Developers Are Using AI to Strip Ads and Tracking from Smart TVs(www.gadgetreview.com)
14 pointsby thunderbong7 hours ago3 comments
  • toomuchtodo7 hours ago
    Related:

    ‘Reverse-Engineer Anything’ Is the New Wild West of AI - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50167587 - October 2026

  • ChrisArchitect5 hours ago
    Related:

    An ad-free Android TV

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50158942

  • weare1385 hours ago
    Stop buying smart TVs. Companies will stop making them if consumers stop buying them and creating a market for them. Look for commercial digital signage displays. You can find dumb TVs with nice screens or ones that just run a stock Android.
    • joshstrange2 hours ago
      This assumes way too much about your average consumer. Most of them from talking to them seem to like their smart TVs.

      For myself, I buy the smart TV and then just never connect it to the internet. Mostly because commercial digital signage is either way more expensive or is worse technology (and also more expensive).

    • mikestew3 hours ago
      Look for commercial digital signage displays.

      People say that while forgetting to mention that you will spend multiples more money for a lower quality viewing experience. Oh, sure, it might be 4K but it won’t have HDR and the like.

      Take the subsidized TV and don’t let it anywhere near a network connection. Throw an Apple TV in front of it for streaming.

    • noman-land5 hours ago
      Another way to kill smart TVs is to buy them at their heavily subsidized prices and then remove all the ad malware. Companies sell those TVs cheap and recover the costs in ads and selling your data so they will lose money.
      • weare1383 hours ago
        But it's still driving sales. I'm from genx and did a stint in the corporate world. The decision makers at these corporations are looking at it solely and myopically from an analytics perspective and trying to make the line go up. Make the line go down. That's how you get through to these people.
        • mikestew3 hours ago
          Doesn’t that line go down if I buy a TV at cost or below, and they never see further revenue because the TV sends nary so much as a byte to the mothership?
          • moi23882 hours ago
            No because the units sold line goes up but the revenue per device goes down so they will look at ways to extract more money per unit, like ads
    • shen5 hours ago
      Do they sell those at Costco where normal people buy TVs?
    • unrented79775 hours ago
      Sure, at 4x the price