“Awful”: Roku tests autoplaying ads loading before the home screen
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They just did this to me. How can I tell them they failed this test?
If it has a video input, hook up a used PC, and pirate everything.
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For years I was a big fan of Roku. It represented a better value alternative from the big corporations pushing their own agenda like Google, Apple, Samsung, and Amazon. They made products that were intuitive and user oriented and carved out a very nice and stable market share for themselves because of it. Now they're just leveraging their hardware relationships to transform the software into something terrible.
I used to look for tvs with Roku built in. Now I've disabled Roku features from my smart TVS and use a separate streaming device.
How did you disable the Roku OS?
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Apple has absolutely no interest in injecting ads like this. That’s not their business model. Apple has a thousand things wrong but it’s reasonable to assume they aren’t going to pull this kind of rug pull.
I definitely think Apple is less susceptible to this, but people seem to forget that Apple literally has an ads business.
Look at the ads in Apple news and in a couple of other places. Apple isn't immune to injecting ads into the UX of their products.
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Not a surprise for Roku. The company has been getting progressively worse in the last few years and their enshittification is accelerating. Their recent forced download of an update that requires users to agree to arbitration to even use our TVs was intended to ultimately take control of those TVs completely away from the people who own them.
Right now it's possible to block Roku's static ads and presumably the autoplaying ones using a local DNS server like Adblock Home or Pihole, but it's only a matter of time before Roku blocks everything unless we watch the ads they are trying force down our throats. I'm already in the process of obsoleting all 5 of our Roku devices.
It has taken Roku years to build up enough market share to allow this kind of behavior and it will take years for the market to abandon them. Their executives will claim ignorance as to why users are walking away when it finally hits their bottom line.
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Im literally willing to ditch the device and cancel all streaming services because of this. When I turn on my TV I don’t want to be forced to consume ads when I haven’t been provided with anything in return.
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Looking around Roku's site, I found this email address: [email protected]
I'm planning on giving them a brief but firm "oh hell no" letter. I wonder how many others will do the same
I emailed them to let them know I cancelled Disney+ and cited this specific ad and advertisement campaign through Roku as to why I cancelled the service.
Let’s make the companies who advertise this way feel pain.
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Whomp whomp. You get what you pay for.
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That’s not how they operate.
That's literally the implication that I'm talking about that you say I'm projecting onto this. You don't know the future, that can change.
Dude I’ve clarified exactly what I meant. At some point you need to stop telling me what I said and listen to me when I tell you what I said.
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If you think another private company with profit on their mind is safe, I've got a bridge to sell you.
As it stands now Apple TV for the win and I'd be legit shocked if Apple puts ads as you boot up an Apple TV.
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Dude I’ve clarified exactly what I meant. At some point you need to stop telling me what I said and listen to me when I tell you what I said.
To quote you:
I said they would not inject ads like this
And I'm saying you don't know that they won't do that in the future. But keep clarifying yourself more, I'm sure it will help clear it up.
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They're working hard to make sure piracy provides the best experience.
It’s approaching 1984 levels of BS control.
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Don't connect your Roku to the internet.
Don’t connect your Roku to the internet.
I thought that Roku was some kind of streaming service to a device. Doesn't that need to be Internet-connected to function?
kagis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roku
Ah. Apparently that's what they originally did, but they've also subsequently come out with smart TVs, which I assume can operate without an Internet connection.
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Im literally willing to ditch the device and cancel all streaming services because of this. When I turn on my TV I don’t want to be forced to consume ads when I haven’t been provided with anything in return.
Get an Nvidia Shield Pro and disconnect your TV from the internet.
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So, I use regex to block all Roku domains on my network via pihole:
(ads|logs|cloudservices|image|images|web|prod.mobile|wwwimg|captive|customer-feedbacks|amoeba|amoeba2|sr|giga.sb|cs).roku(.admeasurement)*.com$Then, possibly overkill due to the above, I used OpnSense firewall rules to block all traffic from my Roku tv. I think I just got fed up with seeing Roku spam in my pihole, as the above regex seems to completely "break" Roku.
After that, I set up FLauncher (following the method #2 instructions on the gitlab page) on my shield. This makes it so I only see the Roku launcher for a few seconds while the shield starts up, and then I'm dropped straight into flauncher. I chose flauncher because it's very simple and barebones, so you might want to explore other options if you want more advanced features. I don't really need those features since I'm usually using an app anyway.
Note that I did all of that after the tv was configured and set up, YMMV if it's a brand new tv as it may need to call home to do the initial set up.
Thanks! I have nothing brand new as I am le poor
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So, I use regex to block all Roku domains on my network via pihole:
(ads|logs|cloudservices|image|images|web|prod.mobile|wwwimg|captive|customer-feedbacks|amoeba|amoeba2|sr|giga.sb|cs).roku(.admeasurement)*.com$Then, possibly overkill due to the above, I used OpnSense firewall rules to block all traffic from my Roku tv. I think I just got fed up with seeing Roku spam in my pihole, as the above regex seems to completely "break" Roku.
After that, I set up FLauncher (following the method #2 instructions on the gitlab page) on my shield. This makes it so I only see the Roku launcher for a few seconds while the shield starts up, and then I'm dropped straight into flauncher. I chose flauncher because it's very simple and barebones, so you might want to explore other options if you want more advanced features. I don't really need those features since I'm usually using an app anyway.
Note that I did all of that after the tv was configured and set up, YMMV if it's a brand new tv as it may need to call home to do the initial set up.
Depending on the model there's also a dev menu that disables some phoning home/connectivity shit
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Don’t connect your Roku to the internet.
I thought that Roku was some kind of streaming service to a device. Doesn't that need to be Internet-connected to function?
kagis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roku
Ah. Apparently that's what they originally did, but they've also subsequently come out with smart TVs, which I assume can operate without an Internet connection.
Roku started as a streaming media box. You paid them money, they gave you a box that could play Netflix and Youtube. It was a simple transaction. Unfortunately, at some point they decided to start selling/giving their OS to TV manufacturers. This was actually nice at the start. You got a smart TV who's "Smarts" were designed by competent people. A revolution at the time. But the drive to drop prices lower and lower meant that there was no margin on the TV, which means Roku had to investigate other ways of making their revenue, AKA Ads and selling data.
Of course, the stand alone box probably would have went that way anyways, but at least with selling a dedicated box, there is a clear financial benefit without the need to get invasive.
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They're working hard to make sure piracy provides the best experience.
This is already my experience but still use a Roku to access Plex. Looks like I'll need to get something else or figure out if i can block them with Ad Guard Home
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How did you disable the Roku OS?
I think it depends on the model, but there should be something in the power settings to change the startup device. I did a factory reset first to clear any network settings or user data, skipped the setup, and set it to startup on the HDMI input.
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True, but most people are buying off-the-shelf stuff and they don't have their own localized piracy-enabled libraries with a Jellyfin server.
Further, I'm pretty sure you've got to connect your Roku at least once to install player apps like Jellyfin. But maybe you don't, I'm not at all familiar with if you can sideload on a Roku.
There is actually a way to sideload apps without internet. I did it once and forgot the details
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Roku is bad, I have one older Roku ""smart"" tv that I just block from accessing the internet entirely, and use a shield with a custom launcher instead.
Is there any point in getting anything above the bottom tier Shield? Just trying to use it to replace my chromecast/stream tv and youtube
