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My shield updated to this the other day. I'm pretty furious about it, it's not a cheap device, and it's certainly not Google's. To be adding these "features" wi

My shield updated to this the other day. I'm pretty furious about it, it's not a cheap device, and it's certainly not Google's. To be adding these "features" without asking, irrespective of whatever agreement between me, Nvidia or Google exists, is ridiculous. I know it's in whatever terms I, uh, "accepted", but there's just no escaping it in this day and age. Fortunately, I know how to use ADB and just installed another launcher, but most other people just have to bend over and take it. No doubt ADB tricks won't be sufficient in future updates and I'll be playing more silly games with a device I own. Apple is seems almost as bad too. There's recommendations that I don't want. It's certainly worse in that I would have even less control and be unable to remove them. It's certainly a good thing that I don't live anywhere near a Google office, otherwise I'd be launching this POS through one of their windows if I did.

DiabloD3 5y ago
What launcher did you switch to?
- sdflhasjd 5y ago
  Wolf Launcher, seems to do everything I need from a homescreen. Lets you hide apps and has some basic customisation. Not amazing, but it has no ads.
  - jahlove 5y ago
    Supposedly Wolf Launcher stole its code from some abandonware launcher, and is not open source. I'm wary of using it, personally.
    - sdflhasjd 5y ago
      Hmm, so it seems. Well, I've been looking around and there seems to be only one open-source launcher I could find. I'll give it a try. https://gitlab.com/etienn01/flauncher https://gitlab.com/etienn01/flauncher
sneak 5y ago
You don't have to bend over and take it, you can throw the device in the garbage. This is what I did with my Alexa hardware the instant it suffixed a routine response to a unit conversion or the weather or something with an ad for some unrelated Amazon service.
- gpspake 5y ago
  There's not a comparable device short of plugging a pc in to my tv and I'm not going back to that life. I play retro arch installed from the play store, stream my pc from my office in to RDP, and connect a wireless kb to one of two usb ports in the back. I also generally like the Google stuff including the assistant integration. The device is perfect in every way and I shouldn't have to throw this $300 device that's worked great for years in the trash because Google made a bad decision about the launcher. It's better than roku, firestick, and apple TV and they all have worse problems. Throw it in the trash can't be the response to everything. Why don't I throw my phone and my car in the trash? Maybe I should throw my fridge and microwave in the trash too? If my fridge started showing ads one day, suggesting that I shouldn't be pissed because I can just throw it out and get a cooler of ice is not helpful.
  - sdflhasjd 5y ago
    Yep, the Shield TV really does seem to have some of the best hardware and sort of "just works" I'd normally just have a Linux box with Kodi, but once you try to get 4K HDR working, things start getting prickly. GPU and driver combos were a bit of a pain and even Windows had issues.
    - Sebb767 5y ago
      I had the exact same problems. Especially when you're trying to get Netflix out PrimeVideo in 4K, you're pretty much out of open source options.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
gpspake 5y ago
My hope is that Nvidia will just develop a launcher. I think a lot of people will jump ship to third party launchers because of this, though, and the damage will be done. Then we just wait for an HN post about thousands of Shield devices being hacked because users installed launchers from who knows where.
- Scaevolus 5y ago
  Supposedly part of the Android TV certification requirements include only using their launcher.
  - TingPing 5y ago
    Is that required for the play store, or just branding as "Android TV"?
    - Scaevolus 5y ago
      The entire GMS suite, including Play Store and YouTube.
  - tyingq 5y ago
    Hopefully there's some negotiation going on. If Google insists that the ad-laden launcher MUST be the default, they are killing any possibility of an "upscale Android TV". Seems dumb to purposefully kill that market.
    - seanp2k2 5y ago
      I was thinking the other day about the Hollywood red carpet event backdrops that are plastered with logos and how tacky that makes the photos look. People even pay thousands for designer fashion goods that have “all-over” logo prints (e.g. most LV stuff, Supreme, Gucci, etc). I get that for some it’s desirable for the virtue signaling, but to me it just looks tacky. Let the quality of the leather and design of the handbag speak for themselves. It’s not as if an Eames chair has leather embossed with the Herman Miller logo every few inches, yet it’s still an iconic and recognizable design. Related: https://www.businessinsider.com/discreet-wealth-logos-status-symbols-cost-louis-vuitton-goyard-2019-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/discreet-wealth-logos-status... Why not just use great-looking photo backdrops instead of tacky logo walls?
thatguy0900 5y ago
I half suspect adb tricks will alway be available. If you allow a technically difficult escape valve for your most motivated users you can probably push the envelope a lot further for everybody else, as long as it's not easy enough for many people to do.
- bashinator 5y ago
  Like enabling the 30-second skip forward on Comcast DVR remotes.
djrogers 5y ago
> Apple is seems almost as bad too. There's recommendations that I don't want. The main AppleTV UI doesn’t have any recommendations for streaming apps you don’t own - the only thing that’s even close are when you highlight one of the apps in the top bar.
- ocdtrekkie 5y ago
  As an iOS user, there's a couple weird ones: Apple prohibits apps from putting ads in notifications, but sends a notification ad for every new Apple TV+ show. "Rules for thee, but not for me"
  - devoutsalsa 5y ago
    The good ol' "do as I say & not as I do" routine.
  - marcellus23 5y ago
    To be honest, Apple never enforces that rule on third parties anyway.
  - kart23 5y ago
    Those are so annoying. Thankfully you can turn the notifications off.
  - reaperducer 5y ago
    For those of you not on iOS, here's what one of those notification spams from Apple looks like: https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1393380938642563072 https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1393380938642563072 See also: Ads for Apple Music, Apple Arcade, and Apple's fitness thing at the top of the Settings app. https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1390696646854397955 https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1390696646854397955 Fake notification alerts in the App Store to get you to tap on the Apple Arcade button to show you a subscription ad. Spam from Apple that I can't seem to stop receiving, even though I'm unsubscribed from every Apple list. I've gone as far as to contact AppleCare about it. I spent an hour on the phone with someone at AppleCare who couldn't explain why I keep getting Apple Arcade spam in my e-mail. https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1394843930932523015 https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1394843930932523015
GOONIMMUNE 5y ago
I haven't resorted to changing my launcher yet, but I will definitely avoid purchasing a new shield (when my old one no longer suffices) as long as this is the user experience
swiley 5y ago
>but there's just no escaping it in this day and age. Yes there is. Absolutely no closed software ever. That's the rule you use. Even the modem on the phone I'm typing this on is running FOSS firmware. Don't compromise your freedom for convenience, you always end up with neither when you do.
- Nicksil 5y ago
  >Yes there is. Absolutely no closed software ever. That's the rule you use. Even the modem on the phone I'm typing this on is running FOSS firmware. Don't compromise your freedom for convenience, you always end up with neither when you do. I don't think I understand fully the point you're trying to make. How does free and open source software prevent a software developer from inserting the code necessary for behavior such as we're discussing? Granted, they may be chastised, but the ability remains. We've seen this happen already with software developers inserting ads into the shell during install (or some other operation). A lot more work and effort on our part is necessary to prevent this type of behavior becoming normalized.
  - gjsman-1000 5y ago
    Take a look at what just happened with Audacity. Open Source is no protection, unless you were aware of the situation and downloaded a fork.
    - swiley 5y ago
      My copy of Audacity hasn't auto-updated to include any of that crap and it looks like future updates will come from a fork where it's stripped (if muse group even bothers to continue) so I'd say that's an example of it working.
      - gjsman-1000 5y ago
        Unless you were unaware of what was happening with Audacity. If you didn't hear about the news, you'll update and have no idea.
xwolfi 5y ago
But you're making a mistake: you never owned this device, you obtained a perpetual license to use it :D
Bayart 5y ago
Wouldn't a hosts file or a local DNS[1] or VPN[2][3] with hosts file support solve that without having to switch software ? I'm using Netguard on Android devices I don't want to root and it's been good. Plus it does per-app firewalling as well. [1]: https://www.zenz-solutions.de https://www.zenz-solutions.de [2]: https://netguard.me https://netguard.me [3]: https://blokada.org https://blokada.org
- Teledhil 5y ago
  I'm using pihole and blocking Google DNS and yet my tv was showing that awful banner. I think google serves the ads using some not-only-ads domain.
  - Spare_account 5y ago
    Presumably Google devices will just resolve DNS queries through a tunnel, if you block 8.8.8.8
  - murph-almighty 5y ago
    It could be that you haven't added the domain they're served from onto your blacklist. A weird side story: I had a situation where an app on my Roku TV would crash if it failed to serve an add from a blocked domain (there were several but they mostly pointed to google ad domains). I actually _had_ to allow ads from the domains they called.
- ignoramous 5y ago
  https://getintra.org/ https://getintra.org/ is the only DNS client I know of that doesn't leak DNS connections over TCP, most other DNS apps (including the 3 mentioned here) do. Blokada is marked with anti-features tag by f-droid for telemetry: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroiddata/-/merge_requests/8536 https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroiddata/-/merge_requests/8536 (Note: Intra, though open-source, has telemetry in it too). Disclaimer: I co-develop a Intra fork.
  - Bayart 5y ago
    AFAIK personalDNSfilter lets your route the DNS however you want. Not that it matters too much to me. I'm not trying to have airtight privacy, I just don't want to be buggered by trash. I'm interested to see your fork, though.
loosescrews 5y ago
One aspect of modern hardware products which contain a lot of software is that they need a steady stream of software updates in order to remain useful and functional. Security updates are essential. Not only is a device full of unpatched vulnerabilities dangerous to use, but as we saw with the recent Western Digital scandal, is a serious risk to the continued functionality of the device. Because the Shield is a streaming device, interoperability with streaming services is required for continued functionality. The set of useful streaming services changes over time and existing streaming services change their APIs. Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Is funding continued updates with ads such a bad thing?
- gmfawcett 5y ago
  > Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Personally, I'd rather that consumers didn't buy into false dichotomies such as this one. You should expect more from your vendors.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  Yes, it is a bad thing. I paid fair and square for the device. I expect the vendor to have factored in all costs beforehand for the expected lifetime of the device. If it physically lasts 10 years then bill me all your expenses for those 10 years. Don't bill me for 3-4 years and then go "Oops, you still have that device, huh? Take those ads because we can't finance support for 6-7 more years out of all our billions. No really, we promise that we can't". Additionally, I expect a corporation like NVIDIA or Google to have amortized the costs of supporting several ecosystems by the mere virtue of having engineers on them on a constant payroll -- those costs are not increasing, they remain the same for long periods of time -- plus to finance the support by other venues if need be. Brand loyalty and stuff? This penny pinching by billionaire conglomerates leaves a sour taste in my mouth and it makes it all the more likely for me to invest in several specialized PCs, a home video / streaming player included. They'll never stop being shady, it seems, so we have to take things in our own hands, apparently.
j45 5y ago
I’d love a link on how to replace the launcher. I have enjoyed my shields and it is now gaudy like ads results on search. Apple TV is less intrusive with ads in the interface and during the viewing experience.
slownews45 5y ago
I use apple TV all the time and I've yet to see an ad. Meanwhile both the TV itself (gone) and other devices seem to push ads all the time. When we say Apple is as bad - what are we talking about? Inside the individual apps obviously developers do push things.
- wlesieutre 5y ago
  Apple defaults to playing big trailers on the home screen, but it's easy to turn off and IMO not nearly as bad as what Google has done here https://9to5mac.com/2020/01/19/how-to-remove-home-screen-trailers-from-apple-tv/ https://9to5mac.com/2020/01/19/how-to-remove-home-screen-tra...
  - slownews45 5y ago
    Very helpful. I'm a Apple TV+ subscriber, so I think I already seem to have access to most of the content. But I also have Prime / Netflix up there, and I can preview that stuff too (neither may wife or I mind this). I did notice once I could turn things off, but we use the Apple TV App (confusing naming) for Up Next pretty frequently (new remote has a quick button for that) and up next nicely seems to pull most of our content in (not sure how) so when we are trying to decide what to watch (we watch about 1 hr every other week) it's handy to remind ourselves of what we were watching from before. Apple obviously does something so that netflix / prime / etc all flow into Up Next. My only annoyance is it feels like there are two "Home" screens, the app icon grid and the apple TV App.
hanniabu 5y ago
Can you use it without accepting the terms of service? If not, it should be required you accept the terms at purchase, otherwise it's just a trojan horse (assuming you're somebody that actually reads the tos).
ji0 5y ago
Capitalists can’t allow social discovery of content. They’re using capital to keep themselves in front of you. That’s what aristocrats do; use their political power to manage agency. Stop enabling aristocracy through politically corrupt distribution of fiat currency; effectively making economic activity constrained to politically dictated economic “norms” (what capitalists fund).
holoduke 5y ago
Do you know a guide on rooting the device? I also would like to put youvanced on it. Cannot really find info about it.
- somebody_amzn 5y ago
  https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-developer-os-images https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-developer-os-images With more resources at: https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-open-source https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-open-source
vlozko 5y ago
I think you’re referring to the TV and movie ads banner at the top? There’s a technical reason for it and a pretty simple fix. That banner shows for whatever app you have in the top left corner of your apps list. To fix it, all you would have to do is to move a different app to be there. I moved the Photos app to be the first on mine and all I see now is a color wheel/flower whenever I turn on my Apple TV.
vmception 5y ago
> I know it's in whatever terms I, uh, "accepted", but there's just no escaping it in this day and age. Courts and legislative bodies can totally overrule and invalidate any clause in a private contract, if you feel this is a social problem then keep speaking up about it and ignore the people playing devil's advocate. People are in the habit of giving counterpoint's for conversation's sake and have no strong opinions on their counterpoint. The path is the following: ethical problem becomes a social problem becomes a legal problem. Specifically, obscure ethical problems become recurring and common social problems which become legal problems that can more easily get patched.
fffrantz 5y ago
No need to sideload anything. Just remove all updates of the Android TV launcher in the settings and disable auto updates. You'll get the good ol' launcher.
- somethingwitty1 5y ago
  No unfortunately that may not work. Even if you revert all updates, the old launcher now has the ad. It appears they are doing this from their service side somehow. I removed all updates and disabled updates, but it didn't work. Mine required side-loading a launcher.
  - beerandt 5y ago
    You have to also revert the play services app and then disable it, in addition to reverting the launcher app. I've got some other apks disabled as well, but I think these two are the critical ones. I haven't had the ads pop up again in over 2 weeks.
    - somethingwitty1 5y ago
      I'd be curious if it depends on when you purchased the shield. I just tried this on my older shield reverting/disabling worked, but my newer one does not.
underscore_ku 5y ago
YOU DON'T OWN "YOUR" DEVICE. go ahead and buy more close source crap
Eridrus 5y ago
I think people here need to realize that in terms of preference, they are massive outliers. While you can conceptualize recommendations for things you have not bought as Ads, there is likely no money changing hands here for these to displayed. And most people actually like these features: https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/19/22580720/android-tv-watchlist-google-tv-features https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/19/22580720/android-tv-watch...
- somethingwitty1 5y ago
  Source on it not creating money? Where I've worked, they had recommendations (for shows and movies) and we definitely were paid for showing them. Companies would pay us for priority, direct buy of a slot or to get certain keywords/demographics. They were really no different from ad slots at the end of the day. Only difference was that there was a small, but unlikely chance, someone that didn't pay could have been promoted. Given this is Google's business, I'd find it hard to believe that they would market other products without a financial incentive (whether through a cut of the sale through the play store or direct payment for displaying the recommendation).
- Mindwipe 5y ago
  At least in the UK there are four recommendations in the top row, and two are explicitly marked with an "Ad" logo, so they are definitely paid ads. (I agree broadly users do not care, but some of these are definitely paid, placed advertisements by Google.)
zepto 5y ago
> Apple is seems almost as bad too. This is a frankly ridiculous comparison.
craftinator 5y ago
Honestly, why do people buy shit like this when you can just hook a raspberry pi to your tv and stream through that? I'm asking a real question here, I simply can't understand what makes this a desirable thing for anyone.
- nichos 5y ago
  Ease of use. Pis are great, but not a trivial setup, especially when you get in to adding ir commands.

DiabloD3 5y ago

What launcher did you switch to?

sdflhasjd 5y ago
Wolf Launcher, seems to do everything I need from a homescreen. Lets you hide apps and has some basic customisation. Not amazing, but it has no ads.
- jahlove 5y ago
  Supposedly Wolf Launcher stole its code from some abandonware launcher, and is not open source. I'm wary of using it, personally.
  - sdflhasjd 5y ago
    Hmm, so it seems. Well, I've been looking around and there seems to be only one open-source launcher I could find. I'll give it a try. https://gitlab.com/etienn01/flauncher https://gitlab.com/etienn01/flauncher

sneak 5y ago

You don't have to bend over and take it, you can throw the device in the garbage. This is what I did with my Alexa hardware the instant it suffixed a routine response to a unit conversion or the weather or something with an ad for some unrelated Amazon service.

gpspake 5y ago
There's not a comparable device short of plugging a pc in to my tv and I'm not going back to that life. I play retro arch installed from the play store, stream my pc from my office in to RDP, and connect a wireless kb to one of two usb ports in the back. I also generally like the Google stuff including the assistant integration. The device is perfect in every way and I shouldn't have to throw this $300 device that's worked great for years in the trash because Google made a bad decision about the launcher. It's better than roku, firestick, and apple TV and they all have worse problems. Throw it in the trash can't be the response to everything. Why don't I throw my phone and my car in the trash? Maybe I should throw my fridge and microwave in the trash too? If my fridge started showing ads one day, suggesting that I shouldn't be pissed because I can just throw it out and get a cooler of ice is not helpful.
- sdflhasjd 5y ago
  Yep, the Shield TV really does seem to have some of the best hardware and sort of "just works" I'd normally just have a Linux box with Kodi, but once you try to get 4K HDR working, things start getting prickly. GPU and driver combos were a bit of a pain and even Windows had issues.
  - Sebb767 5y ago
    I had the exact same problems. Especially when you're trying to get Netflix out PrimeVideo in 4K, you're pretty much out of open source options.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]

gpspake 5y ago

My hope is that Nvidia will just develop a launcher. I think a lot of people will jump ship to third party launchers because of this, though, and the damage will be done. Then we just wait for an HN post about thousands of Shield devices being hacked because users installed launchers from who knows where.

Scaevolus 5y ago
Supposedly part of the Android TV certification requirements include only using their launcher.
- TingPing 5y ago
  Is that required for the play store, or just branding as "Android TV"?
  - Scaevolus 5y ago
    The entire GMS suite, including Play Store and YouTube.
- tyingq 5y ago
  Hopefully there's some negotiation going on. If Google insists that the ad-laden launcher MUST be the default, they are killing any possibility of an "upscale Android TV". Seems dumb to purposefully kill that market.
  - seanp2k2 5y ago
    I was thinking the other day about the Hollywood red carpet event backdrops that are plastered with logos and how tacky that makes the photos look. People even pay thousands for designer fashion goods that have “all-over” logo prints (e.g. most LV stuff, Supreme, Gucci, etc). I get that for some it’s desirable for the virtue signaling, but to me it just looks tacky. Let the quality of the leather and design of the handbag speak for themselves. It’s not as if an Eames chair has leather embossed with the Herman Miller logo every few inches, yet it’s still an iconic and recognizable design. Related: https://www.businessinsider.com/discreet-wealth-logos-status-symbols-cost-louis-vuitton-goyard-2019-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/discreet-wealth-logos-status... Why not just use great-looking photo backdrops instead of tacky logo walls?

thatguy0900 5y ago

I half suspect adb tricks will alway be available. If you allow a technically difficult escape valve for your most motivated users you can probably push the envelope a lot further for everybody else, as long as it's not easy enough for many people to do.

bashinator 5y ago
Like enabling the 30-second skip forward on Comcast DVR remotes.

djrogers 5y ago

> Apple is seems almost as bad too. There's recommendations that I don't want. The main AppleTV UI doesn’t have any recommendations for streaming apps you don’t own - the only thing that’s even close are when you highlight one of the apps in the top bar.

ocdtrekkie 5y ago
As an iOS user, there's a couple weird ones: Apple prohibits apps from putting ads in notifications, but sends a notification ad for every new Apple TV+ show. "Rules for thee, but not for me"
- devoutsalsa 5y ago
  The good ol' "do as I say & not as I do" routine.
- marcellus23 5y ago
  To be honest, Apple never enforces that rule on third parties anyway.
- kart23 5y ago
  Those are so annoying. Thankfully you can turn the notifications off.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  For those of you not on iOS, here's what one of those notification spams from Apple looks like: https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1393380938642563072 https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1393380938642563072 See also: Ads for Apple Music, Apple Arcade, and Apple's fitness thing at the top of the Settings app. https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1390696646854397955 https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1390696646854397955 Fake notification alerts in the App Store to get you to tap on the Apple Arcade button to show you a subscription ad. Spam from Apple that I can't seem to stop receiving, even though I'm unsubscribed from every Apple list. I've gone as far as to contact AppleCare about it. I spent an hour on the phone with someone at AppleCare who couldn't explain why I keep getting Apple Arcade spam in my e-mail. https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1394843930932523015 https://twitter.com/Reaperducer/status/1394843930932523015

GOONIMMUNE 5y ago

I haven't resorted to changing my launcher yet, but I will definitely avoid purchasing a new shield (when my old one no longer suffices) as long as this is the user experience

swiley 5y ago

>but there's just no escaping it in this day and age. Yes there is. Absolutely no closed software ever. That's the rule you use. Even the modem on the phone I'm typing this on is running FOSS firmware. Don't compromise your freedom for convenience, you always end up with neither when you do.

Nicksil 5y ago
>Yes there is. Absolutely no closed software ever. That's the rule you use. Even the modem on the phone I'm typing this on is running FOSS firmware. Don't compromise your freedom for convenience, you always end up with neither when you do. I don't think I understand fully the point you're trying to make. How does free and open source software prevent a software developer from inserting the code necessary for behavior such as we're discussing? Granted, they may be chastised, but the ability remains. We've seen this happen already with software developers inserting ads into the shell during install (or some other operation). A lot more work and effort on our part is necessary to prevent this type of behavior becoming normalized.
- gjsman-1000 5y ago
  Take a look at what just happened with Audacity. Open Source is no protection, unless you were aware of the situation and downloaded a fork.
  - swiley 5y ago
    My copy of Audacity hasn't auto-updated to include any of that crap and it looks like future updates will come from a fork where it's stripped (if muse group even bothers to continue) so I'd say that's an example of it working.
    - gjsman-1000 5y ago
      Unless you were unaware of what was happening with Audacity. If you didn't hear about the news, you'll update and have no idea.

xwolfi 5y ago

But you're making a mistake: you never owned this device, you obtained a perpetual license to use it :D

Bayart 5y ago

Wouldn't a hosts file or a local DNS[1] or VPN[2][3] with hosts file support solve that without having to switch software ? I'm using Netguard on Android devices I don't want to root and it's been good. Plus it does per-app firewalling as well. [1]: https://www.zenz-solutions.de https://www.zenz-solutions.de [2]: https://netguard.me https://netguard.me [3]: https://blokada.org https://blokada.org

Teledhil 5y ago
I'm using pihole and blocking Google DNS and yet my tv was showing that awful banner. I think google serves the ads using some not-only-ads domain.
- Spare_account 5y ago
  Presumably Google devices will just resolve DNS queries through a tunnel, if you block 8.8.8.8
- murph-almighty 5y ago
  It could be that you haven't added the domain they're served from onto your blacklist. A weird side story: I had a situation where an app on my Roku TV would crash if it failed to serve an add from a blocked domain (there were several but they mostly pointed to google ad domains). I actually _had_ to allow ads from the domains they called.
ignoramous 5y ago
https://getintra.org/ https://getintra.org/ is the only DNS client I know of that doesn't leak DNS connections over TCP, most other DNS apps (including the 3 mentioned here) do. Blokada is marked with anti-features tag by f-droid for telemetry: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroiddata/-/merge_requests/8536 https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroiddata/-/merge_requests/8536 (Note: Intra, though open-source, has telemetry in it too). Disclaimer: I co-develop a Intra fork.
- Bayart 5y ago
  AFAIK personalDNSfilter lets your route the DNS however you want. Not that it matters too much to me. I'm not trying to have airtight privacy, I just don't want to be buggered by trash. I'm interested to see your fork, though.

loosescrews 5y ago

One aspect of modern hardware products which contain a lot of software is that they need a steady stream of software updates in order to remain useful and functional. Security updates are essential. Not only is a device full of unpatched vulnerabilities dangerous to use, but as we saw with the recent Western Digital scandal, is a serious risk to the continued functionality of the device. Because the Shield is a streaming device, interoperability with streaming services is required for continued functionality. The set of useful streaming services changes over time and existing streaming services change their APIs. Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Is funding continued updates with ads such a bad thing?

gmfawcett 5y ago
> Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Personally, I'd rather that consumers didn't buy into false dichotomies such as this one. You should expect more from your vendors.
pdimitar 5y ago
Yes, it is a bad thing. I paid fair and square for the device. I expect the vendor to have factored in all costs beforehand for the expected lifetime of the device. If it physically lasts 10 years then bill me all your expenses for those 10 years. Don't bill me for 3-4 years and then go "Oops, you still have that device, huh? Take those ads because we can't finance support for 6-7 more years out of all our billions. No really, we promise that we can't". Additionally, I expect a corporation like NVIDIA or Google to have amortized the costs of supporting several ecosystems by the mere virtue of having engineers on them on a constant payroll -- those costs are not increasing, they remain the same for long periods of time -- plus to finance the support by other venues if need be. Brand loyalty and stuff? This penny pinching by billionaire conglomerates leaves a sour taste in my mouth and it makes it all the more likely for me to invest in several specialized PCs, a home video / streaming player included. They'll never stop being shady, it seems, so we have to take things in our own hands, apparently.

j45 5y ago

I’d love a link on how to replace the launcher. I have enjoyed my shields and it is now gaudy like ads results on search. Apple TV is less intrusive with ads in the interface and during the viewing experience.

slownews45 5y ago

I use apple TV all the time and I've yet to see an ad. Meanwhile both the TV itself (gone) and other devices seem to push ads all the time. When we say Apple is as bad - what are we talking about? Inside the individual apps obviously developers do push things.

wlesieutre 5y ago
Apple defaults to playing big trailers on the home screen, but it's easy to turn off and IMO not nearly as bad as what Google has done here https://9to5mac.com/2020/01/19/how-to-remove-home-screen-trailers-from-apple-tv/ https://9to5mac.com/2020/01/19/how-to-remove-home-screen-tra...
- slownews45 5y ago
  Very helpful. I'm a Apple TV+ subscriber, so I think I already seem to have access to most of the content. But I also have Prime / Netflix up there, and I can preview that stuff too (neither may wife or I mind this). I did notice once I could turn things off, but we use the Apple TV App (confusing naming) for Up Next pretty frequently (new remote has a quick button for that) and up next nicely seems to pull most of our content in (not sure how) so when we are trying to decide what to watch (we watch about 1 hr every other week) it's handy to remind ourselves of what we were watching from before. Apple obviously does something so that netflix / prime / etc all flow into Up Next. My only annoyance is it feels like there are two "Home" screens, the app icon grid and the apple TV App.

hanniabu 5y ago

Can you use it without accepting the terms of service? If not, it should be required you accept the terms at purchase, otherwise it's just a trojan horse (assuming you're somebody that actually reads the tos).

ji0 5y ago

Capitalists can’t allow social discovery of content. They’re using capital to keep themselves in front of you. That’s what aristocrats do; use their political power to manage agency. Stop enabling aristocracy through politically corrupt distribution of fiat currency; effectively making economic activity constrained to politically dictated economic “norms” (what capitalists fund).

holoduke 5y ago

Do you know a guide on rooting the device? I also would like to put youvanced on it. Cannot really find info about it.

somebody_amzn 5y ago
https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-developer-os-images https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-developer-os-images With more resources at: https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-open-source https://developer.nvidia.com/shield-open-source

vlozko 5y ago

I think you’re referring to the TV and movie ads banner at the top? There’s a technical reason for it and a pretty simple fix. That banner shows for whatever app you have in the top left corner of your apps list. To fix it, all you would have to do is to move a different app to be there. I moved the Photos app to be the first on mine and all I see now is a color wheel/flower whenever I turn on my Apple TV.

vmception 5y ago

> I know it's in whatever terms I, uh, "accepted", but there's just no escaping it in this day and age. Courts and legislative bodies can totally overrule and invalidate any clause in a private contract, if you feel this is a social problem then keep speaking up about it and ignore the people playing devil's advocate. People are in the habit of giving counterpoint's for conversation's sake and have no strong opinions on their counterpoint. The path is the following: ethical problem becomes a social problem becomes a legal problem. Specifically, obscure ethical problems become recurring and common social problems which become legal problems that can more easily get patched.

fffrantz 5y ago

No need to sideload anything. Just remove all updates of the Android TV launcher in the settings and disable auto updates. You'll get the good ol' launcher.

somethingwitty1 5y ago
No unfortunately that may not work. Even if you revert all updates, the old launcher now has the ad. It appears they are doing this from their service side somehow. I removed all updates and disabled updates, but it didn't work. Mine required side-loading a launcher.
- beerandt 5y ago
  You have to also revert the play services app and then disable it, in addition to reverting the launcher app. I've got some other apks disabled as well, but I think these two are the critical ones. I haven't had the ads pop up again in over 2 weeks.
  - somethingwitty1 5y ago
    I'd be curious if it depends on when you purchased the shield. I just tried this on my older shield reverting/disabling worked, but my newer one does not.

underscore_ku 5y ago

YOU DON'T OWN "YOUR" DEVICE. go ahead and buy more close source crap

Eridrus 5y ago

I think people here need to realize that in terms of preference, they are massive outliers. While you can conceptualize recommendations for things you have not bought as Ads, there is likely no money changing hands here for these to displayed. And most people actually like these features: https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/19/22580720/android-tv-watchlist-google-tv-features https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/19/22580720/android-tv-watch...

somethingwitty1 5y ago
Source on it not creating money? Where I've worked, they had recommendations (for shows and movies) and we definitely were paid for showing them. Companies would pay us for priority, direct buy of a slot or to get certain keywords/demographics. They were really no different from ad slots at the end of the day. Only difference was that there was a small, but unlikely chance, someone that didn't pay could have been promoted. Given this is Google's business, I'd find it hard to believe that they would market other products without a financial incentive (whether through a cut of the sale through the play store or direct payment for displaying the recommendation).
Mindwipe 5y ago
At least in the UK there are four recommendations in the top row, and two are explicitly marked with an "Ad" logo, so they are definitely paid ads. (I agree broadly users do not care, but some of these are definitely paid, placed advertisements by Google.)

zepto 5y ago

> Apple is seems almost as bad too. This is a frankly ridiculous comparison.

craftinator 5y ago

Honestly, why do people buy shit like this when you can just hook a raspberry pi to your tv and stream through that? I'm asking a real question here, I simply can't understand what makes this a desirable thing for anyone.

nichos 5y ago
Ease of use. Pis are great, but not a trivial setup, especially when you get in to adding ir commands.