shut down functionality whenever they want.

I just want a basic fridge-freezer.

.

I guess? Someone also said “rhetoric”, and although it counts as both of these, I’m specifically thinking about these kinds of statements you get in press releases that obnoxiously try to paint the world the way that the company needs it to be in order to justify what they’re doing.

Things like “Customers don’t like regulations that stop us giving them the best service”, “Our users are clear that they want the freedom to choose what subscription models work for them”, you know? Those kind of weaselly shit on my pie and tell me it’s a blueberry statements, where they dishonestly attempt to pose as the good guys wanting to do best for the world. They clearly must know that nobody actually falls for it, but they say it anyway because they need it to be out there in order for their paid-off politicians and useful idiots to have something to support deregulation.

That sounds right to me. Maybe “spin” if I want to be a bit more neutral, but it doesn’t look like they deserve the benefit of the doubt.

Theyre putting a happy spin on some bullshit.

For me, there’s no level of advertisement that is permissible, no matter how seemingly inoffensive the ad may be. It’s still an ad.

In my own home on a device I paid for, it’s simply not happening.

My tolerance is zero, because I am not willing to accept this ad-saturated society that we have somehow been generationally conditioned into thinking is acceptable.

I have one of those echo ball looking things with a clock on it. I mostly just use it to play atmospheric noise and set alarms and as a clock. I do get ads sometimes. Sometimes I ask it to play something and it will ask me to subscribe to something. Sometimes it will notify me of a price drop on Amazon. I’ll probably get rid of it soon. My life has just been hectic lately, and I haven’t had the time to set something else up to replace it yet. Going to completely de-big-tech soon (I’m mostly there already); I don’t trust them, with them being so close to this fascist admin. I think it’s likely these will be used for state surveillance; some of big tech’s products and services already are.

No, I don’t like mine and would probably literally cover the screen of it was in my eyesight. It’s unacceptable.

Kudos on the N64. What game is loaded? I bought me a Retro-Bit Tribute64 controller and got Rosalina’s mupen64 Emulator going on. Oh my sweet sweet Perfect Dark…

Yes

Amazon and producers might have a deal between them. That’s probably public information if you’re interested.

Shakespeare was about book and ticket sales.

I know, that’s what I do. It’s just so bloat ridden it’s 5 clicks with a shitty remote to switch inputs. I want a tv with no UI, just a power button, volume, channel, and input. Maybe a menu for color settings. The menus on mine are built to push me to one app or another. Every time I turn it on I have to navigate pop ups and prompts trying to get me to connect it and spend money on one app or another. I just want to go to HDMI 1.

I don’t really like the idea - I don’t have an old one to use for that, but even if I had, I wouldn’t leave it plugged in 24/7 with an aging battery inside of it. I’m looking for something that’s either meant to be plugged in constantly or something that can last a few weeks on a single charge.

Cool, thanks. TRMNL looks good, with the only thing I dislike is that the ready made kits ship from the US (I’m in the EU). I see that there are EU resellers stocking DIY kits, so I might have a go at those.