Jackson soon discovered that Amazon suspended his account because a Black delivery driver who’d come to his house the previous day had reported hearing racist remarks from his video doorbell. In a brief email sent to Jackson at 3 a.m., the company explained how it unilaterally placed all of his linked devices and services on hold as it commenced an internal investigation.
The accusations baffled Jackson. He and his family are Black. When he reviewed the doorbell’s footage, he saw that nobody was home at the time of the delivery. At a loss for what could have prompted the accusation of racism, he suspected the driver had misinterpreted the doorbell’s automated response: “Excuse me, can I help you?”
This should be read and understood by everyone and everyone needs to cancel their smart devices from Amazon. The company needs to be broken up.
We should also be able to delete apps on our devices. I have an LG TV that keeps wanting me to use Alexa, but I’m not positive it’s not doing its shitty thing anyway because I can’t delete it.
Man that huge one for me. Samsung phones have so much bolated wear and you can’t delete the apps. Also should be illegal to add games to my device after an update.
Use your wallet. Don’t buy products like that.
Which products don’t have that? I’m seriously asking, I would buy those.
Fairphone?
Maybe? It seems like from their site that they’re more interested in saving the planet but it is bare bones. It doesn’t really make any declarations on that front.
It doesn’t come with preloaded shit though, so in that sense it’s a good option.
I didn’t see that on their site, that’s good to know.
It comes with stock Android, no additional bloatware. There are various tutorials to install other OSes.
Search ADB OTG pm uninstall -k --user 0 [PACKAGE NAME]
Thank me later
Pixel devices, devices with custom roms, and devices that you used ADB bridge to disable or uninstall “system” apps.
Pixel phones are not saints either. They keep pushing google products/servicea down your throat.
Not if you install GrapheneOS
https://itsfoss.com/open-source-alternatives-android/
So, you would have to root kit it, right? I’m not sure I trust myself to be able to do it. I guess I could try it on an old phone or something.
Disconnect the tv from the internet. Use an AppleTV or Nvidea Shield.
Some of them will auto connect to open WiFi signals without advising you just to dial home.
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The Motorola phones I’ve been buying for ages are usually real light on bloat. Worst I had was having to remove Facebook from my phone using CLI commands (I think with adb?)
Pixels…
Their TVs are annoying as fuck. I’ll never buy anything Samsung again.
https://monero.town/post/631850
That’s probably more on the carrier than Samsung themselves. I’ve genuinely never had an issue like that since switching to an unlocked device.
When reading about “smart” thermostat. It has been found that these would listen even though there is no account is linked nor it is activated.
I already did this by never getting smart devices.
It’s increasingly difficult to get a TV nowadays that isn’t “smart”.
Don’t connect it to the Internet
That’s easier said than done. I’ve had TVs that wouldn’t work unless TOS were accepted and I’ve had TVs scan for open networks.
I’m at the point of opening TVs to disconnect the wireless antennas.
Remember that if a TV is connecting to random WiFi spots, it is breaking hacking laws if it logs into someone else’s unsecured WiFi where you don’t have permission to join. Permission, not security measures like passwords, is the key part that defines the legality or otherwise of what you are doing
I see what you’re saying but you give up Netflix, Hulu, and screencasting. It’s an actual sacrifice.
You can connect other devices to your TV, like anything from a Nintendo Switch to an entire laptop/PC. Obviously they have their own privacy issues, but at least on a real computer you have some agency.
I just checked the pricing on OLED monitors, do they go on sale?
It doesn’t have to be a monitor. The computer doesn’t care what the other end of the cable calls itself.
Sometimes occasionally but they’re probably never going to be cheap. Too hard/expensive to manufacture which is why folks like Samsung keep trying really hard with quantum dot LED panels.
That being said, I regret nothing about purchasing my LG C9 OLED TV a couple years ago. Works fantastic, looks fantastic and I pretty much never use the built in UI for anything by going to a Nvidia Shield for my content/streaming needs. I think the LG C series does an excellent job and it occasionally goes on sale during holidays/Black Friday.
You missed the point but also accidentally found it. The point you missed, as others have replied, is that a TV and a monitor both work as PC displays.
But the point you accidentally found is that monitors are pretty much TVs without the smart tv bs added in. They are priced like TVs would be if they weren’t making money from them in other ways, like getting paid for preinstalled apps and selling harvested data.
I didn’t miss that point, I really like LG channels because it introduces me to stuff I wouldn’t normally see. I had a dumb TV up until right before the pandemic and I love the smart TV features but you really sign your life away with their cotracts. I put on live cams or videos of nature while I work directly from the TV while working on my computer. I go offline a lot when I’m working on something that needs to be copyrighted yet, so I couldn’t screencast it unless I got an old computer or something to do that. I think I have unique circumstances and I’m lazy and cheap, tbh.
There’s cheap devices you can get to connect to the expensive device to do that for you. That way the expensive device never takes a turn for the worse.
Nvidia Shield. Or another Android TV set top box. You’re welcome.
I don’t recommend any Android TV box anymore that isn’t from a big brand, which pretty much leaves the Shield and Chromecast with Google TV. All those no-name Amazon boxes are lousy with spyware.
Chromecast? You connect it when needed.
Chrome cast is google, lol.
But it doesn’t rely on any sort of cloud services, so unlike the guy in the article’s problems, you don’t have that if Google decides you’re an undesirable. Your Chromecast will continue to function. It’s rare for a device these days.
Sure, not denying it. But the point was that you can not connect the TV into the Internet and still use netflix etc. You stream the content through chromecast when you need to.
I dont have netflix, hulu, and dont own a TV at all. Its not a sacrifice.
especially since you can get what you want to watch via alternative means.
presumably.
its been to long for me so I do not know the waves like I once did
I am not honestly sure. It has been over a decade since i consumed TV, shows, etc in any serious quantity.
I ended up just getting a big monitor.
Hmmmm, that’s a good option I hadn’t thought of.
I have two TVs. One is an small 720p set we keep in the bedroom with a connected Chromecast, and the other is a 1080p “smart” TV, but they made the mistake of building a Chromecast into it, so we literally never use the “smart” features and just cast from a phone or computer.
I don’t care if that’s “low resolution.” I grew up with CRT TVs. 1080p is terrific as far as I’m concerned.
I can’t even find a goddamned thermostat that doesn’t require some kind of internet connection.
Smart Devices are fine. Buy devices that use Z-Wave or ZigBee and run them with something like Home Assistant. All local processing, no internet needed.
I have a couple of smart bulbs and switches and a couple of wyze cams around but I don’t want or need a smart doorbell, thermostat, etc. I like being able to turn off our bedroom light from my watch or phone and the smart switches work well for devices that need to be plugged in where the actual power cable is hard to reach.
Because that solution worked so well in the telecomms industry.
We need a solution, but breaking up businesses isn’t the only one - and arguably isn’t a good solution when they can more or less carry on with the same practices under more complex ownership structures. A better solution is regulation and enforcement. The government is supposed to regulate to level the playing field between consumers and big business.
Too bad our regulation framework is captured by the same people who own those companies and their friends.
I think we need new legislation that prevents companies with a valuation over a certain inflation-adjusted threshold, say $10 billion, from participating in mergers. Then split up the big troublemakers. This way, they can’t just buy each other out until there are only a few left. They have to innovate and compete to keep growing.
I would love to get rid of my smart devices from amazon/Google but I have yet to find a single plug and play device that allows me to control all my lights, plant humidifiers, aquariums, TV, and whole house music by voice that isn’t from them or even better FOSS.