Samsung opens its Bixby assistant to developers
techcrunch.com
techcrunch.com
It really is an interesting platform that’s worth playing around with. You essentially define a set of “concepts and actions” (objects and functions, effectively), and then give Bixby example sentences for natural language training that specify which words represent input concepts and what the goal is (for instance, an action like “BookUber” or “FindHotel”), and Bixby dynamically generates the program for you, including adding steps on its own to prompt the user for missing information (i.e, you say “book a table at The French Laundry next Saturday at 7” and it knows it needs to ask you “for how many”). You can easily teach Bixby about context and continuing conversation, so you could say “change the reservation to Sunday” and it would know what you were talking about. And, it can even learn the user’s preferred defaults over time, so if you usually specify a table for two, it assumes that’s what you mean. (You’d be able to change that on a confirmation screen before it books anything, of course.)
Full disclosure: I’m a tech writer at Viv Labs, so I’m absolutely biased. :) But I acquired this bias from working with the product.
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/samsung-bixby-viv-alexa-rvia...
On an unrelated note, I am pretty upset that my Samsung ~$1200 TV has ads built into it.
I don't have a TV but really?
- Used to being advertised to constantly so it's not really more of an intrusion.
- Typically don't realize they can or have little desire to impose their will on technology.
- Usually very price discriminating so shaving a few extra dollars off with ad revenue does translate into more sales.
- Have demonstrated their value as someone with disposable income.
- "Smart features" are a novelty value-add that's really cheap to include and has basically no user expectation of working.
Match made in heaven honestly. If you really want a dumb TV you pretty much have to find somewhere that sells commercial models but you're going to pay a huge premium. They're on the way out too since businesses just opt for just buying the cheper consumer models.
Your realistic options:
- Find a Smart TV that can pass as a dumb TV and just never network the thing. Sony is pretty not terrible.
- Buy a projector.
- Buy a TV with a built-in Chromecast or wait for Android TV to happen which might be a not terrible enough experience to actually use.
If you see any Zik Zak ads[1], run away as fast as you can!
Mine has multiple streaming clients built in that work perfectly fine. It's literally running Android. The biggest problem with it is that it uses some private LG app store. If it didn't, I wouldn't own a Apple TV, but as it is, the built in tv apps are where I spend 90% of my time. They work. They're updated frequently. The experience is just better.
Isn't LG running webOS? Didn't think they had any Android based non "Android TV" models.
Honestly, it's pretty good, with the caveat that outside of the major streaming providers, the apps aren't very interesting. But it's not like we're talking a infotainment system from a car manufacturer, those things are 100% shit every time.
Thanks for the idea to uninstall that app.
Don't connect it to the interwebs. I don't have mine connected and have never seen an ad (granted it's two years old, so maybe it's only more recent models).
[1]https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/hack
Welp, never buying a Samsung TV.
I just don't use any of the "smart" crap. It's an input output device, don't need/want it to be more.
On a lighter note, don’t TVs have ads anyway?
Edit: I feel I should add, in fairness, that this has to be done (the removal) per account. I suspect that there is a system directory somewhere that is used as a template but I have not so far bothered to figure out where it is. I guess I've just gotten too accustomed to the 'Unpin from Start Menu' dance.
They can haphazardly reappear in time. I've seen this happen on 2 completely unrelated PCs.
It's probably just bugged. I've found the W10 Start Menu in general to be dodgy. The keyboard-driven search seems like it's totally nondeterministic, e.g. exact string matches for the name of something in Control Panel sometimes finds it and sometimes doesn't.
Another thing that really annoys me is that web results pop in above local results on the computer. I almost never search Bing via the start menu, and I'd love for a way to disable that but I also realize it's their main strategy for monetization for win 10 now that they're doing free rolling releases.
Is it Samsung pushing the advertisements or is it Google (via Android TV)? This is the first I've heard of this. Gross.
Samsung doesn't use Android TV, so it's definitely 100% Samsung here.
As far as I am concerned, if the TV contains ADS, it is totally not worth owning. Maybe if they gave one to me.
Maybe we'll see a return to the 90's when you could get a free computer if you allowed it to show ads at the bottom of the screen.
I know some people were asked to return their computers, but I've heard that some companies crashed so hard that the computers were just abandoned with their users.
To be fair my tv is mostly used to read my hard drive, youtube, netflix and games and not even connected to regular channels, so maybe I am missing something to get them.
https://www.theverge.com/2016/10/5/13180286/samsung-viv-labs...
(or, there's benefits to having a non-"smart" tv)
LG's IT line[1] is not unreasonable in terms of pricing, especially if the purchaser is also paying the electric bill, demands long-lasting color accuracy or otherwise wants a purpose-built solution. I have not used one and I don't know if budget display manufacturers like TCL and Vizio have comparable products.
1. https://www.lg.com/us/business/commercial-display/it-product...
Sure, but lower demand would usually mean lower price, unless the consumers are willing to pay extra for something that other products are missing. In this case, I'm not sure what the other products are missing in comparison, but I'm also not familiar with these TV's.
We've had Sony, Samsung, and LG Smart TVs over the last few years and all were slow, annoying, and all round shitty experiences. I barely use my TV now because I hate waiting for it to "start up" (Sony with Android TV.. "Please Wait" for what seems like forever before you can do ANYTHING on it).
That said, I would also boycott manufacturers/products that behave badly like Samsung mentioned in the above comment.
That being said, I have only ever connected it to the Internet twice via Ethernet to update firmware. Otherwise it remains offline.
It's more about feature checklist pissing contests than any real benefit to the average consumer.
A big problem for entertainment lovers is that there are too many things to control, thus creating the all-in-one market. On the other hand, power users will insist on highly functional subcomponents that each bring a specific and glorious benefit.
And there you have it, all-in-one vs. subcomponents. Which does the average consumer belong?
Of course, if that UI is crap and then doesn't get upgraded, it negates all the advantages...
I wish HDMI-CEC worked better for everyone since it could theoretically solve the problem. It actually works well on our 7-year old TV. I don't even know where our AppleTV remote is (that one with the touch pad everyone keeps complaining about), we just use the TV's remote over HDMI-CEC.
If you knew all the data it collects from you, you'd never give it internet access again:
- grabs the list of HDMI connected peripherals to see what other devices/consoles you use
- analyzes everything you watch using video recognition (similar to what Shazam does for music, so it works with shows that you download, stream, etc and yes it also works with porn)
- grabs the list of other devices it can see on the network so it knows if you're Mac or pc, iPhone or Android, etc
- cross advertises things on your other devices based on your browsing history (on your phone, computer) and viewing history from your tv: do you watch a lot of shows from HBO but you don't have a cable or satellite box connected to your tv? You'll now be a target for ads from HBO and your friendly neighborhood cable company to subscribe.
- tracks your tv viewing habits to provide real-time audience numbers and analytics to broadcasters
It's not like it's a secret, but the reach/extent of the surveillance is not very well known outside the adtech industry. Since working (and leaving in disgust) the industry, I swore to never ever give a smart TV my WiFi password. There is no good reason to do so, and it tries to exfilter way too much data to my liking.
You could always build one from source: https://github.com/wangrunz/BixbyRemap
[1] https://github.com/wangrunz/BixbyRemap/blob/master/app/src/m...
[0] https://www.google.com/amp/www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/201...