[HN Gopher] Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upc...
___________________________________________________________________
Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software
update
Author : stalfosknight
Score : 261 points
Date : 2025-10-28 19:02 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
| verdverm wrote:
| Hopefully DNS level ad blocking will help here, and even more
| hopefully consumers will reject smart appliances. I'd never buy
| one
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| I'll never ever buy a 'smart' appliance. I'll go caveman first.
| Keeping food cold and/or cooking it does not require the
| Internet.
| verdverm wrote:
| Or import one yourself
| thesuitonym wrote:
| They won't. Smart devices tend to be cheap because the
| manufacturer is double-dipping by selling telemetry and
| advertising.
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| Just wait till you have to watch N adds before the door will
| unlock. And good luck getting it open in a power/internet
| outage :lol:
| tracker1 wrote:
| We noticed you have Coca-Cola in your refrigerator...
| please enjoy this Pepsi ad and this QR code for 25% off
| your next purchase.
| denkmoon wrote:
| Millions of people sit through minutes of the worst ads
| I've ever seen to watch mr beast exploit homeless people.
| We're boned.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| How does anyone watch youtube these days? I wouldn't mind
| seeing an ad or even 2, but it feels like youtube is
| singling me out for special treatment. I'm not going to
| watch anything if i'm scared a 30 second ad will
| interrupt the video.
| Digit-Al wrote:
| Use Firefox or Zen browser with uBlock Origin. I never
| see ads on Youtube anymore.
| abnercoimbre wrote:
| Sprinkle some SponsorBlock on top and you're golden.
| robinsonb5 wrote:
| It might be coincidence, but I've noticed the ads get
| slightly less obnoxious if I religiously abandon the
| video and close the browser tab any time the ad is more
| than 10 seconds long and unskippable. I'm sure they're
| monitoring closely to see what people will and won't
| tolerate.
| teddyh wrote:
| Please drink a verification can.
|
| (<https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/2714117-mountain-dew-
| twitch-...>)
| OptionOfT wrote:
| It's probably work like IMDb does on your phone. All ads are
| piped through the same domain as useful data.
| philips wrote:
| Why is this the best business model we can collectively execute
| on? Whether it is AI, home cameras, or fridges it seems to just
| come back to, welp, lets slap an ad on it.
| Retric wrote:
| Internal incentives not overall profitability drive such
| behavior.
|
| An executive can point to a profit stream and suggest that's
| beneficial to the company while ignoring externalities that
| cost the company 5x as much. Nobody inside has complete
| knowledge if someone was a good idea or not so the appearance
| of benefit often replaces the search for actual benefit.
| 6DM wrote:
| I think it's mostly about squeezing consumers for more money,
| even after they already paid a premium, because they simply can
| and nobody will do anything about it.
| nkrisc wrote:
| Because simply selling a refrigerator isn't good enough
| anymore. How else do you fuel infinite economic growth?
|
| If it was legal to kill for money they would do that too. In
| some ways that already occurs.
| GrinningFool wrote:
| It's an inexpensive revenue stream; the secondary effects and
| risk to customers are considered relevant insofar as they can
| negatively impact the company's future profitability (if then).
|
| There's no way that this was ever /not/ going to happen under
| current laws (US).
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| Because it's a dual revenue stream. The retail customer pays
| you, and then the advertising customer pays you. Why make only
| $1 when you can make $2, $3, $4 over time?
|
| If your next question is "why do they need to keep making more
| money?", the answer is capitalism.
| keybored wrote:
| When you get downvoted for making the obvious statement that
| you have to maximize profits as a capitalist entity, well,
| you know you're in a venture capital forum.
| Lammy wrote:
| The System rewards the business model that also covertly
| enables the most surveillance.
| mholm wrote:
| Customers are generally low-information shoppers. They go to a
| hardware store and ask the salesperson for a fridge that fits
| their requirements. The rep will show them a few options, and
| then the customer gets to try them out. This is where the
| animal brain takes over: Samsung designs for the animal brain.
| It's sleek. It's futuristic. There's so many doors. It has a
| beverage drawer. A condiment drawer. You can customize the
| panels. The animal knows the Samsung fridge is better, and
| customers likely won't know any better if the salesperson
| doesn't tell them (and would they? They make a better
| commission on the more expensive fridge)
| xnx wrote:
| > Why is this the best business model we can collectively
| execute on?
|
| Attention is the ultimate resource.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| Unlike conventional businesses where a good or "binary" service
| (it works or not) is sold, advertising is a much more nebulous
| good whose efficiency can't be accurately measured. This means
| there are tons of inefficiencies where middlemen can skim
| something off the top:
|
| * a product manager decides to include ads in some digital
| product. Their analytics show plenty of "engagement". The
| engagement is actually people accidentally clicking on the ad
| while hunting for the tiny "close" button, but even if the PM
| suspects it, they have no reason to volunteer that information.
| They keep getting their salary paid and even earn a promotion
| based on the engagement numbers.
|
| * the developers are tasked with implementing the advertising
| infrastructure - they get paid while padding their resume about
| how they're building "scalable" systems.
|
| * the "scalable" system runs on a cloud provider and earns them
| a ton of money. Cloud provider is happy.
|
| * some marketing agency is given a budget to go and spend on
| ads. The person there maybe even knows that advertising in the
| aforementioned product is a bad idea because most of their
| clicks are fake... but if their client is tasking them with
| burning money, why would they refuse?
|
| * a marketing person at a big company that doesn't actually
| need any more advertising to succeed is given a budget and
| spreads it across a few marketing agencies including the
| aforementioned one. They get paid, why should they refuse?
|
| At every layer (and I haven't even listed them all), people get
| paid by skimming something off the top. It doesn't matter
| whether the advertising works, because nobody in the chain has
| any incentive to admit it while the status quo is so lucrative,
| so the rational thing to do for everyone is to not rock the
| boat.
| notatoad wrote:
| because it's essentially free money with no consequences.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| The line _must_ go up.
|
| By a percentage every year.
|
| Compounding.
|
| This was always an obvious outcome.
|
| What the outcome actually happening is indicative of however is
| that consumers are very very very bad at their job (consuming
| the best products) and do not have enough rights.
|
| If a customer was _entitled_ to a working product without this
| kind of deficiency, and we had courts that actually applied
| punishments to large corporations (instead of unilaterally and
| without justification, significantly reducing fines to nothing)
| we wouldn 't have this problem. It wouldn't be possible to
| profit off of this kind of advertising because you would be too
| busy signing court documents about how you suck at building
| stuff.
|
| There's only so many human beings who can buy your fridge.
| There's only so cheap you can build your fridge. There's only
| so much you can charge for your fridge. But line must go up.
|
| This is simply what it looks like when the people with money
| and resources decide that a stable and reliable profit is a
| Failed business.
| keybored wrote:
| Why do you address us as if we collectively went down to the
| town center and three dozen times in a row and decided on the
| same thing by consensus? For most of us this was shoved down
| our throats by sheer force of violence. And why always this _oh
| shucks_ apologia about the "business model" that they are
| supposedly forced to adapt? No, this fridge already costs a lot
| of money. The ads don't have to be recouping losses. They could
| just be for more profit.
| bmau5 wrote:
| I'd understand if the ads were subsidizing the purchase price
| significantly, but this still seems to be in line with their
| highest pricing.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| > _Samsung also said that its fridges will only show
| contextualized ads, instead of personalized ads, which rely on
| collecting data on users._
|
| What is a contextualized ad?
| Fwirt wrote:
| Probably ads for things that you would think of buying when
| you're standing near the fridge in the kitchen. So not Clash of
| Clans but La Croix.
| mrweasel wrote:
| Well, they probably won't be able to sell enough ad space to
| supermarkets, so people will get ads for "World of Tanks" and
| sports betting.
| immibis wrote:
| Personalized ads are based on your user profile (ads for
| motorbikes because you're tagged as someone who loves
| motorbikes). Contextualized ads are based on where and when
| they're being displayed (ads for food delivery on the fridge
| late at night) but not on your user profile. This is the
| advertising industry, so they're probably lying, or they're not
| lying yet but they plan to add personalized ads later.
| jandrese wrote:
| Ads for things it overheard you talking about recently.
| r0ckarong wrote:
| Don't some of these have "smart" features to detect what is
| actually in your fridge and tell you if you run out? I would
| think removing the last piece of butter could trigger an ad for
| whatever cow-milk-fat substitute won the highest bid on the
| brainfuck raffle that day would be shown to you.
| abdullahkhalids wrote:
| Such a smart feature would most likely include reading
| labels, which means that the system would also know some of
| the medicines you consume. The fridge would most likely also
| record the user's interactions with the fridge, so the system
| will also know what your prescription amounts are. The
| possibilities of abuse are endless.
|
| Another one: "you have consumed 20 units of alcohol this
| week, and run out. Should I order this 25 pack that is
| cheaper?"
| Supermancho wrote:
| Contextual means based on related taxonomy of interest. How
| that interest is measured and what "related" means is
| proprietary.
|
| This is distinct from demographic (trends based on physical
| attributes, like age) or geographic or behavioral (your buying
| patterns) and they already know the device targeting because
| it's their fridge.
|
| Classic digital advertising vectors.
| atourgates wrote:
| "I noticed you had Yoplait brand yogurt in your fridge.
| Here's a coupon for $0.75 off your first six-pack of
| Chobani!"
| liendolucas wrote:
| You do not buy a smart appliance. Period. A fridge, oven,
| toaster, washing machine, bed do not need to be smart.
|
| Smart is the consumer that is able to spot all this BS ideas that
| are putting in front of us and avoids it as much as it can.
| MattPalmer1086 wrote:
| I don't buy smart devices, unless they work fine without the
| smart stuff and it's a good buy. I have a "smart" TV because
| it's a great TV, but it only has HDMI cables plugged into it
| and no internet connection.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| I bought a vented Samsung washer/dryer combo recently. I have
| to say I like it a lot, probably because its a combo and I no
| longer have to transfer clothes from washer to dryer. The fact
| that is Samsung definitely makes me feel nervous however (how
| long will it last?). Unfortunately, they were the only one to
| make a vented combo so far (I should have waited for more
| options, but I'm still OK with it).
|
| We have a frame TV also and it worked nice for the very narrow
| use case we had.
| drdaeman wrote:
| Disagree. Smart can be good, if you're actually in full control
| (whenever you contract the implementation to a company or own
| it).
|
| The real problem is, there's not much on the market that
| respects the consumers in this regard. Ask for an SLA on a
| smart fridge functionality and you'll be met with a confusion
| and possibly a revelation there's nothing of a kind.
|
| It's all ignored because most consumers don't ask questions
| about reliability, functionality, security and control - they
| don't think of those. And it's not a matter of technical or
| specialized knowledge, I'm sure even a caveman can understand
| "will this work tomorrow the exact same way it works today?" or
| "what happens to my fridge if you go out of business?" - it's a
| matter of awareness. People simply don't know yet how those new
| things can fail them.
|
| Eventually people will learn about the issues, and start asking
| maker companies those questions. But it's all too new today.
| perihelions wrote:
| > _" Didn't you have ads in the 20th century?"_
|
| > _" Well, sure, but not in our dreams. Only on TV and radio, and
| in magazines, and movies, and at ball games, and on buses, and
| milk cartons, and T-shirts, and bananas, and written on the
| sky... But not in dreams."_
| BolexNOLA wrote:
| Futurama right? When fry buys that underwear?
| messe wrote:
| More than technically correct--the best kind of correct--you
| are plain correct.
|
| (I've used em-dashes since before LLMs and I'm not fucking
| stopping now)
|
| EDIT: s,',,
| BolexNOLA wrote:
| I feel you on the em dashes lol
| messe wrote:
| My proudest typographical accomplishment is that use of
| em-dashes once got me a tinder date.
|
| ...it didn't go anywhere after that date. But I still
| have the anecdote.
| alentred wrote:
| Ah, lightspeed briefs fit everywhere, on the beach and on your
| the fridge.
| kristjansson wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strawberry_Mansion_(film)
| djoldman wrote:
| > Samsung fridge owners can also opt to avoid the latest software
| update altogether. However, they would miss out on other features
| included in the software update, such as a UI refresh and the
| ability for the internal camera inside some fridges to identify
| more fruits and vegetables inside the fridge.
|
| The level of absurdity here with respect to "miss[ing] out on
| other features" strains credulity.
| jandrese wrote:
| Well, I wouldn't say I was missing them.
|
| I don't know why I would connect a fridge to the Internet at
| all. Maybe there is a use case where you can get a picture of
| the contents of your fridge on your phone when you are out and
| about? Like you're at the grocery store and can't remember if
| you need to pick up milk or not?
| JonChesterfield wrote:
| I could come around to a fridge that keeps track of the
| contents, including use by dates, prompts me to throw away
| things that are going bad and adds replacements to a periodic
| supermarket order.
| grebc wrote:
| Buy the milk anyway, worst case so you've got 1L extra.
| kstrauser wrote:
| This guarantees I'll never buy a Samsung appliance. If they're
| this willing to screw with their customers today, they'll do it
| again tomorrow.
|
| Sadly, I'm including their TVs in this. I have one today,
| displaying the output of an Apple TV and not directly connected
| to the Internet because hah, no way, but I'll be shopping around
| when it comes time to replace it.
|
| Pity. They make nice stuff. Not nice enough that I'm willing to
| tolerate their anti-customer shenanigans, but otherwise decent
| quality.
| noir_lord wrote:
| Same they are off my list as well though I generally have less
| than zero interest in smart devices, I also have a Samsung
| "smart" TV as well, it asked for Wifi first time I turned it
| on, said "nope" connected a HDMI to a Fedora box and just use
| that.
|
| _I control what devices in my house connect to the internet_.
| bobson381 wrote:
| Linux box to Samsung TV here as well. It's awesome, best of
| both worlds. Stable Debian with Plasma DE in my case.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| It's really too bad that Plasma's big picture mode is very
| WIP these days; once it's stabilized it should be a good
| option for this kind of thing
| noir_lord wrote:
| I just run it as a desktop and boost scaling.
|
| No one in my family has an issue with it, use a years and
| years old integrated wireless mouse/touchpad and happy
| days, everything works as you'd expect, you can use it as
| a regular PC (surprisingly handy sometimes) and I can
| adblock the crap out of everything/use unhook to
| decrappify YT.
|
| I happened to have an "old" Thinkpad (T470P, 7700HQ w/
| 32GB RAM and the nvidia GPU) I wasn't using so it's left
| on all the time, runs the TV and serves movies over HTTP
| for family to watch via VLC (VLC will happily "stream"
| over HTTP)
|
| One of those easy to do things where I'll never go back
| :).
| snackbroken wrote:
| With KDE Connect you can use your phone as a
| touchpad+keyboard. One less thing to get lost in the
| couch cushions ;)
| Fwirt wrote:
| I never thought I would connect my Hisense to the internet,
| but it turns out that it runs an MQTT broker and responds to
| WoL packets, so control via Home Assistant was really easy to
| setup and is much better than the IR blaster I was using
| before as response is almost instant and I can get power
| state so I can sync it to the rest of my living room. Most
| smart TVs seem to do well behind a DNS black hole, and if
| you're knowledgeable enough for that then self-hosting a
| dnsmasq instance on an old box you have lying around and
| pointing the TV at it is a snap.
| Larrikin wrote:
| Most modern TVs are fully controllable via their HDMI
| inputs. My shield and gaming systems are perfectly capable
| of turning my unconnected to the Internet TV on and off.
|
| The shield also has a HA integration.
|
| There's no need to risk an update that puts ads on the TV.
| noir_lord wrote:
| Yep, HDMI-CEC is pretty common these days, Samsung call
| it Anynet+ for..reasons I guess.
| Fwirt wrote:
| Yes, but good luck finding a way to integrate CEC with
| Home Assistant, or anything else for that matter. Even
| modern GPUs don't support it. You usually have to buy a
| USB dongle that MITMs the connection for a disgusting
| amount of money. It looks like Raspberry Pis support it,
| but then you have an SBC and its power source dangling
| off of your TV just to run a single lightweight daemon
| that may not even fit your use case. CEC is not designed
| for total control, and on many TVs it's even a bit flaky.
| I had to disable it on mine because misbehaving devices
| would randomly turn the TV off and on when I didn't want
| it.
| netsharc wrote:
| I'm going to sell this idea to Samsung and earn me some Wons:
|
| > When showing that the user has switched to HDMI input, show
| the full screen information: "HDMI1, brought to you by _____
| [insert advertiser here]. Best experienced with Monster HDMI
| cables. Gold plated for the digital clarity."
| teddyh wrote:
| Do not create the Torment Nexus.
|
| (<https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/torment-nexus>)
| monkpit wrote:
| > I control what devices in my house connect to the internet.
|
| That's certainly admirable, but haven't tv manufacturers
| beeen caught connecting to ANY WiFi they find, if it's open?
| Amongst other various dark patterns?
|
| Your statement here kind of characterizes it as user error,
| but the manufacturers are absolutely hostile actors here.
| JoshTriplett wrote:
| > That's certainly admirable, but haven't tv manufacturers
| beeen caught connecting to ANY WiFi they find, if it's
| open?
|
| Not yet. Wouldn't be surprising, but most of the time the
| problem is "person holding the remote wants it to work,
| connects it to wifi when it offers, doesn't know that they
| shouldn't".
| Nextgrid wrote:
| This nonsense keeps getting repeated over and over again
| for years now and I have yet to find a single documented
| case of it happening. You'd think that with all the
| attention, someone would've actually documented it by now.
|
| Enough people connect their TV/smart devices willingly to
| the internet that there is no need for adversarial
| approaches like this (which are not trivial to set up -
| they'd need to maintain per-country partnerships with Wi-Fi
| hotspot providers, pay them and hope the ROI is worth it).
| monkpit wrote:
| Hmm I thought I had read it on an article posted here at
| some point, I could be wrong.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| I think it originated on Reddit and it's since been
| parroted here in the comments on basically every smart TV
| thread but I have yet to see actual evidence. It seems
| like a trivial theory to test - disconnect from your wifi
| or change its password, wait for ads to suddenly reappear
| on the TV (evidence it got a network connection from
| _somewhere_ ).
|
| Similar FUD is being spread around HDMI's Ethernet
| channel; a way to carry network data over an HDMI cable.
| I have basically never seen it in the wild on any
| consumer device, but even if it were, it would still
| require the other device to cooperate and act as a
| switch/router to share its connection to the TV. Yet
| despite that every time smart TVs and privacy comes up
| someone mentions this.
| Fwirt wrote:
| Samsung appliances have among the worst reputations for ease of
| repair and lifespan. Sadly most other brands are rebrands of
| Chinese conglomerates or not much better on the quality chain.
| But honestly it's also a lottery. We bought a fridge on sale
| for $500 as an emergency stopover when our expensive fridge was
| delayed by a month during a move, and it's still plugging along
| out in the garage, a hostile environment for fridges. All the
| parts are very accessible too which bodes well for repair,
| although the leveling feet did snap off.
|
| However, when you see the viral videos of "dream fridges" from
| the 1950s, it's important to remember that adjusted for
| inflation they would be something like $10k today. Of course
| they also last 10x as long, but you can still find fridges in
| that price range today with a similar value proposition. The
| question is whether or not you're willing to pay that upfront.
| I think we've all been so conditioned to accept that appliances
| go obsolete that it doesn't seem possible for a fridge like
| that to ever pay for itself.
|
| It's the boots theory at work.
| comboy wrote:
| Boots theory yes, but there also seem to be a paradox of
| reliability of cheap things.
|
| Manufacturers which are aiming at being dirt cheap and
| selling lots of products, have low margins and simply cannot
| afford too many replacements / warranty repairs. High margin
| products don't care, they could make you three in that price
| and still be ok.
| tempest_ wrote:
| The issue is that the 10k fridge is not actually any better.
|
| The "luxury" appliances can be double that and are still
| shit.
| pixl97 wrote:
| Depends if it's luxury or commercial. Commercial products
| are generally able to be fixed, but there is a quite a
| price premium on them.
| xethos wrote:
| Commercial and consumer dishwashers are only the same in
| that they're both called "dishwashers" and use water. The
| former expect little to no food, have cycles measured in
| minutes, and run at temperatures that would eat more
| sensitive dishes alive.
| bleomycin wrote:
| Not quite accurate as a blanket statement. Munro did a very
| detailed tear down series of a sub zero refrigerator that's
| very interesting. Youtube link:
| https://youtu.be/KAYj6m9QtDU
|
| I wish more content like this existed. It's the only type
| of review that is worth paying attention to.
|
| Long story short if you live in an energy market like
| california the energy savings of the sub zero will likely
| offsets its additions cost over the lifetime of the unit.
| thih9 wrote:
| > you can still find fridges in that price range today with a
| similar value proposition
|
| Does anyone have examples of consumer fridges like this?
| stock_toaster wrote:
| sub-zero or thermadore maybe?
| Retric wrote:
| Parents have a sub-zero that's over 20 years old and in
| good condition, no idea if the new stuff is as well
| built.
|
| Miele still has a good reputation, and you'll pay for it.
| https://www.mieleusa.com/category/1022129/refrigerators-
| and-...
| donmcronald wrote:
| I wonder if those expensive fridges are any more serviceable.
| I'm guessing someone with $10k to spend on a fridge doesn't
| care how easy it is to fix because they'll never do it.
| jdeibele wrote:
| I'm not sure about that. The issue that I'm having is that
| if I could spend $10,000 and not have fridge issues for 10,
| 15, 20 years I might be tempted.
|
| The problem is that there might be problems with the
| equipment or problems caused by the installer.
|
| A few years ago, we ended up replacing a Sub-Zero fridge
| (27 years old) with another one because the repair bills
| were mounting. Because of the way the previous owner did
| the kitchen, using any other kind of fridge other than the
| 2' deep, 7' high kind would have involved remodeling. It
| wasn't quite $10k but it was close.
|
| At our new house, we had a repairman fix the ice maker in
| our current fridge. It's 17 years old and could have come
| off the floor at Best Buy or Home Depot (NOT a Sub-Zero, in
| other words) but he recommended keeping it until it failed
| because the quality of current appliances is not as good.
|
| Our water heater is going to need to be replaced because
| it's 17 years old and showing signs that it's getting too
| old. I want a heat pump water heater because the gas water
| heater is the only gas-powered appliance we have. Trying to
| assess reviews of heat pump water heaters and of the local
| plumbing companies is not fun.
| analog31 wrote:
| Maybe we need a new boots theory:
|
| The rich person buys a $3500 pair of boots that comes with
| surveillance, useless AI, and bricks itself on the next
| firmware update.
|
| The poor person buys a pair of boots, that are... boots.
| lexszero_ wrote:
| "You are so poor that when AWS goes down, you still can get
| into your house" -- seen somewhere
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| I've bought GE recently with good luck (GSS25IYNFSS,
| specifically). No affiliation, just someone who buys a lot of
| appliances that need to last and be simple for longevity
| (housing provider). My kingdom for someone who could build the
| old, reliable tanks of yesteryear.
|
| https://ncph.org/history-at-work/rethinking-the-refrigerator...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refrigerator
| grepfru_it wrote:
| Crap crap and more crap. The quality control on GE fridges is
| absolutely the worst of all worst. It's possible because you
| are working with the economy of scale that you don't see the
| typical problems that individuals run into. But I went
| through 5 in a row and every single one had a problem.
| Switched to LG and never looked back
| vel0city wrote:
| LG with their faulty Linear Compressors and craft ice
| makers that are doomed to fail? The one with the big
| lawsuit for their faulty fridges?
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y54QbkCtFE4
|
| I have an LG fridge. I like it. I think the linear
| compressor tech is cool, even if their implementation is
| potentially flawed. I don't expect this thing to last a
| decade.
| dingaling wrote:
| GE's appliances business was sold to Haier of China in 2016
| SilverElfin wrote:
| Their TVs still don't support all the HDR formats right?
| kstrauser wrote:
| That's correct. I can't use it at all with my Apple TV or
| Playstation 5, because the screen immediately goes dark. I
| don't know how to describe this exactly, but say that the
| TV's regular RGB display goes from 1 to 100. I'd expect that
| HDR would make it go from -50 to 150, or something like that.
| Instead, on my Samsung, it goes from -50 to 50. No amount of
| control fiddling can make it get as bright as it does in non-
| HDR mode.
|
| Our cheaper LG works beautifully with the same inputs. The
| Samsung? Nope. Everything looks like the finale of Game of
| Thrones, even when you're looking at a soccer game played on
| a sunny day at noon on the equator.
| fwip wrote:
| Yeah - they support HDR10 (the most common HDR), HDR10+ (adds
| per-scene tone-mapping, but is rare to see media for), but
| not Dolby Vision (which requires paying a license fee to the
| Dolby folks).
|
| I've heard that Netflix has added HDR10+ streams recently,
| but I haven't verified that myself.
| leblancfg wrote:
| My Samsung computer monitor is also the stuff of nightmares.
| Same story: useless "smart" UI features. I'm told I can use it
| as a dozen different things. But it sucks as a computer
| monitor.
|
| Not cheap either!
| LogicHound wrote:
| I got their monitors from the "before" they bunged smart into
| everything. 2 x 4K from 2016/2017. These things refuse to die
| and the picture is still good.
|
| Unfortunately all of my relatives love their phones.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| I had a Samsung phone a few years ago. It had the usual un-
| removable crap that Android phones have, but it wasn't bad
| otherwise.
| kstrauser wrote:
| That makes me sad. Many, many years ago I had a 17" Samsung
| CRT. It broke within the warranty period. I called their
| support and explained the problem. They asked for my receipt.
| I didn't have one, but I told them that the sticker on the
| back said it had only been manufactured 9 months ago, so it
| _had_ to still be under warranty. Their support person
| agreed. They checked their inventory and found that they were
| out of stock on that model, and asked if I 'd be OK with them
| upgrading me to a 19" CRT. Sure!
|
| I was fiercely loyal to them for a lot of years after that
| experience.
| pfych wrote:
| My Samsung 4k 240hz OLED monitor has an absolutely gorgeous
| panel but if I knew I'd need to connect it to the internet
| and run a PYTHON script to disable some of its "features"[1]
| I probably would have gotten a similar LG display instead.
|
| [^1]: https://pfy.ch/programming/disable-samsung-game-
| bar.html
| thewebguyd wrote:
| > I have one today, displaying the output of an Apple TV and
| not directly connected to the Internet
|
| That's how I do it as well, and I hate that dumb TVs are
| getting increasingly more rare.
|
| I know the day is coming where any new "Smart" TV will mandate
| you connect it to the internet to go through some initial setup
| process or require regular phone homes to function, and I'm not
| looking forward to it.
|
| I don't want my TV to do anything except display whatever I
| have connected to it. It's job stops there.
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| At least with Vizio I kinda expected it. I can't imagine paying
| $3500 only to have it have the "benefit" of ads added after the
| fact.
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| The problem is that we are running out of alternatives. How
| long until there are no refrigerators, TVs, cars, whatever that
| will not work without some amount of baked in advertising?
| embedding-shape wrote:
| I dunno, my family started buying LG stuff for our appliances
| and otherwise, and none of the stuff has forceful ads on
| them, at least yet. Currently I think we have LG TVs, fridge,
| dish washer, drier, washing machine and something else I
| can't remember, all of them working well, has nice and fast
| at-home support when needed and no ads even on the TVs.
| thrill wrote:
| Same, regarding LG slowly occupying all the home appliances
| spaces. As long as they behave like a good guest in my home
| I'll keep buying their stuff.
| justinclift wrote:
| > Currently I think we have LG TVs > no ads even on the
| TVs.
|
| Um, have you needed to change anything for your LG TVs to
| not display ads?
|
| Asking because modern LG TVs seem to display ads too. :(
|
| Saying that because I was recently looking for a TV, and
| considered LG, but many people seem to be having regrets
| now due to ads being shown.
| kelnos wrote:
| [delayed]
| bluGill wrote:
| Depends on what consumers stand for. If enough complain. If
| enough get bad reviews. If enough get returned. If enough buy
| something else is the big one. If there are other uses where
| they can't (some TVs are used a safety message boards in
| factories - if the ads ever show in this context and someone
| is hurt there will be a lawsuit - so there will be some
| demand at any price for something without ads)
| pixl97 wrote:
| Buy commercial units rather than consumer ones.
| keybored wrote:
| > The problem is that we are running out of alternatives.
|
| But why is that? HN told me that ads were just reserved for
| people who refused to "pay for the product". By inference we
| must conclude that for-pay products shall not have ads on
| sheer principle. Where's that smug scolding at now?
| FuriouslyAdrift wrote:
| My house came with all Samsung appliances and I can't wait for
| all fo them to die. The dryer already went (8 years old).
|
| I've been replacing with mid-range LG on advice of the local
| repair company and been happy so far. Quirky and very few
| features but seems well built.
|
| Can't wait to replace the massive refrigerator and swap the gas
| range for inductive. Fridge is slowly going (cracked and
| leaking ice maker, condensation problem with deli drawer).
|
| I now know how my mom could justify the ridiculous expense of a
| Subzero refrigerator (around $6k back in 2000). That thing has
| only needed a couple of tune ups and no parts replacements in
| 20 years.
| Beijinger wrote:
| 8 years is pretty good. I personally like Bosch. Is a fridge
| with an icemaker not always problematic? How about biofilm?
|
| What is the advantage of an inductive stove? Will they even
| work in the US? I think in Europe they work with 360 V if I
| remember right.
|
| I realized two things:
|
| 1. You can cook nearly everything with a ricecooker. Just
| throw everything inside. Yes, even the minced meat on top.
|
| 2. An airfrier is better and faster than a shitty oven.
| southwindcg wrote:
| Only eight years for a dryer is definitely not pretty good
| in my mind. It's barely acceptable unless you have a huge
| family and are doing laundry daily. I had a low-end Capri
| (Sears house brand) that was 21 years old and still going
| strong when I moved away. It was serviced once, by me, to
| replace a fuse. If I'd paid twice as much and gotten only
| eight years out of one, I'd be furious.
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| Yeah-- I was thinking that 8 years isn't even broken-in.
| My old Sears dryer was 27 when I had to replace a pulley
| and a thermal fuse. It ran just like it was new after
| that. I left it with that house but, hopefully, it's
| still running today.
| darkwater wrote:
| > What is the advantage of an inductive stove?
|
| That you can control temperature changes better than with a
| ceramic hob, on par with methane stoves.
|
| > I think in Europe they work with 360 V
|
| No, normal 230V (or 220V)
| smallstepforman wrote:
| 3 phase is 380V
| margalabargala wrote:
| Three phase consumer induction stoves are approximately
| 0% of the consumer induction stove market.
| stephen_g wrote:
| It's 400V in most of the world actually, but residential
| induction stoves are basically always single phase as far
| as I have ever seen.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| My parents fridge started it's life in the mid 1990's, and
| their freezer is probably a decade older, at this stage
| nobody knows. I don't think they were expensive models.
| mbajkowski wrote:
| I can relate. Same for my parents. Washer and dryer still
| going strong after 30 years, same for the fridge which has
| been relegated to the basement since the paint has begun to
| chip. Microwave still works. And out of the three AC units
| they have, only one needed service. Maybe they are just
| exceptionally lucky compared to me. And these were not very
| expensive appliances for that time. I used to offer washers
| and dryers in rental properties for convenience, but their
| reliability has become so bad lately that it is not worth
| it.
| wiredfool wrote:
| My parents are moving out of their house of ~50 years.
|
| The garage fridge was in the house (as the kitchen one)
| when they moved in. The chest freezer in the basement moved
| with them in '77.
|
| They have had at least three kitchen fridges in the time
| since the fridge got moved to the garage. I've lost track
| of the number of dishwashers. The current one was out of
| service for a few months, partially due to wifi/firmware
| issues. The super expensive oven clock doesn't work
| anymore, since it broke after the last time it was fixed
| for an $800 callout.
| oh-4-fucks-sake wrote:
| Speed Queen for washing machines. Bosch for dishwashers.
| zaptheimpaler wrote:
| I got a new Samsung TV recently, i don't get the huge hatred
| for their software. It has some free TV channels, it has apps
| for the streaming services, even a decent web browser and
| overall good features. It supports Airplay, Google Cast,
| bluetooth etc. The OS has some annoyances and rough edges, but
| its mostly fine. I let it connect to the internet but not any
| of my other LAN devices so it cant' snoop too much.
|
| I just don't see the problem, and don't see how connecting a
| different box to watch the same things is much better than just
| using the OS to do that. If they did have ads on it that would
| definitely be a problem though.
| spicybright wrote:
| Well, they could easily push a software update to add ads to
| your TV without a rollback option and disable features if you
| don't allow it.
|
| If you upgrade your TV on the regular I guess you'd just buy
| a new one, but treating it as a dumb display guarantees you
| can keep using it as long as it physically works.
| somedude895 wrote:
| I had a Samsung TV ten years ago. While watching Game of
| Thrones with friends, it overlayed an ad at the top of the
| screen recommending I play Fruit Ninja on my TV. I
| immediately disconnected it from my WiFi and have not bought
| a single other Samsung device since, except for one
| thumbdrive that I needed. Avoiding Samsung as a brand when
| buying electronics has been really easy as well.
| JoshTriplett wrote:
| > and don't see how connecting a different box to watch the
| same things is much better than just using the OS to do that.
|
| Because then you can replace a $50-100 box when it starts
| misbehaving (e.g. tracking and selling your information) or
| not getting upgrades anymore or getting slower, rather than
| replacing a $1000 TV.
| hamburglar wrote:
| Well my Samsung tv I bought two years ago has gotten
| progressively slower and slower despite never installing any
| new stuff on it and only using the basic functionality, so
| that is pretty infuriating. Every couple of weeks I have to
| unplug it (because naturally a soft power off isn't really
| doing anything) and it'll be fast again for a while. When
| it's slow it can easily take 10 seconds to bring up the menu.
| kstrauser wrote:
| I've used the built-in apps at a friend's house, and they
| were _awful_ compared to the Apple TV versions. Everything
| was sluggish, like it was running on something without enough
| RAM and swapping out to an SD card. If I hadn 't used
| anything else but that, or maybe the Dish Network DVR we had
| years ago, I'd probably think it's just fine. However, I
| _have_ used something else, and it made the TV 's own apps
| feel unbearable.
|
| Imagine you're using a brand new maxed-out MacBook Pro, and
| someone hands you a 2013 HP laptop. The HP is... fine. It
| displays web pages, lets you load a word processor, and
| otherwise looks and acts like a laptop. If you hadn't ever
| used another computer, you probably wouldn't think anything
| of it.
|
| BTW, I bet a Fire TV or various other options would be fine,
| too. I just don't have the personal experience to vouch for
| those. I'm not using this anecdote to shill Apple TV
| specifically, just to say that there are much better options
| than the built-in apps.
| electric_mayhem wrote:
| Agreed. Showing ads on TVs is beyond the pale.
|
| (Sorry, I just had to. In fact, thoug, I would be furious if my
| tv injected ads onto my source material)
| nappy-doo wrote:
| I beg to differ that Samsung makes good stuff. We had a Samsung
| front-loading washer. The drum and the crank that holds the
| drum were made of two different materials, and in the presence
| of the water and detergent, a galvanic reaction occurred,
| dissolving the drum arm. Replacing the arm was $400 in parts
| and over 8 hours in repair time. (There's lots of YT videos of
| this exact repair.)
|
| What kind of monkey designs something like that. It's
| obsolescence by design.
|
| I will never buy another Samsung product.
| stephen_g wrote:
| I'm glad to have avoided it - when I moved from sharing with
| room-mates into my own place and had to buy new appliances,
| there had just been a spate of Samsung appliances literally
| randomly catching fire in the news. Those models have all
| been recalled but it put me right off.
|
| Otherwise I might have considered them but steered well
| clear, and am very happy with the decision a decade later.
| Went Bosch for the washer and Electrolux for the fridge, had
| zero issues.
| javier2 wrote:
| hah, I also keep the samsung tv cut off from internet. It was
| bad enough they come pre installed with clearly sponsored apps
| (because they were absolute trash).
| nomel wrote:
| I was out when they decided to change their authentication,
| with only two weeks notice, and (from what I read) incorrect
| documentation, causing it all to not work with HomeAssistant
| for a month [1].
|
| [1] https://github.com/home-
| assistant/core/issues/133623#issueco...
| lexszero_ wrote:
| For a short while, I worked at one of Samsung subsidiaries on
| their TV firmware, mostly fixing Linux kernel bugs introduced
| by the product teams cannibalizing upstream features to serve
| their needs (including intentionally disabling reasonable
| kernel security measures that happened to be in their way).
| I've seen things, both technical and organizational, that led
| me to pledge never to give my money to that company, or have
| their devices connected to networks I care about. I don't trust
| any of it, if not due to evil intent, but just incompetence.
| FloorEgg wrote:
| I bought a Samsung phone back in like 2014, and shortly after
| bought smartwatch to pair with it. A year later, Samsung
| released an update that removed the pairing functionality so my
| smartwatch could no longer pair. They did this in conjunction
| with releasing their own smartwatch and some proprietary
| pairing protocol.
|
| I'm not a fan of vendor lock in, but their decision to
| retroactively remove functionality that I was depending on led
| me to never buy another Samsung product since.
| kelnos wrote:
| > _They make nice stuff._
|
| Do they? I've never owned a Samsung phone, in large part
| because I was always turned off by reports that they liked to
| skin Android in annoying/lame ways. I have a Samsung
| fridge/freezer (old and not-smart), but the in-door ice maker
| has a design flaw that causes condensation to drip, freeze, and
| clog it, so we've given up on it and just make our own ice with
| regular old-school trays in the freezer.
|
| I'm not going to say they make crap, but their stuff is...
| okay, I guess.
| christkv wrote:
| I got smart appliances not a single one is connected to the
| internet and never will.
| baggachipz wrote:
| Way to punish your customers for paying you more.
|
| I know it's a trope, but this is the absolute textbook definition
| of enshittification.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| I've seen enough of these stories to know that I will never buy
| any Samsung product. They are a repeat offender.
| noir_lord wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3pYZwol6Dc
|
| Silicon Valley parodied smart fridges nearly a decade ago.
| dsign wrote:
| Samsung does make really great ad-free computer displays...
| that's as much as I'm willing to buy from them.
| elAhmo wrote:
| It is kinda ridiculous to see this written "add-free computer
| display".
| fourseventy wrote:
| I would rather go without household refrigeration than have the
| refrigerator that I own play ads in my house.
| linsomniac wrote:
| I'd rather put foil tape over the display than go without
| refrigeration.
| aziaziazi wrote:
| Does the door unlock if if the in-display camera can't
| recognize your face though?
| fwip wrote:
| I didn't think that these fridges locked the door. Is that
| a "child proofing" feature you can enable or something?
| rcarmo wrote:
| I've managed to mostly excise Samsung from my digital life
| (except for phones that family buys without my knowledge and that
| I have to troubleshoot), and I have been happier for it for many
| decades now.
|
| (This was after direct exposure to their Tizen engineering team
| back in the early 2000s)
|
| I stayed away from their phones, SmartTVs, everything.
| cma wrote:
| They were caught uploading screenshots from content played on
| smart TVs. Ostensibly to sell ad tracking info like a Nielsen
| TV, but I'm pretty sure it meant they were capturing people's
| desktops with confidential corporate info etc. if you used the
| TV as a monitor.
|
| https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/samsung-smart-tvs...
| nomel wrote:
| This isn't just Samsung! Nearly all of them use ACR [1].
|
| [1] https://www.consumerreports.org/electronics/privacy/how-
| to-t...
| hn_acc1 wrote:
| What phones do you recommend? I have an S21 FE I got free from
| Metro PCS (I got laid off, had to return company S20 phone).
| Others in the family have Pixel / moto. I get the feeling the
| later galaxy phones are much worse than the S21?
| redundantly wrote:
| > except for phones that family buys without my knowledge and
| that I have to troubleshoot
|
| It's okay to say no. After decades of being the computer tech
| in my family, I started saying no and have been a lot happier
| for it.
| steve_avery wrote:
| Why would I ever connect my fridge to the internet? I cannot
| fathom any feature on a fridge that would incline me towards
| giving it the wifi credentials.
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| What if your fridge could do an AI thing and the groceries to
| refill itself would just arrive? Could be a fantastic way to
| control your diet by only buying foods that satiated/goal
| oriented you approved (as opposed to hungry you walking down
| aisles of product placements in the grocery store)
| triceratops wrote:
| Why do you need a fridge to do that? An AI agent with access
| to your Instacart account could do it. If you only buy
| groceries with that it knows roughly how many calories it
| purchased and you should've consumed since the last order.
| comboy wrote:
| At this point they start to demand it, whether that's setting
| up the product or registration needed for warranty protection.
| But you obviously can still cut them off on router.
|
| Soon though they won't ask, LTE-M / NB-IoT, both chips and
| plans are becoming very cheap and unless you are living in a
| faraday cage it will take control away from the user
| completely.
| embedding-shape wrote:
| > I cannot fathom
|
| That's probably because you're a developer, and as developers
| it's really easy for us to develop tunnel-vision for some
| reason, and really hard to see the perspective from a "regular
| person", the sort of person who a salesperson can say "You can
| now get alerted when you're low on eggs, no matter where you
| are!" and the person will think that's a cool feature with no
| drawbacks.
| LogicHound wrote:
| It got nothing to do with someone being a developer and
| having tunnel vision. In fact I would argue that many people
| that work in tech would be the most likely to sold on such a
| feature.
|
| It has everything to do with being frugal and whether you see
| the utility. There is very little benefit in being alerted
| when I am low on eggs because I can simply open the fridge
| and look. I can also normally buy eggs anywhere, at any time
| of day.
|
| There isn't really a problem that needs solving.
| embedding-shape wrote:
| Yeah, which is easy to reason about because you're probably
| used to reason about stuff, sometimes even a lot.
|
| But lots of the average person don't do much of that sort
| of reasoning, lots of people live life basically on
| impulses. They buy stuff based on their feelings, not based
| on "does this solve an actual problem I have that actually
| needs solving?".
| fwip wrote:
| I don't think it's worth it myself, but here are some of the
| features of the Samsung Bespoke fridge that use wifi:
|
| Notifications and Alerts: If the door is left open, or the
| fridge temperature is leaving safe temps, or the water filter
| needs changing, it can send a push notification to your phone.
| (Useful if something fails; or if a kid/guest leaves the fridge
| open by mistake).
|
| Remote control and monitoring: You can use the camera to see
| the contents of the fridge. You can also adjust the temperature
| remotely. (Useful if you're at the grocery store and can't
| remember if you have milk?) It looks like they also have "AI"
| try to categorize these for you.
|
| Built-in tablet: The touchscreen is basically a builtin tablet.
| You can use it to display photos (pulled from your online
| albums), show the weather, or control "smart home" stuff like
| playing some music on your speakers. I imagine you could also
| try to put recipes or cooking videos on there. You can also
| easily order groceries from it or add to your shopping list
| (with your voice).
|
| I'd rather have a separate device for most of this, but I can
| understand the appeal, especially if you're not privacy-
| conscious.
| xaedes wrote:
| In my opinion it is plain fraud: intentional deception to deprive
| a victim of a legal right or to gain from a victim unlawfully or
| unfairly.
| stevepotter wrote:
| This ad nonsense aside, don't buy Samsung refrigerators. They are
| so awfully made and difficult to service that almost no appliance
| repair companies will touch them. I got suckered into buying one
| a few years back and it was awful. The ice maker didn't work,
| every few weeks I would sop up a gallon of condensation at the
| bottom of the cheese drawer, and eventually it just died. I went
| to a local appliance store and they chuckled when I told them.
| They would never carry that brand. Just fridges, don't want to
| talk about other appliances.
| t1234s wrote:
| Is there an alternative OS scene for these types of appliances?
| embedding-shape wrote:
| Not yet it seems, but if history is any good indication of the
| future, someone at one point will have their "You won't give me
| API access to my own goddamn fridge?!" moment and GNU.V2 will
| be born.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Yesterday I was seriously thinking about aftermarket control
| boards startup for some of my appliances (mostly the AC that
| has disgustingly low performance because of eco modes). Seems
| that there will be one for fridges too.
| xoxxala wrote:
| This annoyed so much I actually wrote them a physical letter
| denouncing the practice and mailed it to their US corporate HQ. I
| haven't mailed a letter in years. Feels odd.
| ratelimitsteve wrote:
| I have a samsung fridge, and that's enough for them to already be
| on my shit list. if you put a screen in my kitchen and force me
| to watch ads I'm going to physically shatter the screen, I don't
| care what other functionality it may have.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Previous outrages:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45291107
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45262808
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45292666
| andreldm wrote:
| After not having a Samsung device for many years, I reluctantly
| bought a fridge from them (price was the decisive factor).
| Anyway, almost immediate regret, it features an always-on wifi
| network begging to be connected to the web, the only way to turn
| it off is to disconnect a cable from a circuit board,
| unbelievable.
| pryelluw wrote:
| Can't wait until I get those Lightspeed briefs adverts
| transmitted into my sleep.
| daft_pink wrote:
| The headline is so insane. I'm not very interested in Samsung in
| general, because I use apple products and they don't offer Dolby
| Vision on their TV's, but the headline lol.
| sylvainr65 wrote:
| Apparently, you can turn off ads quite simply.
|
| * How to turn off ads on your Family Hub The widget will appear
| by default on the fridges as part of the software update.
| However, Samsung is giving users the option to turn off ads. To
| do this, go to the Settings page on the fridge, scroll to
| Advertisements, select it, and you'll be taken to a screen where
| you can toggle off ads.
|
| This will remove the widget entirely. If you think you might
| actually like the widget's other features (calendar, weather, and
| news), you can "X" out a particular ad, and it won't pop up
| again. But then you'll get another ad.
| kalaksi wrote:
| For now.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| I wonder how many ads are coming down the pipeline; can I
| remove all of them if I sit in front of my fridge for 15
| minutes?
| dmitrygr wrote:
| Cmon. You know better than that.
| ncr100 wrote:
| I would call that flow "complex." So, I disagree with you.
|
| Simple would be for the "X" button to offer to turn off Ads
| completely, do you disagree?
|
| (Disclaimer: I'm a pro / lifelong tech and both are "simple" to
| me. And to clarify my opinion, my Mom, who is a pro musician,
| would NOT discover / know how to find that option.)
| beerandt wrote:
| Samsung marketplace on the phone used to have this- now it's
| just 'don't show this again today' button.
| driverdan wrote:
| The simplest way is to not connect a refrigerator to the
| internet.
| roskelld wrote:
| That button will soon become "Show fewer ads" if it doesn't
| just get removed at all.
|
| Just like how Youtube won't let you switch off Shorts, but will
| let you click "Show fewer" which lasts for a few weeks.
| nailer wrote:
| They've been doing this for years. The Galaxy S III (yes three)
| shipped with an indelible Pizza Hut bookmark.
| throwacct wrote:
| This is stupid. Companies are really trying to get people to hate
| everything tech related. From "smart" beds, to "smart" fridges,
| and with the "looming" job displacement due to "AI" and robotics,
| I could see how a "human-centric" economy or new wave of
| businesses and startups with a "human-centric" approach could
| develop in few years.
| microflash wrote:
| At this point, anything from Samsung is a vehicle for ads, and
| anything with the word "smart" from Samsung is most likely a
| spyware. The amount of garbage I had to remove from a recently
| encountered Galaxy phone is on par with Windows 11 levels and
| some.
|
| Unfortunately, the entire industry is racing toward this
| behavior. Recent LGs have also started slapping "AI" stickers on
| their products. I've been visiting Rossman's Consumer Wiki[1]
| more often than I'd like before making a purchase.
|
| [1]: https://consumerrights.wiki/w/Main_Page
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| So a digital calendar with ads seems reasonable. What they don't
| mention is how much work they plan on putting into the
| maintenance. A $3k fridge should last decades, including the
| screen, software, and WiFi connection.
| tandr wrote:
| Last decades? _wipes the tear_ You surely forgot /s at end, I
| hope. The evil incarnation what is called "Samsung fridge" that
| I have in my kitchen required repairman's attention just 3
| months after the purchase. And then every 3 months after. And
| children sacrifices, sorry - steam baths, for the ice maker
| every month or so.
|
| Samsung appliances - never again.
|
| PS. Repairman told me that Samsung have fixed already one of
| the problems my fridge has by the time he looked at it, kind of
| hidden recall and fix. Fridge's version (yes, they have
| versions) have advanced like 7 iterations already from the time
| I bought it. That means there were at least 7 serious
| design/manufacturing problems that they had to fix.
| hn_acc1 wrote:
| I mean.. that's based on the assumption that they actually
| care about delivering a working appliance.. As long as the
| spyware works, they don't really care about the "cooling
| food" part..
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| So I recently (last two years or so) bought a (non-Samsung, non-
| smart) fridge. It's a very nice fridge. It cost, IIRC, about
| $1000-1500. No internet connection, no ads, no screen to play
| them on.
|
| Why would I pay $2000 more for a more annoying fridge?
| whatarethembits wrote:
| I'm in the market for buying two new fridges for our new house;
| this post reminded me to filter out Samsung immediately. I LOATHE
| ads.
| fxtentacle wrote:
| Yay to living in the EU! Since I would be allowed to get a full
| purchase-price refund if they'd try to pull this shit in the
| Europe, they limited the new "Cover-Screen-Widget" to only
| activate within the US.
|
| I know, I know, I suffer daily from government overreach ;) But
| have you tried lobbying for your fellow humans?
| antegamisou wrote:
| Europoors seething they can't afford ad-ridden fridges. /s
| triceratops wrote:
| To be fair if you're gonna advertise to someone, people who buy
| $3500 fridges are ideal
| nemo44x wrote:
| Samsung makes bad fridges. I bought a Sub-Zero. It has 2
| compressors (1 for fridge and 1 for freezer), is made of high
| quality parts so will last 20+ years, has excellent service
| guarantees, and is made in America. Highly recommended.
| gpm wrote:
| > It has 2 compressors (1 for fridge and 1 for freezer)
|
| Is this a feature? It seems like making more parts to break.
|
| Surely there's a better way to get independent cooling control.
| E.g. one compressor with valves to control which side(s) the
| coolant flows to?
| HFguy wrote:
| It allows the refrigerator to run two different zones in
| terms of humidity. Evidently, it really does keep fruits and
| vegetables lasting longer.
| supportengineer wrote:
| There is a better way... and stop calling me Shirley.
| hermitcrab wrote:
| Its only a matter of time until your toilet starts telling you
| where to get high fibre cereal at 20% off.
| busymom0 wrote:
| Wasn't there a post last week about this company wanting to
| install cameras in your toilet?
| nerdsniper wrote:
| There's a $30,000 bounty set up for anyone who can patch the
| firmware to eliminate the ads. Please consider contributing
| additional donations against the matching funds.
|
| https://bounties.fulu.org/bounties/samsung-familyhub-refrige...
| wmeredith wrote:
| I lieu of a donation I'll continue to not pay for ad-laden
| garbage.
| martinky24 wrote:
| That website has never once paid out a bounty? hmm...
| commandersaki wrote:
| I recall Louis saying that some (or all?) solutions to these
| bounties cannot be revealed to the public due to being liable
| under DMCA circumvention measures. IANAL.
| scotty79 wrote:
| Doesn't it just affect US citizens?
| keybored wrote:
| IANAA.
| _whiteCaps_ wrote:
| Canada and Mexico too thanks to CUSMA.
| embedding-shape wrote:
| > Include instructions for carrying out the functional method
| which are accessible and easily usable by a non-technical
| individual
|
| Good luck for anyone to claim this bounty if that's one of the
| requirements. Does the fridge have any exposed ports at all
| that the average person could access without removing anything
| from the fridge?
|
| It's also not clear in the bounty, if I add funds to the
| campaign and it gets fully funded, does that mean that
| software/hack will be released publicly? Or only to "backers"?
| It's not clear what the donation goes to, besides for the
| person who makes the hack to claim.
| daveguy wrote:
| Just replaced a Samsung fridge. It was the worst I have ever had,
| and it wasn't even kludged up with smart-ai-internet-
| advertisement bullshit yet. The compressor went out after about
| 12 years (which is apparently good for current refrigerator
| manufacturing - yikes). But the ice maker and operation panel had
| been on the fritz for at least 4 years before that. I went with a
| Frigidaire + 5 year extended warranty. Much better use of
| internal space, nothing smart, dual ice makers. Only negative is
| it's kinda noisy and runs often due to the compressor being sized
| for "efficiency". Fingers crossed.
| schaefer wrote:
| boycotted for life. All products.
| Dan4ik_Owl wrote:
| Where is Gilfoyle when we need him so much?
| klysm wrote:
| The backlash from this doesn't show up on a spreadsheet so here
| we go!
| Beijinger wrote:
| FYI: Out of curiosity, just googled it
|
| "No, Samsung fridges do not run on webOS; they use Samsung's own
| Tizen operating system. LG is the brand that uses webOS in its
| smart refrigerators. "
| ge96 wrote:
| Recently saw this clip about a public bathroom where the toilet
| paper dispenser had a screen on it/qr code you had to scan, watch
| an ad to get the TP... interesting if true.
| kavenkanum wrote:
| One needs to be rally dumb to buy a smart fridge
| JuniperMesos wrote:
| I've never purchased a refrigerator in my life - every place I've
| lived in my adult life has been a rental where I wasn't the one
| picking the appliances. What happens when I'm looking for a place
| to live, and I find somewhere that meets my requirements, except
| that the landlord has this Samsung smart fridge in the kitchen -
| maybe they thought this was a selling point, like the landlord I
| had who put the fact that they had a Google Nest thermostat
| proudly in the apartment ad (I deliberately never gave it my WiFi
| password)?
| atum47 wrote:
| Galaxy S2 was the best phone I ever had. I think it was pure
| Android, if not, you had some minor apps from Samsung that you
| could've delete. I think I left the Samsung train right about S5
| (which was supposed water proof, but it wasn't). It was just down
| fall from there. Samsung account, locked phone full with shitty
| apps that you couldn't remove (without rooting)... I don't think
| I'll ever have anything from Samsung in the near future
| neilv wrote:
| A lot of outrage in HN comments, but it's kinda ironic, because
| if you had to point at the single biggest concentration of people
| who built out surveillance capitalism and other facets of our
| digital dystopian future...
|
| Maybe the people complaining are the ones whose employers don't
| even sell out people with third-party trackers on their Web site.
| But I see more than 3 people complaining.
| prawn wrote:
| Can't stand behaviour like this.
|
| I pay for Spotify and the app now shows paid suggestions (
| _cough_ ads), to paying users. When you tap the ellipsis and
| choose "Not interested", it doesn't respond with "OK, we'll
| stop" but something like 'We'll show less of this'.
|
| No, don't show less, I want you to not show it at all.
| smoe wrote:
| I switched away from Spotify a couple of years ago because of
| this, after having been a paying customer for around 10 years.
|
| But I fear all such services will eventually succumb to this,
| given just how much more lucrative ads can be compared to
| subscriptions.
| jmward01 wrote:
| This is why I have so few 'smart' devices in my life. It is
| obvious that all of these devices are predatory. They start off
| 'helpful' and 'useful' and then turn malicious when you can't
| easily replace them. Lock-in bait and switch should be illegal.
| nicbou wrote:
| Or they are neutered by a software update, or stop working when
| the company shuts down the servers that make them work.
| luxuryballs wrote:
| Samsung SSDs I remember, do they still make good ones? I won't
| buy the washer and dryer from them again, and probably not the
| dishwasher even though for the price it has been good.
| nicbou wrote:
| Samsung is one of these companies that are so consistently scummy
| that I outright refuse to buy any of their products. They are
| forever blacklisted.
| platevoltage wrote:
| "You're going to have to PI-hole your refrigerator" wasn't on my
| 2025 bingo card.
| gus_massa wrote:
| I bought a Samsung notebook in ~2008. No crapware! Nice and
| small, it survived long beyond the guaranty date.
|
| My cellphone decided to die last month. It was near retirement,
| but still working until it didn't. I bought a Samsung phone.
| First it asked twice if I wanted to share all my life with Google
| (using some dark patterns) and then it asked twice if I wanted to
| share all my life with Samsung (using more dark patterns). (After
| that, I installed WhatsApp, so I'm not sure I bothered.)
|
| Next the phone offered to install the app from my carrier, TikTok
| and a ?third? app-store. I didn't want them so in the screen with
| the offer I disabled the first and the other two were disabled by
| default. Anyway, I got TikTok and the other app for some reason!
| (I uninstalled them inmediately.)
|
| I still get random notifications, like complaining that I'm using
| the phone too much. Or a notification that they upgraded
| something, restarted the phone and all apps notifications were
| disabled until I unlock it. (Lucky, I didn't miss any important
| urgent message.)
| aj_icracked wrote:
| I have the Samsung Frame TV (great TV btw) and decided I didn't
| want to pay the $5 / month to have curated art in the room and
| when Superman the movie came out a few months ago it was only
| displaying Superman comics on the screen. Was super annoying bc
| was subtle but not subtle enough. I uploaded family pics instead
| so I don't have that anymore but it was still pretty annoying. I
| have samsung washers / dryers / dishwasher etc all connected to
| the internet and I love the notifications when a load is done but
| I don't know how useful the data is... I assume data brokers are
| like, "Oh Aj uses his washing machine 7 times a month let's hit
| him with Tide ads", but I assume everyone uses the machine that
| much. I'm fine having my machines tell Samsung use bc it's normal
| usage (i think?)
| shreddit wrote:
| It's so sad. Smart devices were meant to make life easier. Now
| all they do is to be another platform for ads.
|
| AI is going the same way.
|
| In the end it's always going to be ads. Is just sad.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Okay - so fridge is something that you buy, you put it on 3
| degrees Celsius and you forget about it for the next 12 years.
| What exactly smartness gives?
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