this post was submitted on 30 Jan 2024
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Go away! Batin’!
Hell.
Best comedy ever made.
*documentary
God damn it Google.
When I turn on the TV, it's fine if the masthead is a banner advertising a new show. I'm literally using the product to find things to watch.
But fast food? That can fuck right off.
I've had an Nvidia Shield since they came out, about 6 months ago when I started seeing a car ad I was like "it's time to switch to something else.."
Or just install a new launcher
I have yet to find one that isn't lacking basic features like being about to put the device to sleep.
I've been using Sideload Channel Launcher since they started putting ads on the home screen. It's a simple clean layout that is easy to set up and get everything you want on it. It even has a icon you can add for power settings.
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Fucking uber have ads, my bank app have ads, everything have ads now. It's a Fucking nightmare.
We were all fed the lie that ads were a necessity to "pay" for services that were otherwise free to the consumer. Of course, it was always the plan to charge for anything that really took hold, and it was concurrently the plan to throw more and more ads on everything anyway -- it's just now, they're considered normalized.
Gas station pumps have fucking ads while you pump
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If you have a CCwGTV, you should be using Apps Only mode. Sucks that Google hides this, because I've found that this is the best streaming device for my needs, but they just keep pushing ads like this. Makes me want to do a homebrew chromecast device.
But switching to Apps Only mode is a decent workaround... for now. https://support.google.com/googletv/answer/10070784?hl=en
Will this really remove the ads? From your link:
In Apps only mode, you don't get personalized recommendations on your home screen. You’ll find a list of installed apps that you can open to find something to watch. You'll also find sponsored content and teasers for popular movies and shows.
Yes, It turns the home screen to a grid of app icons and nothing more.
There's still a single banner at the top, but it's not a giant scroll of ads, and you only have to click down once to get to the apps, instead of scrolling past a whole page of "suggestions"
There are now food ads in Apps Only mode on my TCL Google TV.
Can't you install a custom launcher?
Yes, but you can't change the default launcher in the settings. You have to configure the custom launcher to automatically launch everytime, which does require a some adb commands, if I recall correctly.
Otherwise, setting it to apps mode is the only alternative. Aside from disabling ads, it does disable a few other useful features, but the trade-off is worth it.
But honestly, now that AppleTV allows VPNs and proxy apps, I've mostly stopped using my Google TV boxes.
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Google and Roku primarily make money from ads.
Apple does some stuff that isn’t great, but the Apple TV doesn’t have ads like their competitors. Apps can advertise what’s inside of them when they’re selected, but that’s it on the Home Screen.
Ya, so... They didn't GIVE me the Google TV device, I had to buy it. Therefore they got their money from me for that hardware. I'm not using other 'free' google products that cost them money on that device so why would they be showing ads? What cost are the recouping?
For the record, I have not seen this and we do have a number of google TV's in our house. However our primary TV uses an Nvidia Shield.
I’m a product designer who has worked on a lot of products that have been monetized with ads.
It’s pretty common for a company to split their revenue targets between register sales and monetization deals. You break even on the hardware, and make profit on the ads.
I sure would like the option to pay for the HW/profits up front and not have perpetual ads.
Fun fact: Amazon actually have you this option with the original Kindle. They sold two different versions where the only difference was that the cheaper one would show ads.
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Typically they'd be recouping the cost of the tv they sold at a loss. They sell it at a loss because they know they'll make more money in the long run via the ads.
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It's fairly easy to block Roku ads with a Pihole. I've got all mine in a special group and all I see is a nice, empty space where the ad should be.
True. Just saying there is a reason why Google and Roku’s stuff is dirt cheap. The real money is in the ads and selling your data.
Yep, which makes that empty void where an ad should be feel even better
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I almost completely stopped going to the movies once the pre-roll stuff was ads for cars, food, etc instead of just movie trailers.
The more inconvenient Google makes avoiding ads on their platforms and services, the less of Googles platforms and services I will use.
For now I have a third party launcher setup on my CCwGTV in my living room, but the Apple TV 4k I have in my bedroom sure is looking nice these days with how well it performs and how much less trouble it is to setup and reset should I need/want to do that.
Going the HTPC route is less desirable to me since services like Amazon and Netflix go out of their way to restrict resolutions offered to things like a Debian box running Firefox. I could use Windows and Edge, but that would mean hitching myself to another company that seems more interested in selling me to advertisers than selling things to me.
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Has there been a company that has experienced such a fast fall from grace as Google?
Mere years ago they were viewed as the bastion of intellectuals in tech. They worked on stuff that was deemed "not evil", people that worked there were deemed the best and brightest, and their culture was celebrated so highly that literal movies have been made about working there.
Obviously, the reality is different from the vision, but in a short amount of time they've implemented URA, have had multiple mass layoffs where people were locked out overnight with no more than a sentence in an email after a decade of work, have doubled-down on enshitification of their services, and have alienated a significant chunk of their workers through RTO and cost cutting.
Anyone who bought into the don't be evil story / marketing is being willfully naive. Like all the big tech companies they're basically intelligence fronts. Big tech is big brother. You don't even have to look hard to see how intertwined with the CIA / NSA Google had been from the beginning. Furthermore, Snowden's exposure of PRISM made it clear that it wasn't just a few grants early on, it was setup by design to limit govt liability yet allow mass surveillance to go on unabated and the entire launch of Gmail is yet a single token example. Don't trust big tech.
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Google is, and always has been, an advertising company. Thats their bread and butter
pats his Apple TV good boy
Apple is not your friend.
No ads. Fast box. All the apps I need.
Google is an advertising company. Apple is a hardware/software company. They have very different incentives from one another. Neither are my friend, but one’s entire business model runs on psychological manipulation, the other sells iPhones.
I like that even if Google does something I don't like I can install my own launcher. Or buy a different device, apple is apple and you better be happy with what they want you to want.
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In this case, more than Google apparently.
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If you have a pi-hole or other way to block access to your network, I've found these useful to block:
androidtvwatsonfe-pa.googleapis.com
androidtvchannels-pa.googleapis.com
androidtvlauncherxfe-pa.googleapis.com
This is ridiculous. I would understand if this is subsidized devices where you pay less in exchange for having ads. You already bought the device and suddenly it got shittier. Might as well get a free, big brotherly tv with ads from Telly.
It always has been a device that is primary subsidized by ads and selling your behavioral data.
There is a reason why an Nvidia Shield or AppleTV costs a lot more. They’re making more from the price at the register than the ads and data sales.
Yeah but Google started putting these home screen ads on Nvidia shield also.
Not super up to date with that though because the second they did I switched to a custom launcher.
People in this thread said their Nvidia shield has ads too now. I guess costing a lot more doesn't guarantee the device won't be updated in the future to include ads.
As for apple tv, is it usable in a household that's primarily use Android? Can you cast stuff from Android apps to it? Or is it only supports airplay from apple devices?
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