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from the Grandpa-what-was-TV-like-before-it-was-enshittified? dept.
OEMs are increasingly focused on using TVs as a way to show customers ads:
People who buy a Fire TV from Amazon are probably looking for a cheap and simple way to get an affordable 4K smart TV. When Amazon announced its first self-branded TVs in September 2021, it touted them as being a "great value." But owners of the devices will soon be paying for some of those savings in the form of more prominently displayed advertisements.
[...] Some of the changes targeting advertisers, like connecting display placement ads with specific in-stream video ads, seem harmless enough. Others could jeopardize the TV-watching experience for owners.
For example, Amazon is preparing to make Alexa with generative AI more useful for finding content on Fire TVs. This could help Alexa, which has struggled alongside other tech giants' voice assistants to generate significant revenue. Amazon gets money every time someone interacts with digital content through Alexa.
However, the company is double-dipping on this idea by also tying ads to generative AI on Fire TVs. When users ask Alexa to help them find media with queries such as "play the show with the guy who plays the lawyer in Breaking Bad," they will see ads that are relevant to the search.
[...] Maines told StreamTV Insider that advertisers had been asking for a way to advertise against Fire TV searches. "It just makes sense to expand our existing sponsor tile offering to show advertisements on the search screen with no extra effort or cost for the advertiser," she said.
[...] Amazon Fire TV users will also start seeing banner ads on the device's home screen for things that have nothing to do with entertainment or media. This ad space was previously reserved for advertising media and entertainment, making the ads feel more relevant, at least. Amazon opening the ad space to more types of advertisers is similar to a move Google TV made early this year.
The company seems to be aware of how dominating these types of advertisements can be. Maines emphasized to StreamTV Insider how the native ads are "right at the top of the Fire TV's home screen" and take "up half the screen."
[...] The banner ads will occupy the first slot in the rotating hero area, which Amazon believes is the first thing Fire TV users see. These users may have purchased a Fire TV primarily for streaming content from ad-free subscriptions, but Maines described how Fire TVs can still manage to force ads on these users.
[...] The changes mirror similar moves from others in the TV maker industry.
Vizio has been shifting its business toward advertising for the past few years. Its Q2 2023 earnings report showed its ad business growing 28 percent compared to the same period in 2022, versus a 15 percent increase for the device business. The device business was still larger that quarter ($252.1 million compared to $142.3 million), but it's clear that the company is eyeing advertising as the way forward.
[...] TV giant LG is also moving that way, CEO William Cho announced in July. In a press release that month, LG said it "intends to transform its TV business portfolio into a 'media and entertainment service provider' by expanding content, services, and advertisement in products."
And then there's Telly—the upcoming TV that has a second screen geared toward showing advertisements, including if the TV is turned off. The screen can also show other content, like sports scores or the weather, but its primary gimmick is that the device is given away for free. The cost, instead, comes from a wealth of mandatory data collection used for selling advertisements and products.
Amazon's Fire TV ad push is reflective of many parts of the TV industry. With TV makers today increasingly focused on selling ads on their devices, we'll continue seeing ads stuffed into TV operating systems, potentially at the cost of UI and hardware improvements. TV sellers, similar to the streaming companies whose apps those TVs serve up, have grown increasingly focused on pleasing advertisers and investors with continuous growth and recurring revenue sources. While those parties may smile, customers are left stomaching more ads on TVs that are collecting more data on them.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 13 2023, @12:13PM (15 children)
Obvious commercial move is... Obvious?
Like when a real estate agent gives you a pen or a calendar, it's going to come with their name and phone number printed on it...
I'll repeat again how I was more than willing to pay $700 for a "dumb monitor" instead of $350 for a similarly sized and spec'ed "smart TV" simply because I value my peace and quiet and don't want to spend the next 10 years fighting with embedded advertising software for a net savings of $0.10 per day.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by janrinok on Monday November 13 2023, @01:12PM (10 children)
I am not aware of it happening yet in Europe but do any TVs that are on sale in the USA absolutely demand an internet connection to function at all?
Here in France I can just attach the outdoor antenna and I have 40+ digital channels for free, and more if I wish to subscribe to them, but they are all OTA. I can access Freesat using a small satellite dish (~70cm across and ~40cm from top to bottom) without needing any internet connection and that alongside the French satellite offerings gives me hundreds more free channels. I do NOT connect any devices to the internet unless I want to. Additionally, if I cannot install a firewall on a device it is NOT being connected ever.
If I wanted to watch Netflix or Amazon that would go through my router which is secured reasonably well.
Watching TV costs me nothing except the cost of the electricity.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Monday November 13 2023, @01:29PM (3 children)
I bought my TV second-hand from a Finnish seller. Why? Because Finland is a large country full of emptiness and TV is still mostly distributed over the air there. Also, there are vast swathes of forested areas in Lapland that the internet hasn't reached yet, and people live there too. As a result, selling TVs that refuse to work without an internet connection would create a scandal there.
Buying my TV from a northern Finn ensured that it would work without any sort of connection to the internet. I'm happy to pay for the obscene shipping cost to escape the obscene smart TV insult.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by shrewdsheep on Monday November 13 2023, @01:40PM (2 children)
Why do you need a smart TV at all? I am happy with a projector hooked up to a NUC-form factor linux box. If not for the projector, I would go for a large monitor.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Freeman on Monday November 13 2023, @02:36PM
There are only a few reasons to go with a projector vs a TV/Monitor. Screen to $ size (Though, that can swing wildly in both directions.) and portability are the biggest two I can think of. Generally you're going to be paying a lot more for a huge TV and generally it's much easier to do an outside movie night with a projector. Also, the latency on a (usually cheaper) projector can be big enough to notice, if you're gaming on it.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 13 2023, @07:37PM
dumb TV / monitor on a NUC (and formerly a net-top) running Ubuntu + Kodi and others has been my setup since about 2008.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 13 2023, @01:46PM (4 children)
Last time I did OTA TV in the US was the late 1990s... and of course almost all programming sent OTA is advertising supported. I think it is still possible, but we switched to exclusively Netflix DVDs (plus internet) in early 2002, then of course migrated to streaming in the mid-late 2000s.
You can get a smart TV and feed it from a computer without connecting the TV to the internet - we do this with our BluRay players now - but, they're always a little cheesed off at us for not having that connection, you have to navigate through the menus every time it powers on, etc. I'm sure I could "beat" the smart TV with minimal effort, but I don't want to make that effort - and I fear that, like Kindle tablets, they're going to continue to ramp up how hard you have to fight to use your smart TV without viewing their advertising.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by RedGreen on Monday November 13 2023, @03:12PM (1 child)
"I think it is still possible, but we switched to exclusively Netflix DVDs (plus internet) in early 2002, then of course migrated to streaming in the mid-late 2000s."
I switched/migrated to usenet and the wonderful people there who upload just about any program broadcast without any commercials in them. I for one am tired of the nearly half of the show being taken by commercials these days. Used to be an hour program was over fifty minutes now you are lucky if it is thirty-five and that does not count the two minute intro and two for closing credits. Plus years later they are still available to get solving the where can I watch it problem now it is no longer shown anywhere too.
"I modded down, down, down, and the flames went higher." -- Sven Olsen
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 13 2023, @04:05PM
Occasionally (much less than half the time, actually) when we're staying in a hotel / AirBnB / whatever they will have Cable and we will turn it on for a little while... quickly determine that it is even worse than we remember, then shut it off again.
Once in a while I will get sucked in by an old movie they are showing, and the first half of the movie is a decent viewing experience, with very brief advertising breaks every 30 minutes or even longer - good time to go to the fridge or the bathroom, if you are playing the captive audience watching on "their schedule" - although most places these days now have digital recorders where you can pause the show anyway - within limits of their arbitrary rules - but what you can't do is fast forward the ads, and toward the end of the movie they'll literally be playing 5 minutes of advertisement, then throw in 3 minutes of the movie you were watching, then 5 more minutes of advertising for the last 20-30 minutes of the movie, which seems to stretch for hours... I always end up switching it off instead of seeing the end of what I started.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Monday November 13 2023, @06:03PM
In the 1990s TV was analog. Big difference, I now get more channels over the air at a higher resolution than cable for free. Connected to the internet there are hundreds of more free channels.
I have my TV as a monitor, but it's also plugged into the network jack. Why? Channel guide and the ability to stream PBS, Pluto's 200+ channels, and more a hell of a lot easier than either of the two computers plugged into it (one Windows, one Linux).
AFAIK Amazon is the only one who feeds you ads from their TVs. Windows feeds ads to my TV, but Linux doesn't, nor does the TV itself. Amazon is just evil, I plan to give my Kindle and Ring doorbell away and replace them with items from someone less evil.
A Black, Hispanic, or Muslim voting for Trump is like a Jew voting for Hitler
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Tuesday November 14 2023, @12:09AM
I only use OTA TV via a nice small CRT TV and a digital converter box. Yea, it has advertising, but the few times I actually watch something, I can still change the channel, mute the audio, and/or get up to do something else when the commercials come on. Sometimes they do fuck around with the timing of the commercials, but given the quality of TV shows, I can't possibly care if I wind up missing a few minutes.
(Score: 4, Informative) by mcgrew on Monday November 13 2023, @05:54PM
do any TVs that are on sale in the USA absolutely demand an internet connection to function at all?
Not that I know of, but if you don't conmnect it to the internet you lose a lot of features, like a channel guide or the ability to stream streaming services, may of which, like Pluto or Tubi or PBS are completely free. Pluto is like free cable, over 200 extra channels.
A Black, Hispanic, or Muslim voting for Trump is like a Jew voting for Hitler
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Monday November 13 2023, @05:50PM (3 children)
AFAIK Amazon is the only one, besides Microsoft, that adds advertising to something you paid full price for. Sony doesn't (they do different evil things), nor does Roku. I doubt many, if any but the evil Amazon, do.
A Black, Hispanic, or Muslim voting for Trump is like a Jew voting for Hitler
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 13 2023, @06:06PM (2 children)
I have a Sony BluRay player that's itching for me to install updated apps on it, but I won't give it my WiFi password, so it just pouts when I put in a BluRay disc while it tries to phone in for an updated code, but eventually it relents and plays it anyway. Mostly we watch DVDs, so it's just flashing us with a screen full of their default "app partners" any time we first power it on, or after we eject a disc.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Saturday November 18 2023, @02:53PM (1 child)
Yes, "other evil things" like removing a feature from a device you bought, paid for, and OWN. Removing OtherOS from the PlayStation, and the ability to stream an android device to a TV for example. It should be a felony and someone should have gone to prison after OtherOS. It's like buying a car and having the dealer come to your house to steal your wheels and tires.
A Black, Hispanic, or Muslim voting for Trump is like a Jew voting for Hitler
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday November 18 2023, @06:36PM
I was using OtherOS on our PS3 as many hours a week as we used it for games, maybe more, when Sony pulled the plug on Other OS.
We moved the other OS functions to an Ubuntu NetTop which worked much better, but you are right, they stole that functionality right out of our living room and millions of others
PS4? Or 5? Not in our home.
🌻🌻 [google.com]