Roku is exploring ways to show consumers ads on its TVs even when they are not using its streaming platform: The company has been looking into injecting ads into the video feeds of third-party devices connected to its TVs, according to a recent patent filing.

This way, when an owner of a Roku TV takes a short break from playing a game on their Xbox, or streaming something on an Apple TV device connected to the TV set, Roku would use that break to show ads. Roku engineers have even explored ways to figure out what the consumer is doing with their TV-connected device in order to display relevant advertising.

  • Draconic NEO
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    18 months ago

    Probably injecting the ads into blank screen periods.

    Maybe we should bring back screensavers, would really fuck with devices like this that look for blank screen time that would simply never occur.

    • KillingTimeItself
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      8 months ago

      i think a better option is not buying adware hardware. Or software for that matter.

      • Draconic NEO
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        18 months ago

        Obviously but it could become very hard to do that with Smart TVs dominating the space now.

        • KillingTimeItself
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          18 months ago

          smart TVs are their own shitfest, frankly, if you don’t want to deal with them, i hear you can just buy commercial signage displays. Which are basically just TVs but without the smart part.