Roku files patent to inject ads via HDMI

&gt; When the media device pauses the media content, the display device can determine that a pause event has occurred and insert an ad shown on the display device.<p>Hilarious. I love how all the streaming companies are hijacking the pause control now. Why do you think I hit pause? Pick one or more of the following:<p>1. I need to go to the bathroom.<p>2. I want to inspect the current frame more carefully.<p>3. I want to see an ad for psoriasis medication.<p>Hint: One of the above answers is wrong. Think about it and get back to me. I&#x27;ll wait. (I did hit pause after all.)

&quot;Transfer more value! Transfer more value! Transfer more value!&quot;, the shareholders chanted, as the virgin shrieked on her descent into the throat of an active volcano.<p>&quot;It is done!&quot;, responded the CEO, eyes hidden behind the ceremonial quarterly meeting headdress, shielding them from the immense heat of the lava.

Anyone who cares at all about their privacy wouldn&#x27;t have a roku TV to start with. Roku is one of the most invasive companies there is. Their devices take multiple screenshots of whatever is on your screen every second and then uploads those images to their servers to be scrutinized so that they can make assumptions about you as a person. If you have a Roku TV they can do that for any non-roku device you&#x27;re using too.<p>LG, Samsung, and Skyworth TVs have also injected popup ads over games&#x2F;DVDs&#x2F;Blurays&#x2F;whatever. LG&#x27;s OLED monitors have even been pushing ads on PC users.

HDMI is a farce<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;arstechnica.com&#x2F;gadgets&#x2F;2024&#x2F;02&#x2F;hdmi-forum-to-amd-no-you-cant-make-an-open-source-hdmi-2-1-driver&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;arstechnica.com&#x2F;gadgets&#x2F;2024&#x2F;02&#x2F;hdmi-forum-to-amd-no...</a>

Reason #27,621,938 to stop watching TV. The media creators hate you, the device manufacturers hate you, the streaming companies hate you. It’s amazing what hoops people are willing to jump through in order to poison their own minds.

I don&#x27;t get this bombardment with ads anymore. For all the talk of targeted ads I routinely get them for products like tampons which I definitely do not need. Most of the time it&#x27;s some noise I hear until I can press the skip button. I can&#x27;t really remember what&#x27;s the last time I bought something I saw on an ad.

Roku also recently disabled devices unless you &quot;consented&quot; to forced arb. (E.g., article from about then: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2024&#x2F;03&#x2F;05&#x2F;roku-disables-tvs-and-streaming-devices-until-users-consent-to-forced-arbitration&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;techcrunch.com&#x2F;2024&#x2F;03&#x2F;05&#x2F;roku-disables-tvs-and-stre...</a> )<p>(IANAL.) I&#x27;d like to remind Big Co&#x27;s that contracts aren&#x27;t valid if there isn&#x27;t consideration. And continued use of my own TV isn&#x27;t consideration. (And this is backed by legal precedent, too.)

As somebody who was a roku fan for a while (because I thought their UI&#x2F;os was so much less clunky&#x2F;noisy) I really can&#x27;t recommend this brand.<p>I wonder if there&#x27;s a way to flash your TV with some OS that doesn&#x27;t invade your privacy.

Related:<p><i>Roku data breach: Over 15k accounts affected</i><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39674041">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39674041</a>

Why are forced ads still a thing?<p>When given choice, people escape them - via netflix or adblock. The same people spend their free time watching youtube reviews, chatting on gear forums, or recommending each other deals on social media; it looks like people genuinely want to learn about good and fairly priced products.<p>I sincerely hope we’ll find a better way of reaching an audience than forced ads.

Yikes, I thought HDMI was encrypted similar to DVD&#x27;s &quot;illegal number&quot;.<p>Here&#x27;s bunnie talking about dealing with HCDP when building out the netv.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=gZeCvEa7OqI" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=gZeCvEa7OqI</a> [starts around 14:30]<p>I see in the article they mention a more passive monitoring identifying &quot;when there are pauses&quot;, but how could that hold up to any scrutiny?<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;High-bandwidth_Digital_Content_Protection" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;High-bandwidth_Digital_Content...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;bunnie&#x2F;netv-fpga">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;bunnie&#x2F;netv-fpga</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Illegal_number" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Illegal_number</a>

Can anyone explain why there doesn’t seem to be a market for high-end dumb TVs? I want speakers, tuner, multiple inputs, HDR, 4K. That’s it. I would absolutely pay a premium price for such a dumb TV. I know others in the same position. Am I just in an echo chamber? Or is there something more going on?

How many companies out there make TV-sized LED panels? There&#x27;s a market for dumb TVs obviously. Feels like you could buy the panels, put them in a case with minimal controls, and ship. If you market it as some sort of &quot;pro videophile grade display&quot; you can charge the true material cost + a healthy markup without relying on the recurring ad revenue from smart TV software.<p>You could leave OFF common features like motion smoothing, saving you money, and it would honestly be a more &quot;pro&quot; TV.

If it means that nobody else can implement this without costing a huge amount of money in licensing, this is a net positive.

Reads like this is for Roku TVs. They&#x27;ve gotten wise to the fact that I&#x27;m using my Apple TV more (because I can&#x27;t update the Roku software any higher), but they still want to sell me ads.<p>I try to stay above stuff... but fuck this.

Remind me again, why do people connect their TV to the Internet? I used to work in the space more than a decade ago, and even then the privacy invasions most major brands did were inexcusable.

And just like that, I recall I have a DVD collection and access to alternative means of streaming.

They’re clearly missing an opportunity here. My TV probably spends a whopping 20 hours a day turned off. Why settle for pumping out ads for the few moments it spends paused when there’s all that available screen time going wasted? How long before turning the TV “off” switches it to Billboard Mode?

I understand the conext to be that for a smart TV with Roku built in as the operating system, the idea is that if the TV is set to take input from a HDMI device which is idle the Roku OS might take over and display its own content. Like previews for other shows as a &quot;screensaver&quot; kind of thing.

This seems like patent troll. HDMI-CEC would let you see the pause request if they are using remote not tied to the device. However, to display the ad, it would require you to hijack the input and would be extremely disruptive to the user. Unless they were already using Roku and Roku needs to know Pause command to be helpful to the user. So besides &quot;Show ads&quot; how is this any different from &quot;We handle pause properly!&quot; which is basic function.

You will rent &quot;your&quot; DRM protected PC, and we will inject Ads into your brain

Ah, this is what Tesla meant when he said &quot;You May Live to See Man-Made Horrors Beyond Your Comprehension.&quot;

If I&#x27;m getting this right, any ads you&#x27;d see on a Roku would be hosted by the apps themselves e.g. Youtube and such. So Roku wants a piece of the ad action and this is the only way to do it without the burden of providing any actual content.

Hopefully I can still find a &quot;dumb tv&quot; when the time comes to replace mine.

Thanks Roku for explaining why I shouldn&#x27;t buy a Roku TV or really any &quot;smart&quot; TV.<p>&quot;Smart&quot; refers to how it benefits the manufacturer more so than the user.

On this topic, what’s the best hardware and software to connect to a TV (assuming via HDMI) that allows for running apps for all the usual streaming platform suspects?<p>It doesn’t even have to provide a combined search list. Just something to act as the base OS and launcher for each platform. I know what I want to watch and presumably which one provides it. I just want something to attach to my dumb TV that can play the video.<p>No suggestions. No promoted content. No ads. No upsell.<p>Does such a thing exist?

I refuse to connect my TV to WiFi. I used to use a Roku for all my streaming needs. But I switched to an AppleTV because the Roku apps started to suck and they got into selling data.<p>It’s a dang shame that AppleTV is the only streaming box that doesn’t track what I watch to sell. But that seems to be the world we live in. Aside from being expensive it’s a great product and I definitely recommend it.

McDonald&#x27;s!

I had to check what roku tv was, it seems it&#x27;s just a cheap (android?) tv box.

And it’ll probably be hard to opt out of it: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39643421">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39643421</a>

Discussion from yesterday: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39936016">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39936016</a>

And even deeper on my blacklist your company goes!<p>Who did they think this was a good idea? They are doomed.. Who is going to buy this crap?

Has someone patented a Pi-hole-like HDMI passthrough that blocks out and mutes all ads using SponsorBlock or &quot;AI&quot; mechanisms?

Because if there&#x27;s one thing people can&#x27;t get enough of it&#x27;s ads.

Roku added and removed here.¹<p>¹ <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theguardian.com&#x2F;world&#x2F;2013&#x2F;oct&#x2F;30&#x2F;nsa-sketches-explain-user-data" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theguardian.com&#x2F;world&#x2F;2013&#x2F;oct&#x2F;30&#x2F;nsa-sketches-e...</a>

&quot;Say &#x27;McDonalds&#x27; to end commercial&quot;:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;slatestarcodex&#x2F;comments&#x2F;bsx72f&#x2F;say_mcdonalds_to_end_commercial_patent_by_sony&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;slatestarcodex&#x2F;comments&#x2F;bsx72f&#x2F;say_...</a>

I&#x27;ll cut it out of the cable with a pair of scissors.

Has someone created an enshittification standard scale (ESS) where we can just rate what stage a company is at? It could actually be useful as I would guess that there is probably a good correlation to poor long term financial performance at high ESS.

Why would I use that cable instead of normal one?

misleading headline. It should read &quot;Roku files patent to never do business with me again&quot;

(2022)

#FuckThat

Aaaand Roku is dead to me

you will live to see enshittification beyond your comprehension

I fucking hate capitalism.

This is why hardware that is still controlled by someone else should be classified as a rental, and not a sale.