[GTALUG] Can a smart TV be made dumb?

[Evan Leibovitch]

Hi all.,

I've been reading up about the ridiculously (to me) low prices for
high-quality TVs these days, and the economics of it all is quite
fascinating. It seems that the cost of manufacturing is being well offset
by the revenue from collecting information on a household's watching habits
and sending it back to the manufacturer, Google and who the heck knows who
else...

It would seem, on the surface, ridiculously simply to disable the
information gathering by refusing to connect the device to the Internet and
simply have it do nothing besides switch between tuner and HDMI port for
input. That way I can have better control of my TV's "smarts" with my own
choice of smarts -- Shield, Chromecast, Roku, RasPlex, Android TV, Linux
desktop or whatever. Sure some apps of those devices may also be reporting,
but it's not all-encompassing -- Netflix sends them my Netflix watching,
but not my OTA, YouTube. Kodi or other channel choices.

I haven't bought a TV in a decade so I don't know the current landscape.
What I have seen is that *everything* now is "smart" except for the
lowest-end which tend not to have the best picture.  Is it possible on
modern TVs to install without an Internet connection so they don't phone
home? Or does keeping the TV offline disable important functions? And are
some brands easier to "dumb down" than others?

Thanks!

-- 
Evan Leibovitch, Toronto Canada
@evanleibovitch or @el56
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