That’s not on Nvidia but the fault of Google tho (they use stock Android TV) you can just use another launcher and set it to auto start ( not like the Fire Stick where they barred that option with updates sigh).

I use Syncthing to automatically keep the database up to date and usable on all of my devices. Autotype on PC is such a nice feature I wouldn’t want to miss (and it increases security on top of that).

That’s the same company that has this on their ‘about us’ page:

“Haier company history: since its creation in 1984, the company has been run by the same CEO, Zhang Ruimin, who has always had a clear objective: to build high-quality, reliable products. Within the first year of his appointment, in response to complaints about faulty fridges, his radical action of smashing the fridges with a hammer in front of employees has been recognised as an important cornerstone of the brand.”

I call hypocrisy!

And of course they won’t compete over which service provides the better app\features\catalogue but will try the same exclusivity game the video streaming platforms started… No thanks!

I couldn’t find it again, sorry. But it wasn’t any real brand that did this (yet), but cheap noname TV clones (similar to those Trojan horse android boxes). Not something you’d trust anyway, but didn’t expect them trying to bridge the gap to get telemetry.

I have been searching for the source, but can’t find it anymore between all the WiFi troubleshooting sites. It wasn’t really brand stuff they mentioned but cheapo TV clones they checked for security risks, similar to those Trojan horse Android TV boxes.

But wouldn’t be the first time that the industry takes inspiration from something like that and either implements it silently to get the juicy telemetry (yes, using that to enable smart features would be dumb) or sells it as a ‘feature’.

The question is how long that will help. Just recently read about the first TVs popping up that try to connect to any available open WiFi to phone home, regardless of your settings. Soon our TVs will need tinfoil hats 😱

With Firefox on mobile I can use my personal uBlock filter list to deshitify the search results. That alone makes it superior to Revanced for me (still use it from time to time, but every time I search for something I feel the urge to puke).

At the beginning the launcher-manager acted a bit weird (started FLauncher on every home button press) but a reboot with power off did solve that. Now the launcher starts with boot and stays. Ever since I’ve never had issues. I use an external USB DAC to feed my vintage HiFi tho.

You gain a clean interface a Unsplash wallpaper selector and a nice screensaver (galaxy generator rocks) :)

My guess would be Google. When the first banner carousel came and users complained Nvidia told us they used the stock launcher, we should complain to Google, they don’t care and we’re free to use another launcher (still do ever since and they never tried to block that).

And then everything comes in separate packages with different parcel services anyway… Amazon really has become shit.