I don’t get why people reflexively suggest streaming boxes. A standalone Roku, Onn or FireTV is gonna spy on you just as much as any of these things. Apple TV is probably the best of a bad bunch (esp. since Nvidia enshittified the Shield TV). There’s options like running the Shield with an alternate launcher or putting a ROM on the Fire stick or running A Linux STB but none of those are particularly accessible to the non-tech set.
I guess I wasn’t meaning to recommend one over the other, I was curious what the value proposition of connecting your tv to the internet is. (The tv I have is at least ten years old and is incredibly sluggish even changing channels - I can’t imagine using the built in apps is any better. Same with our ancient Blu-ray player, just awful to use.) Or if there is no value prop and you’re forced (or nagged) to do so in order to use your tv.
I assume that any sort of streaming is offering up a surveillance buffet. I just want to limit the data as best I can.
The usability of “smart” TVs is garbage. They arne’t very powerful computers so if you are going to sacrifice privacy by using streaming, you should do it with a better streaming device. There is no reason a TV needs to connect to the internet. There is nothing that needs to be updated.
I don’t get why people reflexively suggest streaming boxes. A standalone Roku, Onn or FireTV is gonna spy on you just as much as any of these things. Apple TV is probably the best of a bad bunch (esp. since Nvidia enshittified the Shield TV). There’s options like running the Shield with an alternate launcher or putting a ROM on the Fire stick or running A Linux STB but none of those are particularly accessible to the non-tech set.
I guess I wasn’t meaning to recommend one over the other, I was curious what the value proposition of connecting your tv to the internet is. (The tv I have is at least ten years old and is incredibly sluggish even changing channels - I can’t imagine using the built in apps is any better. Same with our ancient Blu-ray player, just awful to use.) Or if there is no value prop and you’re forced (or nagged) to do so in order to use your tv.
I assume that any sort of streaming is offering up a surveillance buffet. I just want to limit the data as best I can.
The usability of “smart” TVs is garbage. They arne’t very powerful computers so if you are going to sacrifice privacy by using streaming, you should do it with a better streaming device. There is no reason a TV needs to connect to the internet. There is nothing that needs to be updated.
Thank you. “I refuse to send my data to my tv company! Here, Apple, you take it instead.”
hypothetically the box doesn’t see everything else you do with the TV, but that’s a minimal reduction in footprint.