alt Hacker News> But for many people, we just want a monitor,
> you can make it a PC and then turn it off
TV manufactories can get the best of both worlds: The people that want smart TVs, get a smart TV. The people that don't want a smart TV, can disable the smart TV features. Manufactors make one model and sell to both market segments.
Why should your preferences impose on the ones that don't want what you want? I guess the preferred way would be for manufactors to have add a feature where the tv prompts you if you want to enable smart features when you boot the tv for the first time, but it's a bit difficult when manufactors get more money when they have these features enabled by default.
> Why should your preferences impose on the ones that don't want what you want?
The problem is that I can’t have my preference: a TV that comes without (non-essential) software installed.
This means I have no choice but to deal with required updates — or at the very least, an annoying reminder that software updates are needed — for software I never wanted in the first place.
If the software was optional — could be uninstalled, or disabled so that updates weren’t required — then I would agree with you that having all TVs be smart TVs would be fine.
But not only is it not optional, it often comes with dark patterns of imposed privacy violations and/or unwanted ads.
The OP’s solution is to “jailbreak” it with a Linux install, which the average consumer doesn’t know how to do.
Again, is fine for hackers that want to tinker with things, but the whole point of the linked article is that many people are tired of smart TVs and the annoyances that come with them.