Submitted 8 months ago by BrikoX@lemmy.zip to technology@lemmy.zip
https://www.androidpolice.com/smart-devices-poor-investment/
Smart devices were supposed to make life better, but constant updates have made them worse
To me a smart device was supposed to be a normal device that you could control ‘smartly’ over wifi.
Mini SoCs with their own apps and an optional subscription built in for some proprietary shit? That goes past smart straight into dumpster trash.
I have to wonder if the irony is lost on the author with how ad ridden and barely usable website they posted this article on. Replace Smart Devices with Websites and the article mainly remains the same.
I had the same thought. I’m viewing on mobile Firefox with UBO, but I couldn’t get the comments to load. So I loaded the url in another browser and now I have cancer.
I can’t buy into Smart Devices unless paying for the smartness lets me actually use it how I see fit.
So often there is little benefit except companies extract data from you, or to enforce some licensing or rent-seeking scheme. You’re just paying to get screwed over.
Yeah. Usually “smart” means it does what the average person wants. Not that it’s customizable at all. Things trying to be smart is what a major portion of my frustrations lie. The other major portion is companies stealing my data.
Home assistant is what you are looking for
Wasn’t that clear since the start?
Yes.
We replaced ours with a refurbished business desktop, installed Linux and Jellyfin then use with a wireless keyboard with built-in track pad
Plays media great, emulates up to Wii and can use for general web browsing too
I do something similar. I have full control over everything. Use Firefox with UBlock. NEVER see an ad. I was super close to buying an Nvidia Shield because the box looks nice, and I’m glad I didn’t.
Yep! I have a Pi 4 running Pihole blocking ads on network and often get thanks from the teens when they’re away from home and they realize just how many ads they would otherwise be exposed to
Oh no, if only those people that kept shouting at every opportunity how terrible these “smart” devices were had been listened to shouted louder, maybe people would be aware. But alas, everyone nobody could’ve seen that coming, it’s truly a surprise.
we are left with the remains of a dream unfulfilled and electronics that respond to the whims, fancies, and ever-changing business decisions of corporations
Reads straight out of !aboringdystopia
[insert shocked pikachu meme]
Technology generally is not a good investment
Sorry but this is such a broad statement that it loses all value
Tbf it depends on the technology. I don’t think anyone would argue that trains are a poor investment.
… And it’s not like every kitchen has a microwave or every household multiple phones or computers or cara in driveways or slimmer glasses to correct vision or etc etc etc
In regards to buying consumer electronics.
What?! Nooooo
Enshittification. Naming your enemy is the first step and we already have a name, use it.
You bought a devices give corporations back door access and control over your leisure and now you’re surprised that they’ve used that access to make the experience worse? Why is anyone surprised? I learned my lesson with the Kindle over a decade ago, never made that mistake again.
The thing I’ve never understood is even just looking at Google, they’ve killed so many products when they could have monetised them better with a little thought.
Instead, we have a phone thats useless for music unless you subscribe, photo storage is headed the same way and its whole ‘smart’ eco system has been ruined because of shareholder greed!
Except if Google pulled there head out there arse and built a platform people wanted to use, they’d likely make more money than they’re making now. Yet they clearly don’t get it and think ‘cloud’ solves everything!
Sadly Apple knows it has no competition so they’re just screwing with anything that they can and claim it’s ‘revolutionary’ so they can re-sell the same devices and while home assistant works ok for those of us who like tinkering, it’s a long way from being user friendly. Never mind the lack of anything smart, like speakers, displays, that work out the box.
It’s just sad to see so much potential being ruined because of seemingly clueless companies!
Google has this culture that you need to make something to be something, usually someone will have an idea to make a product, then the product is quite successful and they get promoted away from managing that product.
Then someone gets assigned to manage that product, since that someone new also wants to make “something” to be something, they put their own spin on that product.
Since they’re not the one who made the product in the first place, they missed what made the product great.
This causes the product to lose quality, and therefore the user base. With a reduced user base, there’s no justification to keep the product alive, so Google pulled the plug on the product.
It’s a vicious cycle that results in a lot of things made and killed by Google.
Use home assistant. Its not very difficult to setup on an old laptop or pi or whatever you have. Its agnostic to whatever system you have. Talks between networks.
Come join us at /homeassistant
Water is wet.
Android police needs an editor. This guy out here casually throwing ’ :::gimped::: ’ around in an article like it’s cool.
This is why I only buy shitty cheap chinese IoT devices. Less likely that they’re going to enshittify my devices for profit. Maybe use VLANs and a firewall, though.
noorbeast@lemmy.zip 8 months ago
HomeAssistant…this is the way!
kakes@sh.itjust.works 8 months ago
Never in a million years would I buy always-online trash when I could just use Home Assistant and control my devices locally.
Windex007@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Also, ESPHome is crazy good. It’s honestly not that hard or experiensive to take a dumb device and splice in some non-cloud home assistant capacity w/ ESPHome
Starayo@lemm.ee 8 months ago
If I can’t run it with home assistant, I’m buying a dumb device instead.
Trying to buy an automated feeder for my cat was a nightmare. Why does everything have a camera and require an internet connection to China? Everything was on tuya! It’s fucking ridiculous. You don’t need cloud processing for this shit. Finding something that’s just a timer worth a battery backup that wouldn’t fail to feed my cat if the power or internet briefly went out took way too much effort.
herrvogel@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Trying to set up home assistant for my parents’ house, I started seeing the point of all the cloud stuff. My dad wants to have home automation but he completely lacks the technical skills to run and maintain a home assistant instance and he’s completely unwilling to learn. Even after I’ve done all the difficult parts for him, he always manages to have trouble. The majority of those troubles could be avoided with a cloud managed service. I’m guessing there are way more people like my dad than there are who could be assed with setting up a 100% local smart home. Because that does require more than a little bit of technical inclination.
hubobes@sh.itjust.works 8 months ago
If anyone is still looking for one, I got myself this model (the one for 2 cats but it works the same): petlibro.com/…/petlibro-granary-automatic-pet-fee…
The company has other models with wifi and cameras as well as an app but this particular model is just a dumb timer based machine.
kboy101222@sh.itjust.works 8 months ago
Any chance you’d know the answer to this (or a better community to ask in) -
I need something I can hook into a projector’s HDMI port. All I need from it is mirroring my phone and occasionally playing Plex. I don’t really want to get a smart device if I don’t have to
anonymoose@lemmy.ca 8 months ago
Nowhere near an expert on the subject, but I wonder if a Raspberry Pi will suffice?
bitfucker@programming.dev 8 months ago
This may be a bit convoluted, but I think its the only way. You have to install 2 apps on the PC and phone. One for controlling the PC, and second for your phone to stream the display to PC. The first one, I don’t know any good one but maybe some simple SSH is suffice. The second is scrcpy. It is an app that lets you stream your phone to the desktop/PC
aniki@lemm.ee 8 months ago
you need a !sbcs@lemux.minnix.dev single board computer with a touch of linux to setup the image.
epyon22@programming.dev 8 months ago
I’ve been eyeing one of those Intel HDMI sticks for this. I have been using my steam deck for stuff lately and KDE connect is really good, or leverage something like Kodi.