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Comment by Ansil849 | Hacker News Reader

The way to combat this is not to buy products that have this and then complain about them. The companies that make them do not care, they have already gotten your money.

The way to combat this is to not buy products that have this in the first place.

edit: a lot of comments are saying that the ads were added later, after purchase. This doesn't change my opinion at all, because people still bought products that have the capability for ads to be added retroactively. That is on you.

If you don't like the option of it happening, and as this example illustrates it can clearly happen, then do not buy products that have the capability of having ads added retroactively to the product.

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That doesn't make sense as this was added additionally, so when people purchased their devices the ads were not present.

To quote one review verbatim:

> I purchased two premium-priced Nvidia Shield TV's and loved them until yesterday. That was the day Google began forcing huge dominating ads on the home screen. These ads are for content in services that I haven't eve subscribed to or installed, they're totally irrelevant and obnoxious, and there is no way to disable them. It's offensive to force ads like this in a premium-priced product well after the return window is over. It's a bait-and-switch and I can only hope they realize this and make it right with the users.

Does the Nvidea Shield TV come with this Google controlled "Android TV Home" as the home screen / launcher?

Seems like a miss on Nvidea's part to let someone else control the default experience, if so.

Edit: It appears so. https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/shield/support/shield-tv/introd...

Yes, it is required by Google for Android TV devices.

Ah, okay. That does make for a confusing consumer experience. I would guess most non-tech users would assume this is something Nvidea can control.

Edit: You can see some complaints flowing in on Nvidea's forum: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/shield-tv/9/

Lots of comments on this specific thread: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/shield-tv/9/4579...

People still bought products that had the capability of ads being inserted retroactively.

If you don't want the potential of ads being inserted into hardware you purchase, then don't purchase hardware that allows it. It is very straightforward.

So you're future victim blaming now? People need to be able to predict all possible eventualities and are to blame for any future changes to a system?

If you buy a product that someone can remotely control, then you are setting yourself up for a world of hurt. Whether that is advertising or having all your data wiped (like is currently the case for those Western Digital Live Book hard drives).

'Future blaming' is an asinine term. If you point out to someone that, well, they shouldn't be surprised if their home got robbed because they only had a screen door, you could make a similar reply that you're "future blaming" those people because they needed to "to predict all possible eventualities and are to blame for any future changes to a system?" Ridiculous.

People need to take accountability for their purchasing decisions. You buy a product with a gaping front door in it that allows the vendor or whoever else to push whatever crap into the product? Then that is on you.

To take your example to the extreme, unless people control their entire tech stack, they deserve whatever is coming to them.

So if the software you're using on your system breaks functionality or introduces ads, it's on you. Maybe you can reject software updates to your local stack that you're aware of, but what happens when stuff is introduced in part of the stack you can't control?

You also assume everyone is sufficiently tech aware to prevent such things. yes, in an ideal world, every one is sufficiently tech savvy to know all possible eventualities. But that's not the case, and anyone here who thinks they're infallible at doing so, is kidding themselves.

Many people definitely predicted this outcome years ago. At the time it was dismissed with "slippery slope fallacy" etc.

You're assuming everyone is sufficiently tech savvy however to understand this could happen. Unless you're going up to every would be buyer and telling them "hey in the future this product might have ads...but also all the other high ends brands might have ads too..." then you can't expect the average person to really prepare for something like this

In the end you didn't you read the fine print where it said google can make changes. You relied on their brand name and popularity and thought you were making a solid choice. You will get outraged today and forget about it tomorrow.

You got played. You were scammed. You are a victim of following what society told you.

Accept it and think though your next purchase.

This is such an absurd take on things. So every change should just be brushed of and people should just move on? No software company is open to criticism for their changes and it's the consumers fault for not understanding every little nuance?

Trusting google to control your tv experience is not the same thing as trusting any company to provide any service.

These changes were foreseeable so much that it is written in the agreement. You have no legal recourse.

To spoil the next discovery, your tv habits are or will be monitored and recorded now or in the near future. This information will spill into your life in unwanted ways.

It is absolutely not straightforward and you are arguing a black-or-white fallacy.

As was discussed ad nauseum on HN before, in threads about "smart" vs "dumb" TVs, telling consumers to "not buy smart devices" is putting an disproportionate burden on them, given the market conditions as well as the actual consumer expectations and desires.

As ads are not required for the functioning of smart devices, compared to for example, electricity being required for a TV to work, or an internet connection being required for movie streaming to work, it is fallacious to suggest that consumers must avoid such smart devices to avoid unwanted behavior being forced upon them at a later date.

> telling consumers to "not buy smart devices" is putting an disproportionate burden on them, given the market conditions as well as the actual consumer expectations and desires.

This is true for all consumer goods. The disproportionate burden has and so long as capitalism exists, will continue to be on consumers. Companies selling products have millions or billions to spend on advertising and lobbying. Consumers do not. Being a responsible consumer and carefully researching your desired product is true for everything you buy, TVs are no exception

So you are suggesting you should never purchase an android phone like a Pixel because google has the capability of putting tons of ads in?

Customers can and should complain here, that's like saying don't purchase any software ever? People like smart TVs for good reasons.

Yep. I’m not really looking forward to buying a hospitality or commercial version for my next TV but I fully expect that is how it will go when I tell the local electronics store that I just want a display.

It’s similar to the whole online advertising thing. I have no qualms about closing your website because of a cookie banner dark pattern or an annoying ad that makes it past my filtering. I’ll never come back either.

The problem is that the vast majority of people do not behave in this manner.

> The problem is that the vast majority of people do not behave in this manner.

Precisely. It's why shit like this continues to happen. Because the stark reality is that most people do not care. And a large percentage of the ones that do care will still continue to buy the offending products anyway, they'll just complain about them.

How do you propose people don’t buy products that have ads added to them in the future?

It's very straightforward: do not buy products that have the capability to have ads added to them retroactively.

There is zero way any of the three televisions in my house will have ads added to them unless someone physically comes into my home and replaces the television sets.

I was looking for dumb tvs a little bit ago and it's quite hard to find. Every company wants to turn their hardware sale into an eternal revenue stream.

They are not hard to find at all. Sure it's more 'difficult' than searching for 'TV' on Amazon, but if you spend ten minutes doing a web search, you will find some brands.

Here's one site to get you started: https://pointerclicker.com/best-dumb-tv/

Alibaba. I'm just buying what are basically big monitors. I'm paying what feels like a premium price for a screen, one power and three HDMI input - only. Lack of other BS is the premium feature.

Edit: down thread someone calls it "commercial display" - search for those.

You’re also limited to mostly LED televisions

How do you prevent someone from adding ads to the phone or computer you used to send that post?

> If you don't like the option of it happening, and as this example illustrates it can clearly happen, then do not buy products that have the capability of having ads added retroactively to the product.

So, don't buy anything capable of receiving a software update?

> So, don't buy anything capable of receiving a software update?

Not quite. Don't buy anything that forces updates. Updates are obviously important for security, compatibility and a slew of other reasons. But updates which are forced on the user are no bueno.

Literally any device can force you to update, by the simple means of not letting you access the service without the latest version of their app.

> Literally any device can force you to update, by the simple means of not letting you access the service without the latest version of their app.

This is literally not true.

And if a fix for a critical vulnerability and an ad feature are both in the same update?

> And if a fix for a critical vulnerability and an ad feature are both in the same update?

Can you point to actual real-world examples where this has been the case?

I don't see the point of this stretched hypothetical. If it were to come up, then you could deal with accordingly - for instance by getting the update and then blocking the ad server somewhere upstream in your network path.

They don't actually have to be in the same update, the security fix just has to come after the ad antifeature with no separate patches presented, only a linear series of versions. And that linear model is extremely common. Anything using the linear model that has both antifeature updates and security updates at unpredictable times is very likely to run into the “can't install the security update without accepting the antifeature” problem.

Again:

> I don't see the point of this stretched hypothetical. If it were to come up, then you could deal with accordingly - for instance by getting the update and then blocking the ad server somewhere upstream in your network path.

And then not buying that brand's products in the future. And advising others not to buy them.

My point above was not about how to deal with it, but only to point in the direction of it being very very much not a “stretched hypothetical”, but a reality of a vast quantity of consumer software, including critical things that are difficult for people to replace. (My worldmodel doesn't judge your proposed counter very highly either, FWIW, but I don't feel up to arguing that part just now.)

And now you have reached the exact point these same Android TV customers have reached :)

Can you admit you are wrong now?

I am not sure it is that stretched. Do you remember Windows 7 added telemetry, how it was added and how update descriptions became way less helpful?

> The way to combat this is not to buy products that have this...

I did!

That is the ENTIRE point.

As far as I understand the product was bought first and the ads came later with an update.

The products didn't have the ads when they bought them.

I’d love to buy a “dumb” tv. How do I do that?

I have searched far and wide last year for a dumb tv and couldn't find one. Like another said there's the Sceptre TVs, I've stumbled upon it earlier this year with this article: https://frame.work/ca/en/blog/in-defense-of-dumb-tvs

I've even started to look into buying just a big monitor and an external tv tuner.

The words you’re looking for are “hospitality” and “commercial display”

The hospitality versions will be cheaper than commercial (commercial displays are designed to last longer with continuous operation).

Just buy a cheap smart one and attach a device that fully controls it via hmdi. My bedroom TV boots to Kodi and the original remote is attached as well as a small keyboard. Basically the best solution I found

I’d be worried that it was still phoning home even when I was on a different input. It’s a good solution if you have to have a smart tv though.

How would it do that? You think they’re shipping SIM cards in the TV?

IMO these problems should be solved with a firewall either way. You can never know when they start talking home.

Right! Like Nvidia Shield! wait

Walmart sells Sceptre brand TVs. They make 4K dumb TVs up to 75".

Thank you. This looks like exactly what I wanted.

Just admit you posted a bad take and move on.

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