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- cross-posted to:
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A patent application from the company spotted by Lowpass describes a system for displaying ads over any device connected over HDMI, a list that could include cable boxes, game consoles, DVD or Blu-ray players, PCs, or even other video streaming devices. Roku filed for the patent in August 2023 and it was published in November 2023, though it hasn’t yet been granted.
The technology described would detect whether content was paused in multiple ways—if the video being displayed is static, if there’s no audio being played, if a pause symbol is shown anywhere on screen, or if (on a TV with HDMI-CEC enabled) a pause signal has been received from some passthrough remote control. The system would analyze the paused image and use metadata “to identify one or more objects” in the video frame, transmit that identification information to a network, and receive and display a “relevant ad” over top of whatever the paused content is.
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So we just ordered a new tv and just want the universe to know that Roku wasn’t even considered and this shit is why.
I mean, yeah sure, but are the alternatives that much better in this respect? Which alternative non-ad-ridden, privacy-respecting smart tv would you recommend (or ended up buying)? Asking for my future tv choice…
Samsung, but I’d rather report back when I see if it’s a mistake.
I intend to keep using my AppleTV and hope that’s the end of it. But the Samsung was a process of elimination of Roku and LG via shitty experience with the WebOS on the work TV. If Tizen doesn’t stay out of the way then I’ll start playing router games.
Commercial displays are your best bet, although they can be quite expensive.
I’m glad they patented it so that any of the products I actually buy won’t be able to do this
Parents can be licensed for use by other companies.
Autocorrect or comment on society?
roku has patented a way to go fuck itself
The amount of ewaste they will be producing when they push that update. Should be against some environmental laws.
Can’t we put these devices in some kind of dev mode and install software to stop this shit?
I assume these devices run some kind of Linux kernel, with a stripped down Linux distro.
roku generally puts a lot of effort into security
“security” for themselves, not the customer, I guess
i’m trying to say that they’re pretty locked down
I’m tired boss…
My TV set is like a dumb monitor: HDMI in, colorful image out, basta.
Not even audio. And of course it does not get any internet connection. And I don’t feed it any caviar.
Hopefully this ends up something they never actually do like that sony patent for ads that only go away if you call out the name of the product.
Sony fabitch!
Roku filed for the patent in August 2023 and it was published in November 2023, though it hasn’t yet been granted
So they haven’t patented shit.
I never considered Roku and I’m glad.
also, check their privacy policy 💀
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Time to go back to books, fellas. This party is done.
Aight. So it’s time for me to start taking this seriously. Has anyone tried using like a GrapheneOS or LineageOS as a Roku or FireTV replacement? Is there anything like that which will support an experience with a regular remote control and have apps like Netflix and Hulu work?
The problem with those TV apps is DRM. All the major streaming services require that you either use a locked down platform (probably checking SafetyNet and more on Android TV) or settle for their browser UI which lacks dpad support and gets quality throttled to 1080p or lower.
Circumventing that DRM is possible, but no project at the scale of a platform like those would dare the both legal risk and support headache of making those circumventions (which are very liable to break) a core part of the OS.
Kodi (and distros using it like LibreELEC) exist for people who want a FOSS platform for using non DRM encumbered media with a TV remote interface.
Kodi. But it’s a mess compared to roku.
Maybe not the solution you were asking for, but the Nvidia Shield on the stock code has been a fair compromise for me. The ads on the main screen are relatively unobtrusive, and sometimes even vaguely relevant to our viewing preferences. We largely watch Hulu, Prime and YouTube+ (with free access to AppleTV and Netflix, but I haven’t set those up yet). For ads, we pretty much only deal with Amazon’s new advertising in included Prime content. We’ll probably stop viewing that content once the series we’re currently watching wraps.
For context, my daily driver phone is LineageOS which is rooted all to heck to smack down intrusive advertising and tracking (Magisk, AdAway, AppManager to disable in-app trackers, uBlock on the browser, etc…), and my home network uses a pihole for DNS and malware blocking. I really hate advertisers.
On the pihole, the Shield is actually only the #3 top offender of blocked requests, behind my wife’s work laptop and my kid’s Steam rig. The main offender on the Shield was the ESPN app, which I removed because I never really watch sports outside of tye idd division game, which most of the time I meet friends out at the local pub anyway. Otherwise the Shield has been a well behaved appliance.
So it’s not the perfect ad-free experience, but its hardly the advertising dystopia of broadcast TV.
you could install Android on a raspberry pi with a usb remote.
That backlog of books and DVDs in my closet is more and more attractive each day.
So I guess fuck people who use static images as screensavers
I mean… Yes? I hate this idea and Roku will lose me as a customer over this, but yes they are specifically targeting screensavers. Idle time is ad time to these people.
I would assume that these ads still need an internet connection to play. Another great reason to use an external box to play your media and leave the smart TV offline.
