I don’t care that companies thought they’d get away with this, the problem is have are the people buying this shit! This should’ve been enough to get people to just refuse to buy it but no.

And the bigger problem isn’t what we know they can do, you have to think about what it ‘could’ do.

Even if you never connect this stuff to the internet, they could still track all this stuff locally. Once that happens, which no doubt it will if not already, what happens if suddenly you get arrested for something, they confiscate the TV, download all the stuff tracked, and oops, something even more incriminating… maybe you watched an illiegal movie on jellyfin! 😲

Look at all the “People will never let it happen” that has happened pretty much unchallenged… you’ll have no privacy, and you’ll all be paying for it!

Do they though?

If i buy a TV for £600 and it lasts ~20 years, is that more expensive than the TV the cost £300 and lasts 3 years?

Cheaper to buy doesn’t mean its cheaper and this is what capitalism has brainwashed people with. The biggest issue right now is theres so much cheap crap that needs replacing, we don’t all have the means to replace it with decent stuff that actually lasts.

And the other cost no-one ever factors in is cost of time! When all this crap breaks, how much time are you wasting chasing up fixes or replacements? Time catching up on all the jobs because your washer broke, again!

People need to stop thinking cheap is cheaper! 🙄🤦‍♂️

My issue with this is this is an opportunity for someone with money to start up alternatives that are built on the principles of “it lasts”!

It’s not that hard, make the OS open source, we already have alpine linux, busybox, debian, etc, then build the basic functions in and those who can extend things, will!

On the hardware side, use screws rather than clips, offer downloadable pdf’s with schematics, all this used to get done and dropped because profits! If I had the money I have a decent idea on how I’d start this up so who knows, there’s a few small things I’d like to learn to design/build and think maybe it’ll be sellable so who knows, maybe in 6/12 months and i’ve paid off a few debts i’ll build something useful.