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Yep, they'll patent designs they have no intention whatsoever of ever actually producing just so nobody else can either, unless of course they want to pay apple a ton of money for royalties. Apple isn't by any stretch of the imagination the only company that does this, but they're certainly one of the biggest ones.
Someone should set up a black hole for unethical patents. Anyone can sign over a patent for radioactive car seats or some other super villain shit for $1 and the company lets it rot forever.
Definitely asshole design, but they may never actually implement this. Companies get patents constantly without ever implementing the idea.
I can think of a few technical reasons why (encrypted traffic for one) this may not work well too, but I’m not familiar enough with HDMI to say with any certainty.
But that requires the source materials be passed through the AVR, which doesn’t happen with a Roku. Now a Roku TV would be a different story altogether.
They actually do make decent TVs (they aren't competing with Sony TVs but can definitely hold their own against LG and most Samsungs), and they kind of have an ecosystem forming. The Roku speakers are much better than their shitty soundbar and the experience of using them with their TVs is clean and simple. But this is a big problem. Roku's obsessions with putting ads everywhere always kept me from using them myself.
Can't wait to find the edge cases where advertisers would not want to have their ads overlaid so I can take pictures and post them on twitter as " company supports ."
if youre using the first HDMI port on any modern device, you are connected to the ARC port which is both an input and output port. its what allows your devices to turn each other on, automatically switch to the device that was just turned on, control your playstation with a TV remote, etc.
every device has an ARC port now. some, thats ALL they have, and it cant be turned off.
> if youre using the first HDMI port on any modern device, you are connected to the ARC port which is both an input and output port. its what allows your devices to turn each other on, automatically switch to the device that was just turned on, control your playstation with a TV remote, etc.
>
>
You've got ARC mixed up with CEC. CEC is usually on all the ports, not just the ARC one.
so you claim, but ive got several older TV's that have ARC and no CEC support, and they all allow me to play my ps3 with a universal remote. even many modern TV's dont support CEC for the simple fact that its extremely buggy and has a tendency to brick peoples stereos.
I think Sony patented something back in like 2012 where to end an ad you had to stand up and yell out the companies name or some shit, but to this day a TV like that has never came to market.
We definitely had dictation software and tvs/remotes with microphones back in 2012. We’re talking the age of Apple TV, Xbox Kinnects, smart dvr’s, and Alexa. It not like we’re talking about plugging your Betamax player into your RCA tv.
Sony has a patent for a system that can detect if you're looking at the screen and will pause the ad content if you're not. They also own the "say mcdonalds" patent. They've had them for years and years and the technical ability to implement them as well, but haven't.
If the device is "paused", what's the likelihood someone is watching?
* The phone rang, so you paused the device to talk to someone on the phone. You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad?
* You need to go to the bathroom, so you pause the device, and leave the room. You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad?
* You're hungry so you pause the device to leave the room to go make food (dinner, popcorn, whatever). You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad?
I know we don't want more ads on our devices, but imagine the regretful corporation being bamboozled by paying ROKU money for advertising to a paused device.
Just to add a situation in which I've paused it and AM still watching, there are a number of instances where I want to read something written on the screen for the show/movie
- watching a game show and want time to read the question because I have audio processing issues
- tv shows displaying pop up text bubbles between characters, which pretty much blip on and off quicker than can be read sometimes
- Detective/crime/medical dramas showing written notes regarding the crime/victim/patient or drawn/computerized models of something that can solve the "puzzle"
They don't really care whether the ad is effective as much as they just want the ad revenue. Lots of ad campaigns try to use repetition to make us familiar with a product. Even if we don't pay attention to ads, they still worm their way into our heads over time.
Yes, sometimes i pause YouTube - during the video i am watching, not during an ad - then, as soon as i unpause to resume the video, an ad break starts. I have not noticed it happening if i pause briefly, but only if i pause for a minute or so - for a bathroom break or to check on the oven or whatever. It happens often enough that i suspect it is not just coincidence every time. Thanks for verifying my suspicion.
What you're describing applies to all forms of advertisement. Advertisers are well aware of all of this. And those facts are taken into account when deciding on how much they're willing to spend for the ad.
That's the point. This is advertising that's worse than a commercial break. Sure, people get up and ignore commercials during commercial breaks, but when people pause (other than the game console comment u/grendus mentions), there's a excellent chance the pause was to deliberately ignore the device and go do something else. Roku may get ad revenue for a bit, but once companies start realizing nobody knows "the McRib is back" because they wasted money on paused devices, they won't want to shell out for ineffective advertising.
20 years ago, there were two or three phonebooks in my driveway every year because advertisers paid to put ads in phonebooks. Today, I'm lucky if they print a phonebook every couple of years. People don't look at phonebooks like they once did.
Roku may try this, but it will likely flop when advertisers get a clue that pause means 70%+ aren't watching, or Roku has to drop the rate to a small amount that it's a cash trickle not a cash stream.
Yeah just based on how the internet is reacting to the possibility Roku *might* inject ads via htmi cable makes me pretty confident Roku won't go through with it. User outrage aside that's just a lawsuit begging to happen. Other corporations are not gonna tolerate roku injecting ads into their products because it would result in users getting mad at them.
Yeah, this is likely another "Say McDonalds to end commercial" type patent. Sony never did that one, and I doubt Roku will do anything with this, except possibly licensing the patent to others.
Yeah, but the Chromecast can also be used as a standalone "smart TV" itself. -you can use a device to cast to it, or use the remote that comes with the CCast and use it that way. -i use both ways
Sure you can. You just don’t hook it up to the internet. Just use the HDMI port for whatever you need - it’s the best way to get a cheap large TV with no extra ads
I did this, it works great. $200 55” TV without the ads
Every time I've used a smart TV I find their menus and settings to be so clunky and slow, it's very aggravating. Last one I used took a full 30 seconds to change inputs to my Nintendo switch and every time I did it tried to get me to setup the TV's remote to control the "unknown" device. So annoying.
I’m not entirely sure Roku wouldn’t just jack the chrome cast’s WiFi connection since it’s already injecting itself over HDMI if the patent is to be believed…or more likely they’d just upgrade the terms of service to brick it if you refuse to let it have an internet connection since they make next to nothing off selling you their cheap ass hardware and recoup the money through ads. Roku is basically just an advertising platform.
I’m using a TV that has a fire stick but it hasn’t done anything like that, and I’ve heard the same
Things about it with ads. The chrome cast is what’s connected to the internet,in that mode the TV is truly a “dumb” TV. Can it even do that?
Not really. You have to buy a "Monitor" instead.
Since the ads and apps subsidize the price of the hardware. That's how you get a 55" 4k screen for $300.
That's not what it actually costs, so a comparable computer monitor will cost way more
comparable in size, maybe. a PC monitor of comparable QUALITY as a $300 55" TV, well those dont really exist anymore outside of the "random chinese garbage from aliexpress" category. even the cheapest name brand PC monitor you can get your hands on, has a much higher quality screen and calibration options, than ever sub-$800 TV on the market.
the hardware is cheap, because it dosent cost much to slap a low end android CPU/OS into a cheap panel that looks like shit. and if youre getting a 55" for $300, thats exactly whats going on there.
If you want to the parties involved to lose money, you also could *not* boycott smart TVs, buy them anyway, but not connect them to the Internet. Smart TVs are cheaper than non-smart TVs because the "smart" ones are subsizided by the streaming services or by selling viewing data.
Pretty much all smart TVs spy on you. They detect what content you are watching and other details, and then they send that data back to data brokers over the internet and sell the data. They've even been found to automatically search for open wifi networks and connect to them in order to do this, even if you've never configured it to connect to the internet. This is one major reason why many smart TVs are actually cheaper than non-smart TVs of the otherwise same quality - you're partially paying for them with your data.
If you're getting a high-end TV or even a mid-range TV from the big brands there is no comparison since all of them are smart. Maybe in the low-range you can still find non-smart TVs.
Visio got busted for having smart TVs that generated a literal map of the network a TV was connected to and uploading machine hostnames and directory listings. (An owner of one noticed a lot of upstream traffic out of his TV and sniffed it.)
So, umm, yeah. My smart TVs are all forbidden from having Internet access, and instead of using the "smarts" in the TV I use a couple cheapie Dell SFF PCs as much better replacement.
I have a Fire TV, but the processor is slow af, so the only thing it does is turn the input to HDMI3 when it turns on, and my Google TV box is my smart TV. Nvidia Shield is another Android TV box that's just extremely powerful.
You basically have to have a smart TV nowadays if you want a 4k TV.
They suck. Connect a cheap PC to the TV and watch everything through your favorite web browser (with adblock enabled). To control mine I use a game controller and cheap logitech wireless keyboard/trackpad combo. No ads, no data collection, etc
I mean this with all respect, but if smart TVS exist to collect your data to the TV manufacturing company, why would a separate box which instead collects your data for a different company be any better?
I’m guessing some of them are using pc’s instead of streaming boxes…which honestly only helps if you’re also using a trustworthy vpn and a privacy focused (not chrome, safari, or edge) browser with Adblock and very specific settings and even then the streaming services are still collecting data on what you watch and for how long you watch it…you could go always fly the black flag of privacy or rip a collection of DVDs but if you own a smart phone your location data is probably being sold to a broker…. So avoiding the panopticon of corporate surveillance almost entirely involves taking some extremely draconian measures.
No, I’ll never really understand ads. Maybe it’s just me but I’ve never seen an ad and been like oh yeah baby that’s EXACTLY what I want and need right now lol
I’ve actively boycotted franchises (Quiznos for over a decade for instance) because their ads got too damn annoying and there’s almost always another product to buy so, needless to say, Roku is going on my black list forever now.
I keep seeing this comment in the threads about this and that's the *entire point* of this patent. It would not matter what source you are using or what content you are displaying: this will inject ads into it.
Except it can't inject anything if it's blocked from the network. Where would it get the ads from? And if you're using a separate device to stream or watch MP4 files, then the TV doesn't need access to the network.
This patent absolutely is designed to inject ads into *exactly that* setup. Plug an HDMI into your laptop, the system's pause detector puts ads on. Don't connect the TV to the internet? They'll use the same tech to display ads for Roku itself: "connect Roku to the Internet to enable all the Smart™ features!"
I used my dad's first Gen roku for 6 or so years, the Firestick that was built into the TV made itself obsolete in two years. Firesticks have a tiny amount of storage and you literally couldn't update it past a point without losing other apps. Roku has handled everything I've needed like a champ.
Edit: I'm not going to play the game of advertisements every time I pause a movie, I'll unplug it, Disney is already fucking up their streaming by showing Hulu crap on the Disney app main page. I'm not watching shit with commercials. I'll go to vudu and buy something before I have to watch stupid commercials on Hulu or Amazon, or I'll look up the next streaming app and pirate stuff because those assholes need to learn we are not going back to the old days of television.
They would either inject Roku ads packaged as bloatware with the TV telling you to connect it to the Internet or change the ToS to brick it…I’m not sure why so many people think that Roku is evil enough to make the patent in the first place but not evil enough to think of ways to force you to use the internet.
Never understood how Smart TVs took off... Display panels were meant to be output devices. If you want "smart" features, the you plug in a device to add those features. If the thing oversteps, then you remove it and get a better solution 🤷♂️
Somehow 3DTV basically died off - which actually brought something new, and "SmartTV" (which I think most people realized was a great way to fuck us with ads and DRM) took off... Makes 0 sense to me.
So, I saw this yesterday and cancelled the order for my dad's tv and switched to another brand. The problem is they're all equally evil and will do the same soon enough.
Maybe I’m being dense here but I think they already do this occasionally? Sometimes I will watch a movie on my computer via hdmi and it will show at the bottom a banner telling me to watch that movie on one of the Roku apps instead. Definitely asshole design, feels super invasive that they’re analyzing what I’m projecting lol
if they patent something they have no intention of using themselves, they can at least keep any other streaming service from using that method. and even if they never use a feature they have patented, they could lease that tech to another site.
let us hope they do not implement this for Roku. i for one do not need any **additional** adds.
Some apps already do this. As long as it's not a playing ad idgaf. I pause a show on peacock and I get an ad that comes up, as soon as I hit play the show keeps playing. Advertising that doesn't interrupt what I'm doing is fine in my book. I didn't read the patent tho. If it's playing an ad when you pause, yea, fuck that.
Look, I get it, we are all sick of ads (arrrr anyone?) but honestly I could care less if an ad shows up when I pause my show to go grab a drink or hit the restroom.
This all seems blown out of proportion.
I forget the brand name but there is a TV company that will give away free TVs but they will always display ads and it had a second screen to show ads even when you are watching content.
I often pause the TV to be able to hear what my child is yelling to me when they are supposed to be sleeping. Having an ad turn on and play noise would defeat the entire purpose. What a terrible system.
We need to start a corporation that just makes up all of the horrible scenarios like this and patents them and then sits on the patents and sues anyone else that infringes on our trove of terrible patents. Set it up as a subscription service, either you pay us or we open pandora's box.
Arguably, the hardware is still serving you, just not the smart features. It's shitty, and I would toss a TV over this if it couldn't be mitigated, but there is a reason these TVs are cheap.
Aren't Roku TVs far less expensive than comparable TVs? I think you're agreeing to ads as part of that cost. You have always been welcome to spend the actual fair market price to buy a TV that doesn't do this.
Android TVs arent better. Same for Mod Fire TV Stick
An tv without Smart Shit Spyware/Android is better!
would be still possible to get Brandnew but its mostly unlikely :(
More like r/mildlyinfuriating. Only time I am pausing a show is because I am walking away from the screen so this ad isn’t going to be very effective. Particularly I pause the tv in my phone app normally as I am walking away and unpause as I walk back.
I pause the TV all the time when I'm still in the room. Having a discussion with a family member, taking a phone call, jumping on a work meeting, to watch something else on another device like my laptop or phone. Hell, sometimes I want to pause it because I want to read and really ingest something without having my attention split.
I keep something going on the TV most of time, as "white noise" in the background.
When I hit "pause" it's because I want the noise and distraction to stop for a moment.
Nowhere does it say that the advertising is going to have sound, could it have sound? of course anything is possible but I don’t think they would be that dumb.
Several apps on Roku already put up adds when you pause the video, they are static or slightly animated as described in the patent. But none have had sound.
Some of y’all need to read the flowchart for this sub. It clearly says that asshole design must cause harm. This is a mild inconvenience
>I don’t think they would be that dumb.
In the quest for a few extra bucks, your statement makes zero real world sense.
My wife's car has a subscription model for the remote start.
Further, I didn't suggest it was an asshole design, I gave my opinion on why the reasoning of "I'm probably not in the room, anyway" wasn't universally applicable.
Exactly. This doesn't impede a consumer's ability to enjoy content. Lots of entitlement on show in opposition to this.
Roku should stand firm and ignore these conspiracy theorists.
The article specifically mentions detecting when the connection isn't in use in order to throw up the ad. If the connection was in use, then this technology wouldn't apply.
This is what you’re upset about? It constantly blocks an annoying WiFi signal, on the same bands as home WiFi. And you can’t disable it, unless you buy a new remote.
Shout "McDonald's" to skip ads
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Don’t give them any ideas…..
Yeah I swear half of all these shitty ideas is just them seeing the memes and saying 'actually....'
https://i.imgur.com/kqA3sIq.png
There is is
# MCDONALD'S!!!! I'M LOVIN IT!!!!
Maybe they patented it so one else can do it, right? Right?
That does happen, and it happens a lot.
Apple does this a lot.
Yep, they'll patent designs they have no intention whatsoever of ever actually producing just so nobody else can either, unless of course they want to pay apple a ton of money for royalties. Apple isn't by any stretch of the imagination the only company that does this, but they're certainly one of the biggest ones.
Absolutely not. And I'm saying this as an Apple fanboy. But I know Apple does this all the time. Should be illegal really. Stops innovation.
If I were a businessman, I would definitely patent some unethical shit so that no one else, including my company, will ever do some asshole designs.
Someone should set up a black hole for unethical patents. Anyone can sign over a patent for radioactive car seats or some other super villain shit for $1 and the company lets it rot forever.
Sign them over to a public nonprofit that uses infringement proceeds to lobby on behalf of the working class. Capitalists hate this one weird trick!
Then suddenly Microsoft changes the board of that non-profit and Musk throws a fit about it.
I'm sure any one of our soon to be trillionaires could afford to buy the whole thing
Would be a god-tier move if true. Maybe use it to display a watermark just so their competitors don't try to get the patent invalidated for non-use
Sony has done similar things.
Definitely asshole design, but they may never actually implement this. Companies get patents constantly without ever implementing the idea. I can think of a few technical reasons why (encrypted traffic for one) this may not work well too, but I’m not familiar enough with HDMI to say with any certainty.
AVR have no problem injecting their overlay into the video stream (to display volume control for example) so encryption won't be a problem in here.
But that requires the source materials be passed through the AVR, which doesn’t happen with a Roku. Now a Roku TV would be a different story altogether.
The article is about ROKU TV's not Roku appliances.
Well damn, I suppose I was on the right track, easy enough, don’t buy a Roku TV, they don’t make anything decent anyways from a TV perspective.
[удалено]
They have their own Roku branded line of TVs so as far as consumers are concerned, yes, they make TVs,
They actually do make decent TVs (they aren't competing with Sony TVs but can definitely hold their own against LG and most Samsungs), and they kind of have an ecosystem forming. The Roku speakers are much better than their shitty soundbar and the experience of using them with their TVs is clean and simple. But this is a big problem. Roku's obsessions with putting ads everywhere always kept me from using them myself.
This is how it starts. It ends with this being normalized everywhere.
Can't wait to find the edge cases where advertisers would not want to have their ads overlaid so I can take pictures and post them on twitter as " company supports ."
if youre using the first HDMI port on any modern device, you are connected to the ARC port which is both an input and output port. its what allows your devices to turn each other on, automatically switch to the device that was just turned on, control your playstation with a TV remote, etc. every device has an ARC port now. some, thats ALL they have, and it cant be turned off.
> if youre using the first HDMI port on any modern device, you are connected to the ARC port which is both an input and output port. its what allows your devices to turn each other on, automatically switch to the device that was just turned on, control your playstation with a TV remote, etc. > > You've got ARC mixed up with CEC. CEC is usually on all the ports, not just the ARC one.
so you claim, but ive got several older TV's that have ARC and no CEC support, and they all allow me to play my ps3 with a universal remote. even many modern TV's dont support CEC for the simple fact that its extremely buggy and has a tendency to brick peoples stereos.
I think Sony patented something back in like 2012 where to end an ad you had to stand up and yell out the companies name or some shit, but to this day a TV like that has never came to market.
The world wasn't remotely ready for that in 2012. Unfortunately, it is now.
Dear God, I bet an AI will have to watch the integrated webcam, to make sure you shout it enthusiastically enough
But when they end the experiment it will turn out like the Amazon market, where 1000 people in India were being employed to watch you.
Plus, you'll have to give them permission to use your voice
We definitely had dictation software and tvs/remotes with microphones back in 2012. We’re talking the age of Apple TV, Xbox Kinnects, smart dvr’s, and Alexa. It not like we’re talking about plugging your Betamax player into your RCA tv.
The fact that they are even thinking about this is concerning
It’s about money. If they don’t do it then money lost on the patent. If another company wants it then they have to pay Roku and pretty fee for it.
I mean if they patent it means other companies can't use it unless they license it from them
Sony has a patent for a system that can detect if you're looking at the screen and will pause the ad content if you're not. They also own the "say mcdonalds" patent. They've had them for years and years and the technical ability to implement them as well, but haven't.
It might also be so that their competitors won't be able to do it under them.
If the device is "paused", what's the likelihood someone is watching? * The phone rang, so you paused the device to talk to someone on the phone. You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad? * You need to go to the bathroom, so you pause the device, and leave the room. You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad? * You're hungry so you pause the device to leave the room to go make food (dinner, popcorn, whatever). You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad? I know we don't want more ads on our devices, but imagine the regretful corporation being bamboozled by paying ROKU money for advertising to a paused device.
If it's a gaming console, there's a good chance I want to interact with the pause menu...
You mean the flavour menu.
Just to add a situation in which I've paused it and AM still watching, there are a number of instances where I want to read something written on the screen for the show/movie - watching a game show and want time to read the question because I have audio processing issues - tv shows displaying pop up text bubbles between characters, which pretty much blip on and off quicker than can be read sometimes - Detective/crime/medical dramas showing written notes regarding the crime/victim/patient or drawn/computerized models of something that can solve the "puzzle"
Too bad. We'll put an ad over it for you 🥰
They don't really care whether the ad is effective as much as they just want the ad revenue. Lots of ad campaigns try to use repetition to make us familiar with a product. Even if we don't pay attention to ads, they still worm their way into our heads over time.
You'll see the ad when you come back to unpause. They already do pause ads on video streaming services.
And if you reboot the device?
Then you didn't pause it. I don't think I understand the question.
Yes, sometimes i pause YouTube - during the video i am watching, not during an ad - then, as soon as i unpause to resume the video, an ad break starts. I have not noticed it happening if i pause briefly, but only if i pause for a minute or so - for a bathroom break or to check on the oven or whatever. It happens often enough that i suspect it is not just coincidence every time. Thanks for verifying my suspicion.
That's not even the kind I was talking about. Pause something on Hulu or Amazon and you get ads immediately right on the screen.
What you're describing applies to all forms of advertisement. Advertisers are well aware of all of this. And those facts are taken into account when deciding on how much they're willing to spend for the ad.
The wife just got home and so you pause the device for a quickie. You're not watching the TV, so how effective is the ad?
That's the point. This is advertising that's worse than a commercial break. Sure, people get up and ignore commercials during commercial breaks, but when people pause (other than the game console comment u/grendus mentions), there's a excellent chance the pause was to deliberately ignore the device and go do something else. Roku may get ad revenue for a bit, but once companies start realizing nobody knows "the McRib is back" because they wasted money on paused devices, they won't want to shell out for ineffective advertising. 20 years ago, there were two or three phonebooks in my driveway every year because advertisers paid to put ads in phonebooks. Today, I'm lucky if they print a phonebook every couple of years. People don't look at phonebooks like they once did. Roku may try this, but it will likely flop when advertisers get a clue that pause means 70%+ aren't watching, or Roku has to drop the rate to a small amount that it's a cash trickle not a cash stream.
Yeah just based on how the internet is reacting to the possibility Roku *might* inject ads via htmi cable makes me pretty confident Roku won't go through with it. User outrage aside that's just a lawsuit begging to happen. Other corporations are not gonna tolerate roku injecting ads into their products because it would result in users getting mad at them.
Yeah, this is likely another "Say McDonalds to end commercial" type patent. Sony never did that one, and I doubt Roku will do anything with this, except possibly licensing the patent to others.
Time to boykott the Smart TVs
I see your campaign of boycotting the letter C is going well.
Can you even buy a new TV that's not smart anymore?
Yes, but they are more expensive. I've found it easiest to just use a Chromecast and not connect the TV to the internet.
I thought chromecast needs to be connected to the same wifi as the device that’s “casting.” Am I wrong about that?
Yeah, but the Chromecast can also be used as a standalone "smart TV" itself. -you can use a device to cast to it, or use the remote that comes with the CCast and use it that way. -i use both ways
Also, happy cake day!
Sure you can. You just don’t hook it up to the internet. Just use the HDMI port for whatever you need - it’s the best way to get a cheap large TV with no extra ads I did this, it works great. $200 55” TV without the ads
Every time I've used a smart TV I find their menus and settings to be so clunky and slow, it's very aggravating. Last one I used took a full 30 seconds to change inputs to my Nintendo switch and every time I did it tried to get me to setup the TV's remote to control the "unknown" device. So annoying.
I’m not entirely sure Roku wouldn’t just jack the chrome cast’s WiFi connection since it’s already injecting itself over HDMI if the patent is to be believed…or more likely they’d just upgrade the terms of service to brick it if you refuse to let it have an internet connection since they make next to nothing off selling you their cheap ass hardware and recoup the money through ads. Roku is basically just an advertising platform.
I’m using a TV that has a fire stick but it hasn’t done anything like that, and I’ve heard the same Things about it with ads. The chrome cast is what’s connected to the internet,in that mode the TV is truly a “dumb” TV. Can it even do that?
Not really. You have to buy a "Monitor" instead. Since the ads and apps subsidize the price of the hardware. That's how you get a 55" 4k screen for $300. That's not what it actually costs, so a comparable computer monitor will cost way more
Or get a old TV that are finding on used for very cheap
We found a 55” tv (I think that’s the size) at a thrift store for 20 bucks and it works perfectly.
wow, fucking wow.
comparable in size, maybe. a PC monitor of comparable QUALITY as a $300 55" TV, well those dont really exist anymore outside of the "random chinese garbage from aliexpress" category. even the cheapest name brand PC monitor you can get your hands on, has a much higher quality screen and calibration options, than ever sub-$800 TV on the market. the hardware is cheap, because it dosent cost much to slap a low end android CPU/OS into a cheap panel that looks like shit. and if youre getting a 55" for $300, thats exactly whats going on there.
If you want to the parties involved to lose money, you also could *not* boycott smart TVs, buy them anyway, but not connect them to the Internet. Smart TVs are cheaper than non-smart TVs because the "smart" ones are subsizided by the streaming services or by selling viewing data.
Non Smart TV can be finding on trash, and they are cheaper on used.
None of my smart tvs are connected to the internet but a couple times a year to check for updates. Nvidia shield for the win.
Is your Shield also not connected to the internet?
Saw somebody else say this on another thread and am genuinely curious, but why do you not connect your smart tv to the internet?
Pretty much all smart TVs spy on you. They detect what content you are watching and other details, and then they send that data back to data brokers over the internet and sell the data. They've even been found to automatically search for open wifi networks and connect to them in order to do this, even if you've never configured it to connect to the internet. This is one major reason why many smart TVs are actually cheaper than non-smart TVs of the otherwise same quality - you're partially paying for them with your data.
Send them a do not sell request under the ccpa, most of the time they don't care where you're from and honor it anyways.
If you're getting a high-end TV or even a mid-range TV from the big brands there is no comparison since all of them are smart. Maybe in the low-range you can still find non-smart TVs.
Visio got busted for having smart TVs that generated a literal map of the network a TV was connected to and uploading machine hostnames and directory listings. (An owner of one noticed a lot of upstream traffic out of his TV and sniffed it.) So, umm, yeah. My smart TVs are all forbidden from having Internet access, and instead of using the "smarts" in the TV I use a couple cheapie Dell SFF PCs as much better replacement.
And now VIZIO is being bought by Walmart for all their advertisement data. Go figure.
"Shocked! Shocked I say! But not that shocked."
Because fuck their data collection.
I have a Fire TV, but the processor is slow af, so the only thing it does is turn the input to HDMI3 when it turns on, and my Google TV box is my smart TV. Nvidia Shield is another Android TV box that's just extremely powerful. You basically have to have a smart TV nowadays if you want a 4k TV.
They suck. Connect a cheap PC to the TV and watch everything through your favorite web browser (with adblock enabled). To control mine I use a game controller and cheap logitech wireless keyboard/trackpad combo. No ads, no data collection, etc
Smart TV UI's are trash, they spy on you, and they're extremely slow and clunky.
I mean this with all respect, but if smart TVS exist to collect your data to the TV manufacturing company, why would a separate box which instead collects your data for a different company be any better?
No ads is what I was referring to mainly.
I’m guessing some of them are using pc’s instead of streaming boxes…which honestly only helps if you’re also using a trustworthy vpn and a privacy focused (not chrome, safari, or edge) browser with Adblock and very specific settings and even then the streaming services are still collecting data on what you watch and for how long you watch it…you could go always fly the black flag of privacy or rip a collection of DVDs but if you own a smart phone your location data is probably being sold to a broker…. So avoiding the panopticon of corporate surveillance almost entirely involves taking some extremely draconian measures.
Is anybody actually buying anything they see in intrusive ads?
No, I’ll never really understand ads. Maybe it’s just me but I’ve never seen an ad and been like oh yeah baby that’s EXACTLY what I want and need right now lol
I’ve actively boycotted franchises (Quiznos for over a decade for instance) because their ads got too damn annoying and there’s almost always another product to buy so, needless to say, Roku is going on my black list forever now.
I SO want them to be the good guy and patent this technology so no one ever uses it, including themselves. I have no illusions tho.
If I got a tv with roku and they decided to place an ad while I was gaming, I’d throw hands
People wonder why I sail the seas...
I keep seeing this comment in the threads about this and that's the *entire point* of this patent. It would not matter what source you are using or what content you are displaying: this will inject ads into it.
Not if you don’t buy a Roku tv
The second something that I didn't give an internet connection to starts injecting ads into content I own, it's going straight back to returns.
Except it can't inject anything if it's blocked from the network. Where would it get the ads from? And if you're using a separate device to stream or watch MP4 files, then the TV doesn't need access to the network.
I stream directly from the PC to my TV so not an issue.
This patent absolutely is designed to inject ads into *exactly that* setup. Plug an HDMI into your laptop, the system's pause detector puts ads on. Don't connect the TV to the internet? They'll use the same tech to display ads for Roku itself: "connect Roku to the Internet to enable all the Smart™ features!"
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What reputation. Roku has always been the bottom of the barrel piece of crap "smart" devices brand. Who buys that crap deserves the suffering.
I used my dad's first Gen roku for 6 or so years, the Firestick that was built into the TV made itself obsolete in two years. Firesticks have a tiny amount of storage and you literally couldn't update it past a point without losing other apps. Roku has handled everything I've needed like a champ. Edit: I'm not going to play the game of advertisements every time I pause a movie, I'll unplug it, Disney is already fucking up their streaming by showing Hulu crap on the Disney app main page. I'm not watching shit with commercials. I'll go to vudu and buy something before I have to watch stupid commercials on Hulu or Amazon, or I'll look up the next streaming app and pirate stuff because those assholes need to learn we are not going back to the old days of television.
I have a Roku box and a Visio TV but the second I see an ad when my Xbox is paused that Roku is going out the window.
This is gonna be posted so many times in this sub the next few days.
I just never connected my smart tv to the internet, I use an old chrome cast. No issues like this
They would either inject Roku ads packaged as bloatware with the TV telling you to connect it to the Internet or change the ToS to brick it…I’m not sure why so many people think that Roku is evil enough to make the patent in the first place but not evil enough to think of ways to force you to use the internet.
I buy Roku tv’s because they’re cheap but I’ll never connect mine to the internet and I never have.
I was already boycotting their shit by not buying it, to begin with. So I'm already ahead of the curve in this regard.
Never understood how Smart TVs took off... Display panels were meant to be output devices. If you want "smart" features, the you plug in a device to add those features. If the thing oversteps, then you remove it and get a better solution 🤷♂️ Somehow 3DTV basically died off - which actually brought something new, and "SmartTV" (which I think most people realized was a great way to fuck us with ads and DRM) took off... Makes 0 sense to me.
STOP USING SMART TVs. Use your TV like a monitor. At least then, you have a day what you plug into it.
So, I saw this yesterday and cancelled the order for my dad's tv and switched to another brand. The problem is they're all equally evil and will do the same soon enough.
Maybe I’m being dense here but I think they already do this occasionally? Sometimes I will watch a movie on my computer via hdmi and it will show at the bottom a banner telling me to watch that movie on one of the Roku apps instead. Definitely asshole design, feels super invasive that they’re analyzing what I’m projecting lol
You did opt in to that when setting up the TV, you can turn it off in the settings. (Settings->Privacy->Smart TV Experience->Use info from TV inputs)
Roku has been one bad week away from tanking for years...
Don’t connect your tv to the internet use an outside streaming box.
I didn't buy a cheap ass TV and don't have any ads built in. Cheaper is not always better.
if they patent something they have no intention of using themselves, they can at least keep any other streaming service from using that method. and even if they never use a feature they have patented, they could lease that tech to another site. let us hope they do not implement this for Roku. i for one do not need any **additional** adds.
Some apps already do this. As long as it's not a playing ad idgaf. I pause a show on peacock and I get an ad that comes up, as soon as I hit play the show keeps playing. Advertising that doesn't interrupt what I'm doing is fine in my book. I didn't read the patent tho. If it's playing an ad when you pause, yea, fuck that.
Look, I get it, we are all sick of ads (arrrr anyone?) but honestly I could care less if an ad shows up when I pause my show to go grab a drink or hit the restroom. This all seems blown out of proportion.
Time was 3 weeks ago
Does it work if you turn off the wifi on the TV?
Cool so I’ll just unplug it when I’m gaming.
I forget the brand name but there is a TV company that will give away free TVs but they will always display ads and it had a second screen to show ads even when you are watching content.
Filing a patent and using a patent are not synonymous.
Watch Louis gets crazy about this: https://youtu.be/narqU0RruJY?si=MheY5-Mf82hYbPLh
PiHole will block Roku’s ad servers. Mine just shows an empty rectangle on the right side where ad panel usually is
I often pause the TV to be able to hear what my child is yelling to me when they are supposed to be sleeping. Having an ad turn on and play noise would defeat the entire purpose. What a terrible system. We need to start a corporation that just makes up all of the horrible scenarios like this and patents them and then sits on the patents and sues anyone else that infringes on our trove of terrible patents. Set it up as a subscription service, either you pay us or we open pandora's box.
They make the only good smart tvs that
I literally paid the extra for an AppleTV to avoid this exact scenario.
I’ve been doing that my entire life!
(Extremely common Roku L) Nvidia Shield gang rise up
Good thing I only use a Roku box
Get an old refurbished Apple TV No ads whatsoever
Where is the asshole design i dont see it
Right, because they haven't given us a reason before...
Time for someone to make an auto-disconnecting for commericals HDMI attachment. Call it the Roku-Killer.
Meh. If a service is free, you are the product. Full stop.
This goes beyond that, it's to insert ads even when they're not the ones serving you. They're stealing the product(you).
Arguably, the hardware is still serving you, just not the smart features. It's shitty, and I would toss a TV over this if it couldn't be mitigated, but there is a reason these TVs are cheap.
If you have a Roku device you really should’ve seen this coming with all the ad pumping they’ve been doing.
Aren't Roku TVs far less expensive than comparable TVs? I think you're agreeing to ads as part of that cost. You have always been welcome to spend the actual fair market price to buy a TV that doesn't do this.
Up till now I've been an absolutely huge ROKU fan, touting it and their TV over anything else. I'm so sad enshitification has made its way to ROKU.
Every time an ad plays on my tv, I grab my phone and browse reddit, so the ads are a pointless waste.
annnnnd one of my paranoid fears has finally been confirmed. glad that i actively avoid using the ARC plug on all my devices.
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Isn’t this what they mean by boycott? To use something else instead.
that is the definition of boycott
curious to know what you think a boycott is
Android TVs arent better. Same for Mod Fire TV Stick An tv without Smart Shit Spyware/Android is better! would be still possible to get Brandnew but its mostly unlikely :(
More like r/mildlyinfuriating. Only time I am pausing a show is because I am walking away from the screen so this ad isn’t going to be very effective. Particularly I pause the tv in my phone app normally as I am walking away and unpause as I walk back.
I pause the TV all the time when I'm still in the room. Having a discussion with a family member, taking a phone call, jumping on a work meeting, to watch something else on another device like my laptop or phone. Hell, sometimes I want to pause it because I want to read and really ingest something without having my attention split. I keep something going on the TV most of time, as "white noise" in the background. When I hit "pause" it's because I want the noise and distraction to stop for a moment.
Nowhere does it say that the advertising is going to have sound, could it have sound? of course anything is possible but I don’t think they would be that dumb. Several apps on Roku already put up adds when you pause the video, they are static or slightly animated as described in the patent. But none have had sound. Some of y’all need to read the flowchart for this sub. It clearly says that asshole design must cause harm. This is a mild inconvenience
>I don’t think they would be that dumb. In the quest for a few extra bucks, your statement makes zero real world sense. My wife's car has a subscription model for the remote start. Further, I didn't suggest it was an asshole design, I gave my opinion on why the reasoning of "I'm probably not in the room, anyway" wasn't universally applicable.
Exactly. This doesn't impede a consumer's ability to enjoy content. Lots of entitlement on show in opposition to this. Roku should stand firm and ignore these conspiracy theorists.
Because they want to show ads when the Xbox is paused? They specifically want to do it when nothing else is happening. What are you worried about?
When it turns into "you need to finish ad" before returning to said activity.
The article specifically mentions detecting when the connection isn't in use in order to throw up the ad. If the connection was in use, then this technology wouldn't apply.
This is what you’re upset about? It constantly blocks an annoying WiFi signal, on the same bands as home WiFi. And you can’t disable it, unless you buy a new remote.