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This is why I still use a 720p LCD TV from the early 2000s. Am I ever tempted to get a bigger, higher-def, TV? Sure, but then I remember that they're all "smar

This is why I still use a 720p LCD TV from the early 2000s. Am I ever tempted to get a bigger, higher-def, TV? Sure, but then I remember that they're all "smart" and realize I don't actually have a problem with how I'm watching TV now. I don't want smart anything in my house. My lights are hardwired to a switch on the wall. My washer and drier need me to turn dials and push buttons and go ding when they're done. My fridge has no microprocessor in it. I honestly don't understand people who want all this internet connected garbage. These things weren't broke, they don't need fixing!

xvector 6y ago
> I honestly don't understand people who want all this internet connected garbage. Because it’s convenient. As I leave work, my home’s AC turns on. When I arrive and open the door, my lights fade on and my blinds gradually roll up. My music seamlessly transitions to my home theatre with a tap. If someone’s at my door, it appears on my TV. When it’s time to go to bed I can turn everything off with a murmur. Adjust my temperature to be absolutely perfect without getting out of bed. When it’s time to wake up, the lights gradually increase in intensity, and my blinds automatically open again. I can ask for my schedule and whether I need a jacket while getting ready for work. Have my car turn on the AC as I leave my apartment, and have my lights, blinds, and AC automatically turn off when I leave home. The little things add up. Life in a connected home is easier. I can spend the time saved on things that actually matter. All that is well worth the marginal privacy impact of HomeKit for most people.
- the_cat_kittles 6y ago
  i think people who repair and make stuff hate these sorts of things because they introduce a layer of complexity that ruins longevity and predictability. what you call convenience, i call added costs down the line, and unreliability. also, the "time saved" is a bit like saying modal editors are good because you can enter text more efficiently. its all technically true, but seems irrelevant to me (and i use vim exclusively). but i have to concede that this idea of IOT home convenience stuff may be legitimately useful for some people, like yourself. it just seems to be the case that thats only true for some people.
  - xvector 6y ago
    > introduce a layer of complexity that ruins longevity and predictability. These are more growing pains than anything else. Adding a HomeKit appliance is absurdly simply these days (you just scan it with your phone) and then it just works. > the "time saved" is a bit like saying modal editors are good because you can enter text more efficiently It’s not an insignificant amount. If you live in a highly connected smart home, you will definitely notice the saved time and you will definitely notice how you simply have to do less things. There’s a sort of lightened cognitive load that’s difficult to describe. Things just feel more chill when you can adjust conditions to perfection without lifting a finger.
    - drewzero1 6y ago
      There is a level of internal complexity implied within "it just works," and an added layer of frustration when someday down the line, it just doesn't work. Eventually an electronic component wears out, or the manufacturer shuts down their server, or your phone is no longer supported. I have always loved the idea of a connected house, but I haven't yet seen a feature that would make it worth the trouble of installation, added cost, and yet another app to control my life.
    - JKCalhoun 6y ago
      Curious if, in ten years, the HomeKit appliances of today will still work. Or will you have to find a decades-old phone to control them? It's always interesting to see vestiges of a home intercom in really old homes, the phone jacks in bedrooms, ladder-style wire for TV aerials mounted in the walls, bits of some kind of home-alarm system....
      - vidarh 6y ago
        I don't know specifically about HomeKit, no experience with it, but many of the underlying standards are "old". E.g. Zigbee is 20+ years old and was standardized in 2003. Most of these systems today also let you put in place one hub per standard you care about, and then just update devices, and you can mix and match. Some, like Zigbee, are standards supported by multiple manufacturers. The radiator thermostat interface I rely on is standard for UK radiators at least, and is physical and pre-dates electronic thermostats by decades - the smart thermostats physically press down on a switch on the radiators; to replace them with another standard - or a manual one - you just twist the old one off and twist a new one one, done in ~2 minutes. They similarly communicate with a hub, and an optional central boiler thermostat. The boiler thermostat is the only part that took any time to figure out (but there are plenty of installer services available), and the thermostat interface for boilers in the UK at least is built so that anyone can build replacements; you just need something that can switch a current. Keep in mind that the only thing that is new here is the network enabled smart control - many of the interfaces are already really old and established. I have ~20 Zigbee lightbulbs. I also have some LightwaveRF switches. As I refurbish and/or as the Zigbee bulbs die, I'll slowly replace the Zigbee lightbulbs with Lightwave switches as they are more convenient. But the difference is small enough that I've not bothered going over the house to replace them all. If either one of them become hard or expensive to come by, I'll just at that point add a hub that can bridge between a new standard and whatever device I use to interact with them. Setting up the Lightwave hub took me less than half an hour. If I have to invest half an hour to add a new type of hub every 10-20 years, I'm fine with that. In this case, if Lightwave "dies" entirely and becomes impossible to support, I'll lose the smart functionality of those switches, but nothing else is hard-wired (the Zigbee setup is all mesh between the bulbs themselves, and a hub built into one of my Alexas, and they too require no extra wiring that a normal switch doesn't, and fall back to working like a slightly fancy normal switch if the network is unavailable, and someone unaware of Lightwave wouldn't know anything was broken. And that's what I'd face while transitioning to something new.
- userbinator 6y ago
  Life in a connected home is easier. I can spend the time saved on things that actually matter. Philosophical point: If everything you do is under the whims of large corporations, does anything "actually matter" anymore? Is it really your life, or are you just "living" an empty existence controlled by global faceless entities who seek to maximise only their profits? "We fight because we live. We live because we fight."
  - xvector 6y ago
    > If everything you do is under the whims of large corporations, does anything "actually matter" anymore? First, you already live life at the whims of many other entities. Whether you use HomeKit or not, will most certainly not be the breaking point for your freedom. Second, what relation does being under some level of control have to the value of life? For example, would an otherwise fulfilling life under a monarch be empty and meaningless?
  - jsight 6y ago
    Who said anything about big corporations? Maybe all of his stuff uses zigbee or z-wave and is controlled by FOSS controllers?
    - JKCalhoun 6y ago
      I believe we were talking about all the major "smart" television manufacturers. Wether they use a Zigbee under the hood is orthogonal.
      - jsight 6y ago
        The post we are responding to had only one smart TV element involved, and that was the door camera. The rest was about thermostats, light control, and window shades. I think its fair to point out that those things don't have to be proprietary. Even the door camera doesn't really have to use a smart tv, though it probably does in that case.
- christiansakai 6y ago
  You are living the Tony Stark life lol.
  - xvector 6y ago
    Ah, that’s the dream. At least for me!
- asdff 6y ago
  Most of that stuff aside from the surveillance feed you could set up, probably in a lot less time, with analog outlet timers. My grandparents had a setup similar to this smart home setup 30 years ago.
- talentedcoin 6y ago
  I’d love to see an estimate of how much time per year saved. My suspicion is, not much. And my bet would be that one or two outages (likely to happen at some point with these devices) would tip the scale the other way. Nothing wrong with liking cool stuff, but this type of argument doesn’t resonate with me.
  - rorykoehler 6y ago
    Phillips hue works like a normal light if there is no internet or if you cycle the power from the switch.
    - timrichard 6y ago
      Mine works completely if there is no internet. I like the Hue system as it only relies on the internet connection for software updates of you want them. The Zigbee network it uses has been super reliable for me, and always responds to the app which only needs to work on my LAN. It only gets spotty sometimes for me when used via Amazon Echo devices, which have to phone home to interpret the voice command before triggering the Hue devices.
      - rorykoehler 6y ago
        Yes good point. I always have internet so I never noticed but of course it's all on the local network.
      - twothamendment 6y ago
        Your approach sounds similar to mine. While it is true the switches work without internet, out even without the local controller - I just learned the hard way that they don't work at all when the capacitor inside dies. Keep a dumb switch on hand so you can swap it in when you have a light you can no longer turn on! I had 2 die recently. The is a thread out there on repairing them, but I don't think my soldering skills are that good. I'm also thinking "repair my light switch?" What has the world come to?
    - jrussino 6y ago
- rorykoehler 6y ago
  HomeKit is so bad and clunky I had to delete it and just use the proprietary apps shipped with the iot products we use. I really wish they tried to do less and opened up their OS to better developers to build their own solutions instead.
- Aerroon 6y ago
  But won't having to sit through a few additional ads wipe out all of those time savings? Not to mention the time spent on setting them up in a way to make the appliances not spy on you.
  - xvector 6y ago
    I’m talking more about general smart appliances than smart TVs. I don’t connect my smart TV to the internet, that’s the job of the Apple TV or Nvidia Shield.
- AshWolfy 6y ago
  How much time or effort is this actually saving you? Maybe its just me, but id say i spend maybe a few minutes doing these tasks every year. A lot of this is achievable without smart technology anyways
  - xvector 6y ago
    Originally I thought the same as you, but when I tried it, I noticed that it actually saves way more time than I expected. I think we simply don’t notice the amount of time spent on the little, meaningless things. For me, once things were connected it kind of felt like I had aliased a commonly-used command. You could also argue that the saved time was already spent in researching which smart home appliances to get (bad ones can be a flaky nightmare), which is a fair argument. For me, though, the increased convenience in actual day to day use was well worth it.
    - AshWolfy 6y ago
      Maybe you overestimate the amount of time you save? Ive definitely noticed that when i get a something thats a time saver, i tend to overestimate how much time it saved, maybe its more that mental load of not having to worry about it.
  - EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 6y ago
    I wanted to install a system to automatically switch lights on and off when I enter/leave the room, but a quick calculation showed that the system will pay off in maybe 10 years, with today's efficient LED lights. And it will sure not work 100% exactly as expected, causing frustration.
- SECProto 6y ago
  I flick lights on and off as I enter a room, which I agree, might use 1/8th of a second each time, say 2 seconds a day. And the light switches are well over two decades old. I have given them 0 thought over those years, and don't expect I will for a few more decades. A simple $25 programmable thermostat keeps the temperatures moderated. It may use a bit more energy if I'm running a different schedule than usual, but again - decades old, works fine. Car AC, again - works fine, turns on when I turn on the car. My blinds go up and down when I want them to, which has nothing to do with my schedule. Nothing you've listed (or anyone else who talks about smart homes) is even a positive to me, let alone a time saver.
  - lvturner 6y ago
    For me, the real killer was being able to turn off all the lights in the house from my bed. I could live without it (and currently am, due to an apartment move), but it was certainly handy.
    - dham 6y ago
      Phones are too dirty to be allowed in bed. This was my thinking pre Covid 69 too. In my opinion it's like wearing shoes in bed.
      - saagarjha 6y ago
        Why, because you take it outside?
        klyrs 6y ago
        Maybe it's a loving bed, not a doomscrolling bed. Mad respect
        coldtea 6y ago
        If they're worried about "dirt" on the phone, I doubt it's anything than a "lie down and worry needlessly about cleanniness and heath" bed...
- misterkrabs 6y ago
  This reads like an American Psycho monologue (no offense).
- wdb 6y ago
  Personally, I enjoyed the ceremony of opening blinds, turn on the lights when I returned from work.
- EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 6y ago
  I found this "convenience" is mostly not convenient at all, wastes a lot of time, brings a lot of frustration and sometimes is outright dangerous. For example, an internet connected CO2 detector provides a perfect way for burglars to detect when no one is at home. Connections are always broke, wifi passwords are forgotten, sites not accessible, phone number does not pass verification process etc. Thankfully, all my devices still have buttons that allow them to operate without internet connection, but I fear that will not be the case in the future ..
- sgtnoodle 6y ago
  Does it all work that seamlessly? If so, that sounds lovely. As a software engineer with a master's degree in computer science engineering and over a decade of experience working on high reliability embedded systems, I'm about ready to just give up and expel any electronics from my home more elaborate than a dimmable LED lightbulb. On the other hand, maybe consumer electronics are flaky for me due to the fact that there's 20+ other wifi access points in range besides my own, and half my electric sockets are still on 100 year old knob and tube wiring...
- lm28469 6y ago
  These stories almost reads like a parody or a dystopia. What's the next step of automation ? To be put in an artificial coma in sleeping pods to conserve as much energy and live as long as possible in some kind of VR in which nothing bad ever happens ? So much time, energy and money spent on something that tells you who's at the door or if you need a damned jacket... So many gadgets that need to be manufactured and shipped to the other side of the world to open your blinds... I can already see a future in which people don't know how to use a "dumb" door knobs All this shit will end up in a landfill in less than 50 years, and probably be deprecated well before. The amount of waste generated for such a minor improvement of quality of life over good old proven tech which are a fraction of the cost, waste and maintenance (light switches, regular timed central heating/cooling, weather reports and peepholes). These things are the literal opposite of sustainability. Did we all collectively go mad ?
  - tommit 6y ago
    It's okay if you decide for yourself that you want no part in this. But I don't think our global waste problem will be solved by berating people that enjoy smart homes as a hobby, convenience, or both. I've been a fan for about 5 years now and I have everything connected as well. It used to be a big pain and it still can be sometimes, so I don't agree 100% with the comment you replied on that it saves time in a significant way. Though I assume that depends on your setup and how much you tinker with it. I know I will never get back the time I invested over the years in trying to make things work by not having to press light switches anymore. But you know what? It's fun. I like it. It's the closest thing to an Iron Man like house we have so far. And I will be damned if I let it be ruined by you shaking your head and calling us enthusiasts mad.
    - lm28469 6y ago
      > But you know what? It's fun. I like it. It's the closest thing to an Iron Man like house we have so far. That's the only argument I can accept, "it's cool". I still believe it's not sustainable in any way, shape or form and that it's going to be a major pain in the ass down the line both in term of waste and long term maintenance. It's like huge diesel trucks running straight pipes, some people think it's fun, I'm glad most people don't and that most places ban them. We'd get more time to spend on "real life" if we used automation's productivity improvements to reduce working hours to 4 hours a day rather than by getting gadgets rolling our blinds and setting the AC automatically.
- suifbwish 6y ago
  It isn’t even really that convenient having smart home devices. Managing the extra network overhead to keep their spying packets away from everything else is not convenient. I wouldn’t mind a smart TV but I want root access if I buy one
  - xvector 6y ago
    I just toss them on their own VLAN.
- epalm 6y ago
  My dishwasher and washing machine do meaningful work for me, saving many hours each day/week. But what you describe is saving a minute here, a second there. Spending time on things that matter is all well and good, but is there really a difference between doing those things for 4 hours rather than 3 hours and 52 minutes?
- bradgranath 6y ago
  No it's CHEAP. A 31" Sony Trimaster costs $30,000. Getting a 4K OLED screen the size of a windshield for $1,500 is beyond suspicious.
throwaway53453 6y ago
The other day I went to my parent's place. I literally couldn't turn the lights on because the Google Home there didn't recognise me. Smart things that add value are okay, but smart things with a single point of failure are just stupid.
- vidarh 6y ago
  That does indeed seem stupid. There are plenty of smart switches that also have buttons.
  - throwaway53453 6y ago
    To be honest, I think they've gotten so used to not using the switches they don't realise they're not working. Will be inconvenient if the internet goes down...
JetAlone 6y ago
I think only a small (but substantial) number of people actually want home based Smart/IoT products. And I think there's the extra push we see here to advertise to them because they're big trender spenders. Inshallah this article is part of a push-back that will encourage some TV companies to take a step back and get a little less intrusive on their customers. One of the biggest IoT markets is large corporations with large workforces they would like to manage. A lattice of job-relevant IoT devices give them an automated layer to monitor and control. It lets them enhance safety, productivity, communication and motivation to their own likings. IE to their own profits. Usually at any personal expense or detriment on the part of their work force they can reasonably expect to get away with.
hesdeadjim 6y ago
I bought a 4K Sony this year and it’s been an entirely simple experience. I didn’t connect it to my wifi, so I see nothing except a gray textured screen. Works great.
- greggman3 6y ago
  Counterpoint. I have a 4yr old 4K Sony TV, it was a higher end model, and it's horrible. It runs Android and is apparently underpowered. When I turn it on (from standby, not from zero power), it can often take 30-60 seconds to turn on...AFAIK it's recovering from garbage collection. That doesn't happen every time. Just tried now and it took 4 seconds to turn on and 10 more seconds until it would actually respond to button presses on the remote. The screen is (was) covered in ads for TV programs and movies. Fortunately I was able to turn all that off but the home screen is designed around ads so without them it looks clunky. (unlike say Apple TV which just shows the apps) A few times in the last 4 years it has crashed and rebooted in the middle of watching something (that process takes 1-2 mins? Just timed a reboot, 1 min 20 seconds but crashes take longer) I hoping to get something dumb next time I get a TV. Unfortunately dumb TV generally seem more expensive. Like I have to by a business display TV and are often missing features (like no lag, no interpolation modes)
randmeerkat 6y ago
Just use an Apple TV and don’t connect your smart tv to the internet. Stream everything through apps on Apple TV or cast it with airplay.
- nettdata 6y ago
  Exactly what I do and I love it. The AppleTV Plex app was a game changer.
- _rs 6y ago
  This is my plan when I eventually don't have a choice and need to replace my TV. But I am also worried: we've gotten to a point where manufacturers ship products with a known backlog of bugs and plan to fix them with software updates.
  - ornornor 6y ago
    There is usually a path to upgrade without internet access. You usually get the firmware from the manufacturer website, put it on a usb stick, plug it into the tv and it picks up the upgrade from there.
  - JKCalhoun 6y ago
    Enable WiFI, Update, disable WiFi. (May have to change your WiFi password as well.)
- yellowapple 6y ago
  Which works until TV manufacturers make their TVs wardrive and find a neighbor's wifi, or build cellular modems into 'em.
  - JKCalhoun 6y ago
    Then you open the back of the TV, find the WiFi antenna, and clip it or scratch it off the PCB. :-)
    - 6y ago
onedr0p 6y ago
I have a lot of "smart" devices and they aren't connected to the internet. Home assistant and Zigbee2mqtt is amazing and it's all local. The only internet "smart" devices I have are a ecobee thermostat and a water monitoring system, both are in their own VLAN with only access to the internet. My thermostat can be controlled manually if internet is out. I own a LG 4K OLED TV, I put it in the same VLAN add above and block all requests to the internet. Instead I use an nvidia shield for streaming tv and movies.
feifan 6y ago
I imagine for many (most?) people, it's not that they want the "internet connected garbage"; it's that they want the big 4k TV and they're wiling to put up with the garbage that comes with it.
- solarkraft 6y ago
  They also want streaming from their service of choice (thus "apps") and casting. That's kind of it, though. Nobody asked for ads. Of course it makes the manufacturer money, but also severely degrades the UX. I wonder how much higher demand would need to get for them to offer a shit-free experience for a bit more money.
  - feifan 6y ago
    I imagine most people on HN would take the latter, but most people in the broader population aren't that bothered by ads, and most people would probably put up with ads rather than pay e.g. an extra $50 (especially if it's a side-to-side option, like an "ad-free upgrade").
    - nataz 6y ago
      The kindle is probably a good test case for this hypothesis. The base version has an option to show ads on the off screen for a nominally reduced purchase price. I wonder how many people choose ads. I also wonder what kind of price sensitivity we are looking at when it comes to a 1,500 tv.
      - tonyedgecombe 6y ago
        The trouble is the people who will spend money to remove ads are exactly the people who the advertisers want to target.
- JKCalhoun 6y ago
  Just don't connect it to WiFi. Problem solved. I have a Mac mini serving content to the (not dumb, but deaf, dumb and blind) TV.
samatman 6y ago
Being able to adjust the colour temperature and hue of my house lights is nice, so is doing it by speaking to my watch or speaker. Turning all the lights out when I'm finally comfy in bed is nice. Turning the string of Christmas lights on the lanai on, which don't have a switch indoors or anywhere near the door, is nice. Being able to ask for an album or genre to play and having it happen: nice! Having a certain light turn on at sunset: nice. None of these things were broken before, but they weren't as nice. It isn't garbage. Although having it reset during a 3 am power outage, resulting in lights turning on in my formerly dark bedroom: not as nice! Still a few bugs in the system...
bArray 6y ago
> Am I ever tempted to get a bigger, higher-def, TV? Sure, but then I remember that they're all "smart" and realize I don't actually have a problem with how I'm watching TV now. If you ever are tempted, there are still a few good dumb TVs out there. Admittedly they get less, so vote with your wallet! > I don't want smart anything in my house. My lights are hardwired to a switch on the wall. My washer and drier need me to turn dials and push buttons and go ding when they're done. My fridge has no microprocessor in it. I would update that to: "I don't want smart anything in my house [that isn't fully open source]." Obviously this is not great for the average person, but at least for a programmer I can review, test and improve these devices. One thing I will never have in my home that is closed source is a camera or microphone. I want to know _exactly_ how this data is used and where it goes.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- developer92 6y ago
  curious if that also applies to your phone
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
  > Obviously this is not great for the average person, but at least for a programmer I can review, test and improve these devices. Please God no. The last thing I want to do after coming home from work is the same shit I was doing at work. I like the simplicity of shit just acting as expected.
  - bArray 6y ago
    > Please God no. The last thing I want to do after coming home from work is the same shit I was doing at work. I like the simplicity of shit just acting as expected. I understand, but a side project feels different. I do it because I want to, not because I need to.
broabprobe 6y ago
This is why I still use a 480i CRT from the early 1980s. Shelves of VHS haven't broke and don't need fixing!
ip26 6y ago
Scheduling my thermostat, smart outlets, and sprinklers works much better via a computer. Dial lamp timers suck, and programming a complex schedule via four push buttons and an eight-segment display is miserable. (I would not mind using bluetooth instead of wifi, but wifi is more widely used) Network monitoring allows my solar array to be remotely monitored for faults & diagnosed. Network access allows my sprinkler controller to track the weather for more accurate water usage modeling... Ordinary light switches and light bulbs are great. But some things stand to benefit from smarts.
christophilus 6y ago
I use a 5k monitor hooked up to a Linux desktop that I built. Works great, and all the components are dumb. The day they bake ads into all computer monitors is the day I move off grid and start taking permaculture farming seriously.
- wobbly_bush 6y ago
  This is my approach as well. The UX isn't as good as pure-TV apps. I specifically have to use the screen zoom functionality when trying to select what to watch from the couch. But after the selection process, it works great.
spoonjim 6y ago
My washer sends a message to my phone when I leave the laundry in it. Has saved me countless loads of mildewy smelly wet clothes in the morning.
- LegitShady 6y ago
  I set a timer on my phone. No internet required. Never missed it yet
  - spoonjim 6y ago
    Yes, but that’s one of many things that I don’t have to worry about. You can do you, I prefer the connected home. If configured correctly it’s like having a very basic butler.
    - LegitShady 6y ago
      I don't consider setting a timer something I worry about and given my experience with smart home devices the inverse is true for them.
- jeegsy 6y ago
  I mean thats great and all but I really very much prefer to be the sort of person who remembers to remove their laundry.
  - spoonjim 6y ago
    Sure, and I’d like to have the physique of LeBron James, the looks of George Clooney, and the intelligence of John Von Neumann, but here I am instead.
Larrikin 6y ago
I recently got a 55 inch 4k TV after having a 40 inch HD TV for some years. I regret having friends suffer through that quality to watch things like the last season of Game of Thrones just because I liked hosting. I had friends with better TVs that didn't say anything because I liked having people over and they didn't. I've never connected it to the internet and glad I haven't but there really is a night and day difference in quality. I've slowly upgraded my parent's TVs and they have really appreciated it.
zeepzeep 6y ago
> My lights are hardwired to a switch on the wall. Oh you mean like an ethernet cable?
Kiro 6y ago
I keep seeing this exact comment at the top in every thread about smart devices. It's basically copypasta at this point. Even the replies follow the same pattern we've seen a thousand times. I wish there was a way to detect "standard comments" and filter them out or put them in a different tab. It's not just this topic. Another example is the "I quit X and couldn't be happier" we see in every thread about Big Tech, regardless of the content of the article. I understand that these comments resonate with a lot of people but when clicking a thread I expect to read comments about the actual topic (the new intrusive ads that LG just introduced), not generic comments about smart devices in general.
- Rule35 6y ago
  Ugh, in every thread there's some guy complaining about people's opinions, just because they don't specifically mention the brands and events from the specifc article linked. "A Panasonic TV gave your voice-search data to the police? Irrelevant! We're discussing a Mitsubishi smart-stove phoning the FBI because it detected you cooking Panda meat." I wish these people would realize that the problem is smart devices in general and stop complaining that the tiniest of circumstances make an entirely new case. I understand that this sort of emotional populism resonates with people: "lol, no - this case is totally different and you have to suck it!" but when I click on a headline I expect to see people engaging with the heart of the issue, not dodging and dissembling because they're offended by the implications. ---- Yeah, I get ya. It is annoying that people don't address the specific topic at hand, but you have to realize that the specific brand (LG) of the TV isn't the issue - companies blatantly invading our privacy is. If we get too distracted on which company is doing it this week we'll look up in a few years and realize we're arguing over whether Samsung or LG is sending our records to the government instead of fighting for a blanket users-rights bill and it'll be too late, both will be.
  - Kiro 6y ago
    For me personally, as an owner of an LG device who just yesterday had to accept new T&Cs for these ads, I'm very interested in the actual topic but I understand your point. That's why I'm theorizing about a function separating "general comments" from "topic-specific comments".
sgtnoodle 6y ago
If you do some research and find a reasonably engineered TV, the inclusion of "smart" functionality doesn't necessarily detract from the device's utility. About 5 years ago I bought a 55" 4K TV based purely on its performance as a PC monitor. It happened to be an Android TV. After moving, I stopped using it as a monitor and started using it as a TV. It's been a mostly positive experience. It even received an update within the last year. The update exchanged some old bugs for some new bugs, but for the most part it turns on and streams videos without much fuss. It's the first TV I've owned that correctly sequences my audio receiver's power over HDMI, and successfully passes through the TV remote's playback controls to the blu-ray player. The most frustrating thing about it is that there's apparently a defect in its hardware accelerated video decoder. When Netflix came out with their fancier compression codecs last year, 4k shows started completely glitching out. Folk were complaining about it on reddit for months. Luckily I have a friend who works at Netflix who was able to start busting some skulls and get it patched over. For now... I figure I've got at least another year or two before the built-in Android functionality is obsolete to the point of being inconvenient, or the streaming apps stop coping with the buggy video decoder. Since the TV works pretty well as a monitor, though, I should be able to just hook up a more modern external Android TV device and keep going with a roughly similar experience. I'm hopeful that it will even continue to seamlessly power on and off. My other TV is a "dumb" 1080p Samsung plasma screen I bought second hand in 2010 from a particularly sketchy dude on Craigslist. It's still going strong, other than some occasional power supply buzzing and perhaps a bit of phosphor fade. It's travelled across the country and even survived a bachelor party camping trip. Honestly though, it's more of a pain to use than the Android TV, even as a dumb monitor.
wazoox 6y ago
I feel for you. I too am sticking to an obsolete unsmart TV. In 2016 I had to change my home heaters, and nowadays they're all "smart". The app that's supposedly used to control them never could find one of them; instead of a temperature knob and an on/off switch, you constantly need to dive into cascading menus; and of course I'm confident that this smart sh*t will be the reason why they'll fail in the future, for instance when the screen will fail and make the heater unusable.

xvector 6y ago

> I honestly don't understand people who want all this internet connected garbage. Because it’s convenient. As I leave work, my home’s AC turns on. When I arrive and open the door, my lights fade on and my blinds gradually roll up. My music seamlessly transitions to my home theatre with a tap. If someone’s at my door, it appears on my TV. When it’s time to go to bed I can turn everything off with a murmur. Adjust my temperature to be absolutely perfect without getting out of bed. When it’s time to wake up, the lights gradually increase in intensity, and my blinds automatically open again. I can ask for my schedule and whether I need a jacket while getting ready for work. Have my car turn on the AC as I leave my apartment, and have my lights, blinds, and AC automatically turn off when I leave home. The little things add up. Life in a connected home is easier. I can spend the time saved on things that actually matter. All that is well worth the marginal privacy impact of HomeKit for most people.

the_cat_kittles 6y ago
i think people who repair and make stuff hate these sorts of things because they introduce a layer of complexity that ruins longevity and predictability. what you call convenience, i call added costs down the line, and unreliability. also, the "time saved" is a bit like saying modal editors are good because you can enter text more efficiently. its all technically true, but seems irrelevant to me (and i use vim exclusively). but i have to concede that this idea of IOT home convenience stuff may be legitimately useful for some people, like yourself. it just seems to be the case that thats only true for some people.
- xvector 6y ago
  > introduce a layer of complexity that ruins longevity and predictability. These are more growing pains than anything else. Adding a HomeKit appliance is absurdly simply these days (you just scan it with your phone) and then it just works. > the "time saved" is a bit like saying modal editors are good because you can enter text more efficiently It’s not an insignificant amount. If you live in a highly connected smart home, you will definitely notice the saved time and you will definitely notice how you simply have to do less things. There’s a sort of lightened cognitive load that’s difficult to describe. Things just feel more chill when you can adjust conditions to perfection without lifting a finger.
  - drewzero1 6y ago
    There is a level of internal complexity implied within "it just works," and an added layer of frustration when someday down the line, it just doesn't work. Eventually an electronic component wears out, or the manufacturer shuts down their server, or your phone is no longer supported. I have always loved the idea of a connected house, but I haven't yet seen a feature that would make it worth the trouble of installation, added cost, and yet another app to control my life.
  - JKCalhoun 6y ago
    Curious if, in ten years, the HomeKit appliances of today will still work. Or will you have to find a decades-old phone to control them? It's always interesting to see vestiges of a home intercom in really old homes, the phone jacks in bedrooms, ladder-style wire for TV aerials mounted in the walls, bits of some kind of home-alarm system....
    - vidarh 6y ago
      I don't know specifically about HomeKit, no experience with it, but many of the underlying standards are "old". E.g. Zigbee is 20+ years old and was standardized in 2003. Most of these systems today also let you put in place one hub per standard you care about, and then just update devices, and you can mix and match. Some, like Zigbee, are standards supported by multiple manufacturers. The radiator thermostat interface I rely on is standard for UK radiators at least, and is physical and pre-dates electronic thermostats by decades - the smart thermostats physically press down on a switch on the radiators; to replace them with another standard - or a manual one - you just twist the old one off and twist a new one one, done in ~2 minutes. They similarly communicate with a hub, and an optional central boiler thermostat. The boiler thermostat is the only part that took any time to figure out (but there are plenty of installer services available), and the thermostat interface for boilers in the UK at least is built so that anyone can build replacements; you just need something that can switch a current. Keep in mind that the only thing that is new here is the network enabled smart control - many of the interfaces are already really old and established. I have ~20 Zigbee lightbulbs. I also have some LightwaveRF switches. As I refurbish and/or as the Zigbee bulbs die, I'll slowly replace the Zigbee lightbulbs with Lightwave switches as they are more convenient. But the difference is small enough that I've not bothered going over the house to replace them all. If either one of them become hard or expensive to come by, I'll just at that point add a hub that can bridge between a new standard and whatever device I use to interact with them. Setting up the Lightwave hub took me less than half an hour. If I have to invest half an hour to add a new type of hub every 10-20 years, I'm fine with that. In this case, if Lightwave "dies" entirely and becomes impossible to support, I'll lose the smart functionality of those switches, but nothing else is hard-wired (the Zigbee setup is all mesh between the bulbs themselves, and a hub built into one of my Alexas, and they too require no extra wiring that a normal switch doesn't, and fall back to working like a slightly fancy normal switch if the network is unavailable, and someone unaware of Lightwave wouldn't know anything was broken. And that's what I'd face while transitioning to something new.
userbinator 6y ago
Life in a connected home is easier. I can spend the time saved on things that actually matter. Philosophical point: If everything you do is under the whims of large corporations, does anything "actually matter" anymore? Is it really your life, or are you just "living" an empty existence controlled by global faceless entities who seek to maximise only their profits? "We fight because we live. We live because we fight."
- xvector 6y ago
  > If everything you do is under the whims of large corporations, does anything "actually matter" anymore? First, you already live life at the whims of many other entities. Whether you use HomeKit or not, will most certainly not be the breaking point for your freedom. Second, what relation does being under some level of control have to the value of life? For example, would an otherwise fulfilling life under a monarch be empty and meaningless?
- jsight 6y ago
  Who said anything about big corporations? Maybe all of his stuff uses zigbee or z-wave and is controlled by FOSS controllers?
  - JKCalhoun 6y ago
    I believe we were talking about all the major "smart" television manufacturers. Wether they use a Zigbee under the hood is orthogonal.
    - jsight 6y ago
      The post we are responding to had only one smart TV element involved, and that was the door camera. The rest was about thermostats, light control, and window shades. I think its fair to point out that those things don't have to be proprietary. Even the door camera doesn't really have to use a smart tv, though it probably does in that case.
christiansakai 6y ago
You are living the Tony Stark life lol.
- xvector 6y ago
  Ah, that’s the dream. At least for me!
asdff 6y ago
Most of that stuff aside from the surveillance feed you could set up, probably in a lot less time, with analog outlet timers. My grandparents had a setup similar to this smart home setup 30 years ago.
talentedcoin 6y ago
I’d love to see an estimate of how much time per year saved. My suspicion is, not much. And my bet would be that one or two outages (likely to happen at some point with these devices) would tip the scale the other way. Nothing wrong with liking cool stuff, but this type of argument doesn’t resonate with me.
- rorykoehler 6y ago
  Phillips hue works like a normal light if there is no internet or if you cycle the power from the switch.
  - timrichard 6y ago
    Mine works completely if there is no internet. I like the Hue system as it only relies on the internet connection for software updates of you want them. The Zigbee network it uses has been super reliable for me, and always responds to the app which only needs to work on my LAN. It only gets spotty sometimes for me when used via Amazon Echo devices, which have to phone home to interpret the voice command before triggering the Hue devices.
    - rorykoehler 6y ago
      Yes good point. I always have internet so I never noticed but of course it's all on the local network.
    - twothamendment 6y ago
      Your approach sounds similar to mine. While it is true the switches work without internet, out even without the local controller - I just learned the hard way that they don't work at all when the capacitor inside dies. Keep a dumb switch on hand so you can swap it in when you have a light you can no longer turn on! I had 2 die recently. The is a thread out there on repairing them, but I don't think my soldering skills are that good. I'm also thinking "repair my light switch?" What has the world come to?
  - jrussino 6y ago
rorykoehler 6y ago
HomeKit is so bad and clunky I had to delete it and just use the proprietary apps shipped with the iot products we use. I really wish they tried to do less and opened up their OS to better developers to build their own solutions instead.
Aerroon 6y ago
But won't having to sit through a few additional ads wipe out all of those time savings? Not to mention the time spent on setting them up in a way to make the appliances not spy on you.
- xvector 6y ago
  I’m talking more about general smart appliances than smart TVs. I don’t connect my smart TV to the internet, that’s the job of the Apple TV or Nvidia Shield.
AshWolfy 6y ago
How much time or effort is this actually saving you? Maybe its just me, but id say i spend maybe a few minutes doing these tasks every year. A lot of this is achievable without smart technology anyways
- xvector 6y ago
  Originally I thought the same as you, but when I tried it, I noticed that it actually saves way more time than I expected. I think we simply don’t notice the amount of time spent on the little, meaningless things. For me, once things were connected it kind of felt like I had aliased a commonly-used command. You could also argue that the saved time was already spent in researching which smart home appliances to get (bad ones can be a flaky nightmare), which is a fair argument. For me, though, the increased convenience in actual day to day use was well worth it.
  - AshWolfy 6y ago
    Maybe you overestimate the amount of time you save? Ive definitely noticed that when i get a something thats a time saver, i tend to overestimate how much time it saved, maybe its more that mental load of not having to worry about it.
- EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 6y ago
  I wanted to install a system to automatically switch lights on and off when I enter/leave the room, but a quick calculation showed that the system will pay off in maybe 10 years, with today's efficient LED lights. And it will sure not work 100% exactly as expected, causing frustration.
SECProto 6y ago
I flick lights on and off as I enter a room, which I agree, might use 1/8th of a second each time, say 2 seconds a day. And the light switches are well over two decades old. I have given them 0 thought over those years, and don't expect I will for a few more decades. A simple $25 programmable thermostat keeps the temperatures moderated. It may use a bit more energy if I'm running a different schedule than usual, but again - decades old, works fine. Car AC, again - works fine, turns on when I turn on the car. My blinds go up and down when I want them to, which has nothing to do with my schedule. Nothing you've listed (or anyone else who talks about smart homes) is even a positive to me, let alone a time saver.
- lvturner 6y ago
  For me, the real killer was being able to turn off all the lights in the house from my bed. I could live without it (and currently am, due to an apartment move), but it was certainly handy.
  - dham 6y ago
    Phones are too dirty to be allowed in bed. This was my thinking pre Covid 69 too. In my opinion it's like wearing shoes in bed.
    - saagarjha 6y ago
      Why, because you take it outside?
      - klyrs 6y ago
        Maybe it's a loving bed, not a doomscrolling bed. Mad respect
        coldtea 6y ago
        If they're worried about "dirt" on the phone, I doubt it's anything than a "lie down and worry needlessly about cleanniness and heath" bed...
misterkrabs 6y ago
This reads like an American Psycho monologue (no offense).
wdb 6y ago
Personally, I enjoyed the ceremony of opening blinds, turn on the lights when I returned from work.
EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 6y ago
I found this "convenience" is mostly not convenient at all, wastes a lot of time, brings a lot of frustration and sometimes is outright dangerous. For example, an internet connected CO2 detector provides a perfect way for burglars to detect when no one is at home. Connections are always broke, wifi passwords are forgotten, sites not accessible, phone number does not pass verification process etc. Thankfully, all my devices still have buttons that allow them to operate without internet connection, but I fear that will not be the case in the future ..
sgtnoodle 6y ago
Does it all work that seamlessly? If so, that sounds lovely. As a software engineer with a master's degree in computer science engineering and over a decade of experience working on high reliability embedded systems, I'm about ready to just give up and expel any electronics from my home more elaborate than a dimmable LED lightbulb. On the other hand, maybe consumer electronics are flaky for me due to the fact that there's 20+ other wifi access points in range besides my own, and half my electric sockets are still on 100 year old knob and tube wiring...
lm28469 6y ago
These stories almost reads like a parody or a dystopia. What's the next step of automation ? To be put in an artificial coma in sleeping pods to conserve as much energy and live as long as possible in some kind of VR in which nothing bad ever happens ? So much time, energy and money spent on something that tells you who's at the door or if you need a damned jacket... So many gadgets that need to be manufactured and shipped to the other side of the world to open your blinds... I can already see a future in which people don't know how to use a "dumb" door knobs All this shit will end up in a landfill in less than 50 years, and probably be deprecated well before. The amount of waste generated for such a minor improvement of quality of life over good old proven tech which are a fraction of the cost, waste and maintenance (light switches, regular timed central heating/cooling, weather reports and peepholes). These things are the literal opposite of sustainability. Did we all collectively go mad ?
- tommit 6y ago
  It's okay if you decide for yourself that you want no part in this. But I don't think our global waste problem will be solved by berating people that enjoy smart homes as a hobby, convenience, or both. I've been a fan for about 5 years now and I have everything connected as well. It used to be a big pain and it still can be sometimes, so I don't agree 100% with the comment you replied on that it saves time in a significant way. Though I assume that depends on your setup and how much you tinker with it. I know I will never get back the time I invested over the years in trying to make things work by not having to press light switches anymore. But you know what? It's fun. I like it. It's the closest thing to an Iron Man like house we have so far. And I will be damned if I let it be ruined by you shaking your head and calling us enthusiasts mad.
  - lm28469 6y ago
    > But you know what? It's fun. I like it. It's the closest thing to an Iron Man like house we have so far. That's the only argument I can accept, "it's cool". I still believe it's not sustainable in any way, shape or form and that it's going to be a major pain in the ass down the line both in term of waste and long term maintenance. It's like huge diesel trucks running straight pipes, some people think it's fun, I'm glad most people don't and that most places ban them. We'd get more time to spend on "real life" if we used automation's productivity improvements to reduce working hours to 4 hours a day rather than by getting gadgets rolling our blinds and setting the AC automatically.
suifbwish 6y ago
It isn’t even really that convenient having smart home devices. Managing the extra network overhead to keep their spying packets away from everything else is not convenient. I wouldn’t mind a smart TV but I want root access if I buy one
- xvector 6y ago
  I just toss them on their own VLAN.
epalm 6y ago
My dishwasher and washing machine do meaningful work for me, saving many hours each day/week. But what you describe is saving a minute here, a second there. Spending time on things that matter is all well and good, but is there really a difference between doing those things for 4 hours rather than 3 hours and 52 minutes?
bradgranath 6y ago
No it's CHEAP. A 31" Sony Trimaster costs $30,000. Getting a 4K OLED screen the size of a windshield for $1,500 is beyond suspicious.

throwaway53453 6y ago

The other day I went to my parent's place. I literally couldn't turn the lights on because the Google Home there didn't recognise me. Smart things that add value are okay, but smart things with a single point of failure are just stupid.

vidarh 6y ago
That does indeed seem stupid. There are plenty of smart switches that also have buttons.
- throwaway53453 6y ago
  To be honest, I think they've gotten so used to not using the switches they don't realise they're not working. Will be inconvenient if the internet goes down...

JetAlone 6y ago

I think only a small (but substantial) number of people actually want home based Smart/IoT products. And I think there's the extra push we see here to advertise to them because they're big trender spenders. Inshallah this article is part of a push-back that will encourage some TV companies to take a step back and get a little less intrusive on their customers. One of the biggest IoT markets is large corporations with large workforces they would like to manage. A lattice of job-relevant IoT devices give them an automated layer to monitor and control. It lets them enhance safety, productivity, communication and motivation to their own likings. IE to their own profits. Usually at any personal expense or detriment on the part of their work force they can reasonably expect to get away with.

hesdeadjim 6y ago

I bought a 4K Sony this year and it’s been an entirely simple experience. I didn’t connect it to my wifi, so I see nothing except a gray textured screen. Works great.

greggman3 6y ago
Counterpoint. I have a 4yr old 4K Sony TV, it was a higher end model, and it's horrible. It runs Android and is apparently underpowered. When I turn it on (from standby, not from zero power), it can often take 30-60 seconds to turn on...AFAIK it's recovering from garbage collection. That doesn't happen every time. Just tried now and it took 4 seconds to turn on and 10 more seconds until it would actually respond to button presses on the remote. The screen is (was) covered in ads for TV programs and movies. Fortunately I was able to turn all that off but the home screen is designed around ads so without them it looks clunky. (unlike say Apple TV which just shows the apps) A few times in the last 4 years it has crashed and rebooted in the middle of watching something (that process takes 1-2 mins? Just timed a reboot, 1 min 20 seconds but crashes take longer) I hoping to get something dumb next time I get a TV. Unfortunately dumb TV generally seem more expensive. Like I have to by a business display TV and are often missing features (like no lag, no interpolation modes)

randmeerkat 6y ago

Just use an Apple TV and don’t connect your smart tv to the internet. Stream everything through apps on Apple TV or cast it with airplay.

nettdata 6y ago
Exactly what I do and I love it. The AppleTV Plex app was a game changer.
_rs 6y ago
This is my plan when I eventually don't have a choice and need to replace my TV. But I am also worried: we've gotten to a point where manufacturers ship products with a known backlog of bugs and plan to fix them with software updates.
- ornornor 6y ago
  There is usually a path to upgrade without internet access. You usually get the firmware from the manufacturer website, put it on a usb stick, plug it into the tv and it picks up the upgrade from there.
- JKCalhoun 6y ago
  Enable WiFI, Update, disable WiFi. (May have to change your WiFi password as well.)
yellowapple 6y ago
Which works until TV manufacturers make their TVs wardrive and find a neighbor's wifi, or build cellular modems into 'em.
- JKCalhoun 6y ago
  Then you open the back of the TV, find the WiFi antenna, and clip it or scratch it off the PCB. :-)
  - 6y ago

onedr0p 6y ago

I have a lot of "smart" devices and they aren't connected to the internet. Home assistant and Zigbee2mqtt is amazing and it's all local. The only internet "smart" devices I have are a ecobee thermostat and a water monitoring system, both are in their own VLAN with only access to the internet. My thermostat can be controlled manually if internet is out. I own a LG 4K OLED TV, I put it in the same VLAN add above and block all requests to the internet. Instead I use an nvidia shield for streaming tv and movies.

feifan 6y ago

I imagine for many (most?) people, it's not that they want the "internet connected garbage"; it's that they want the big 4k TV and they're wiling to put up with the garbage that comes with it.

solarkraft 6y ago
They also want streaming from their service of choice (thus "apps") and casting. That's kind of it, though. Nobody asked for ads. Of course it makes the manufacturer money, but also severely degrades the UX. I wonder how much higher demand would need to get for them to offer a shit-free experience for a bit more money.
- feifan 6y ago
  I imagine most people on HN would take the latter, but most people in the broader population aren't that bothered by ads, and most people would probably put up with ads rather than pay e.g. an extra $50 (especially if it's a side-to-side option, like an "ad-free upgrade").
  - nataz 6y ago
    The kindle is probably a good test case for this hypothesis. The base version has an option to show ads on the off screen for a nominally reduced purchase price. I wonder how many people choose ads. I also wonder what kind of price sensitivity we are looking at when it comes to a 1,500 tv.
    - tonyedgecombe 6y ago
      The trouble is the people who will spend money to remove ads are exactly the people who the advertisers want to target.
JKCalhoun 6y ago
Just don't connect it to WiFi. Problem solved. I have a Mac mini serving content to the (not dumb, but deaf, dumb and blind) TV.

samatman 6y ago

Being able to adjust the colour temperature and hue of my house lights is nice, so is doing it by speaking to my watch or speaker. Turning all the lights out when I'm finally comfy in bed is nice. Turning the string of Christmas lights on the lanai on, which don't have a switch indoors or anywhere near the door, is nice. Being able to ask for an album or genre to play and having it happen: nice! Having a certain light turn on at sunset: nice. None of these things were broken before, but they weren't as nice. It isn't garbage. Although having it reset during a 3 am power outage, resulting in lights turning on in my formerly dark bedroom: not as nice! Still a few bugs in the system...

bArray 6y ago

> Am I ever tempted to get a bigger, higher-def, TV? Sure, but then I remember that they're all "smart" and realize I don't actually have a problem with how I'm watching TV now. If you ever are tempted, there are still a few good dumb TVs out there. Admittedly they get less, so vote with your wallet! > I don't want smart anything in my house. My lights are hardwired to a switch on the wall. My washer and drier need me to turn dials and push buttons and go ding when they're done. My fridge has no microprocessor in it. I would update that to: "I don't want smart anything in my house [that isn't fully open source]." Obviously this is not great for the average person, but at least for a programmer I can review, test and improve these devices. One thing I will never have in my home that is closed source is a camera or microphone. I want to know _exactly_ how this data is used and where it goes.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
developer92 6y ago
curious if that also applies to your phone
AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
> Obviously this is not great for the average person, but at least for a programmer I can review, test and improve these devices. Please God no. The last thing I want to do after coming home from work is the same shit I was doing at work. I like the simplicity of shit just acting as expected.
- bArray 6y ago
  > Please God no. The last thing I want to do after coming home from work is the same shit I was doing at work. I like the simplicity of shit just acting as expected. I understand, but a side project feels different. I do it because I want to, not because I need to.

broabprobe 6y ago

This is why I still use a 480i CRT from the early 1980s. Shelves of VHS haven't broke and don't need fixing!

ip26 6y ago

Scheduling my thermostat, smart outlets, and sprinklers works much better via a computer. Dial lamp timers suck, and programming a complex schedule via four push buttons and an eight-segment display is miserable. (I would not mind using bluetooth instead of wifi, but wifi is more widely used) Network monitoring allows my solar array to be remotely monitored for faults & diagnosed. Network access allows my sprinkler controller to track the weather for more accurate water usage modeling... Ordinary light switches and light bulbs are great. But some things stand to benefit from smarts.

christophilus 6y ago

I use a 5k monitor hooked up to a Linux desktop that I built. Works great, and all the components are dumb. The day they bake ads into all computer monitors is the day I move off grid and start taking permaculture farming seriously.

wobbly_bush 6y ago
This is my approach as well. The UX isn't as good as pure-TV apps. I specifically have to use the screen zoom functionality when trying to select what to watch from the couch. But after the selection process, it works great.

spoonjim 6y ago

My washer sends a message to my phone when I leave the laundry in it. Has saved me countless loads of mildewy smelly wet clothes in the morning.

LegitShady 6y ago
I set a timer on my phone. No internet required. Never missed it yet
- spoonjim 6y ago
  Yes, but that’s one of many things that I don’t have to worry about. You can do you, I prefer the connected home. If configured correctly it’s like having a very basic butler.
  - LegitShady 6y ago
    I don't consider setting a timer something I worry about and given my experience with smart home devices the inverse is true for them.
jeegsy 6y ago
I mean thats great and all but I really very much prefer to be the sort of person who remembers to remove their laundry.
- spoonjim 6y ago
  Sure, and I’d like to have the physique of LeBron James, the looks of George Clooney, and the intelligence of John Von Neumann, but here I am instead.

Larrikin 6y ago

I recently got a 55 inch 4k TV after having a 40 inch HD TV for some years. I regret having friends suffer through that quality to watch things like the last season of Game of Thrones just because I liked hosting. I had friends with better TVs that didn't say anything because I liked having people over and they didn't. I've never connected it to the internet and glad I haven't but there really is a night and day difference in quality. I've slowly upgraded my parent's TVs and they have really appreciated it.

zeepzeep 6y ago

> My lights are hardwired to a switch on the wall. Oh you mean like an ethernet cable?

Kiro 6y ago

I keep seeing this exact comment at the top in every thread about smart devices. It's basically copypasta at this point. Even the replies follow the same pattern we've seen a thousand times. I wish there was a way to detect "standard comments" and filter them out or put them in a different tab. It's not just this topic. Another example is the "I quit X and couldn't be happier" we see in every thread about Big Tech, regardless of the content of the article. I understand that these comments resonate with a lot of people but when clicking a thread I expect to read comments about the actual topic (the new intrusive ads that LG just introduced), not generic comments about smart devices in general.

Rule35 6y ago
Ugh, in every thread there's some guy complaining about people's opinions, just because they don't specifically mention the brands and events from the specifc article linked. "A Panasonic TV gave your voice-search data to the police? Irrelevant! We're discussing a Mitsubishi smart-stove phoning the FBI because it detected you cooking Panda meat." I wish these people would realize that the problem is smart devices in general and stop complaining that the tiniest of circumstances make an entirely new case. I understand that this sort of emotional populism resonates with people: "lol, no - this case is totally different and you have to suck it!" but when I click on a headline I expect to see people engaging with the heart of the issue, not dodging and dissembling because they're offended by the implications. ---- Yeah, I get ya. It is annoying that people don't address the specific topic at hand, but you have to realize that the specific brand (LG) of the TV isn't the issue - companies blatantly invading our privacy is. If we get too distracted on which company is doing it this week we'll look up in a few years and realize we're arguing over whether Samsung or LG is sending our records to the government instead of fighting for a blanket users-rights bill and it'll be too late, both will be.
- Kiro 6y ago
  For me personally, as an owner of an LG device who just yesterday had to accept new T&Cs for these ads, I'm very interested in the actual topic but I understand your point. That's why I'm theorizing about a function separating "general comments" from "topic-specific comments".

sgtnoodle 6y ago

If you do some research and find a reasonably engineered TV, the inclusion of "smart" functionality doesn't necessarily detract from the device's utility. About 5 years ago I bought a 55" 4K TV based purely on its performance as a PC monitor. It happened to be an Android TV. After moving, I stopped using it as a monitor and started using it as a TV. It's been a mostly positive experience. It even received an update within the last year. The update exchanged some old bugs for some new bugs, but for the most part it turns on and streams videos without much fuss. It's the first TV I've owned that correctly sequences my audio receiver's power over HDMI, and successfully passes through the TV remote's playback controls to the blu-ray player. The most frustrating thing about it is that there's apparently a defect in its hardware accelerated video decoder. When Netflix came out with their fancier compression codecs last year, 4k shows started completely glitching out. Folk were complaining about it on reddit for months. Luckily I have a friend who works at Netflix who was able to start busting some skulls and get it patched over. For now... I figure I've got at least another year or two before the built-in Android functionality is obsolete to the point of being inconvenient, or the streaming apps stop coping with the buggy video decoder. Since the TV works pretty well as a monitor, though, I should be able to just hook up a more modern external Android TV device and keep going with a roughly similar experience. I'm hopeful that it will even continue to seamlessly power on and off. My other TV is a "dumb" 1080p Samsung plasma screen I bought second hand in 2010 from a particularly sketchy dude on Craigslist. It's still going strong, other than some occasional power supply buzzing and perhaps a bit of phosphor fade. It's travelled across the country and even survived a bachelor party camping trip. Honestly though, it's more of a pain to use than the Android TV, even as a dumb monitor.

wazoox 6y ago

I feel for you. I too am sticking to an obsolete unsmart TV. In 2016 I had to change my home heaters, and nowadays they're all "smart". The app that's supposedly used to control them never could find one of them; instead of a temperature knob and an on/off switch, you constantly need to dive into cascading menus; and of course I'm confident that this smart sh*t will be the reason why they'll fail in the future, for instance when the screen will fail and make the heater unusable.