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Comment by nipperkinfeet | Hacker News Reader

These days, the general rule is to avoid buying anything 'smart'. They are all filled with advertisements and data-sharing practices and are designed to target you through their user interface and applications. They bombard you with offers for their other products and deals.

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Matrix got it a bit wrong; the machines aren't interested in our body heat, they're going to put us in the goo pods and force use to watch adverts 24/7

Why? What do they or their creators get out of it?

Shareholder value

“Shareholder value”

Obviously platforms get advertiser dollars, but the question is what the business paying for that gets. The answer is.. almost nothing? Dedicated marketing/advertising resources at your business is probably just a fifth column, where shareholders and business owners are swindled into paying the salary and other maintenance for people who are actually working for google/facebook/amazon/whatever.

Source? Like 20+ years of ubiquitous surveillance, tracking and micro-targeting.. and yet non-pet owners still get ads for dog food, males get ads for feminine hygiene products, single people are offered deals on family vacations, and people who just bought a car get car advertisements for the next 3-5 years which only taper off when it might actually be time to buy another car.

Human pets.

I don't have a reliable source, but I've heard that the original script had the machines use us for our processing power, not our energy, but that the studio thought it sounded too complicated and had them change it. Of course, changing it makes it make ZERO sense.

Some not so reliable sources I found:

https://www.reddit.com/r/matrix/comments/q2i0by/is_it_true_t...

https://www.reddit.com/r/plotholes/comments/11khig/comment/c...

Black mirror got it right?

I'm starting to think the people who make the big decisions are using dystopian speculative fiction as guidebooks.

Don't worry, the ad spending will die down soon as more of the working class has less disposable income.

Apple gets a lot of criticism but one thing I do like is that their devices at least respect me. The AppleTV streaming box has no ads in the OS and OS-level data sharing is opt-out.

It’s nothing inherently bad with “smart” devices. Just the business models behind them.

For now...

Is it even possible to buy a non-smart tv these days?

All I really need or want is something I can plug a few gaming consoles into... so HDMI, composite and preferably s-video. No bells or whistles or Internet connection necessary.

Ironically advertising displays a pretty good.

I've read something like 5 or 6 HN threads about a dumb TV, and without fail _this_ is always one of the replies.

Another benefit — advertising displays are also designed to be always-on and last much longer than consumer devices.

The other side of the coin? Because of the first two points, they are also rather cost-prohibitive.

Nevertheless, anyone know where I can pick up a good one?

I don't know how long they are supposed to last always on, but I have done a few always-on displays with cheap-ass consumer TVs. They have always been fine left on for a couple of years. I mean, some of them got turned off on weekends and stuff, but for the price of a commercial display, you can buy 4 cheap-ass displays, and just replace one if it dies. I've also seen lots of these commercial displays die as well... I just don't believe they are really worth spending the money on. Of course, this was back before every consumer TV was a smart TV. I dunno if you can find cheap-ass TVs that aren't smart anymore.

There are probably many places where the cost of sending a technician to replace the display is rather expensive.

> The other side of the coin? Because of the first two points, they are also rather cost-prohibitive.

Not if you steal one! Which has 3 great benefits, you get a free screen, wherever you stole it from no longer bombards passersby with intrusive advertising, and whoever though doing that was a good idea is now out the cost of their expensive screen.

> Nevertheless, anyone know where I can pick up a good one?

Your local shopping mall late at night...

Don't connect it to wifi?

Wasn't there a minor scandal a while back where I think Samsung TVs were discovered to be connecting to nearby unsecured wifi to send their telemetry back to HQ? I feel to be safe you'd want to consider opening them up and removing the wifi radio or antenna.

Smart just means bait-n-switch to me now. Like those Samsung refrigerators or those cars with the subscription for heated seats or remote start.

Also the UX and human interface design on them is usually bafflingly bad. Like smartphones.

I was all-in on Amazon Alexa until I wasn't. Wasn't worth the friction.

as long as you got a smart phone you can “smart” everything else as it don’t matter no more…

I'm technically ignorant on this but would GDPR apply to this type of thing as well?

(I hope so)

You'd be able to opt out of data collection and request a copy of your data, but not opt out of adverts in general.

Not really. GDPR deals with privacy and personal data handling.

There are directives about transparency in the costs or charges tied to a sale, but it is not immediate that it covers including new ads as an extra burden on the consumer.

Same for other directives regarding misleading advertising and the like, hard to prove that this new anti feature goes against the advertised product. it’s all very indirect and hazy, we’re in need of more protections for consumer to truly own their hardware.

GDPR doesnt block ads

"Smart" just means enshittegenic. Ripe for enshittification.

To stick to the metaphor (apologies if this isn't HN friendly)

Smart TV? Fart TV

Smart display? Fart display

Smart fridge? Fart fridge

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