this post was submitted on 08 Nov 2026
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270
Developer ends lucrative screensaver deal with Roku because Fox bought it (arstechnica.com)
submitted 7 hours ago by lechekaflan@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
35 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

today I fucking learned Roku is now a Murdoch Box.

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[–] carrylex@lemmy.world 3 points 12 minutes ago* (last edited 1 minute ago) (1 children)

WTF a screensaver on a TV that requires money? Is this like a free money glitch for doing nothing? Just bundle a few free images, buy them at a reasonable price (not $80k/year) or tell your company photographer to take them.

Also how often do you see a screensaver on a TV: Short answer almost never because a) you're watching stuff or b) you turn the device off

Also who buys this Roku trash in the first place? Apple users? Just plugin a laptop/PC via HDMI & Co or slap some Android/Linux TV device/Raspberry with Kodi behind the TV.

[–] angband@lemmy.world 2 points 1 minute ago* (last edited 40 seconds ago)

I was in a meeting recently and the smart tv had a screensaver showing a 1950's-esque street scene sidescrolling and showing what looked like at least one text ad in the bacground.

The new OOB experience.

[–] blargh513@sh.itjust.works 5 points 52 minutes ago

Well, this explains it.

I changed the screensaver to the fish tank because the default cityscape on has all those stupid ads plugged in.

The other day, it had a banner that said the fishtank was being removed. I couldn't figure out why.

I guess I will have to find a new streaming box? Sheesh.

I had long ago blocked all telemetry at my edge network box for the whole house. Now I presume it will not be sufficient.

[–] arrow74@lemmy.zip 1 points 9 minutes ago

CEOs are the dumbest pieces of shit on the planet. Roughly could have set up their own fish tank and recorded it for 10k and I'm inflating that number by about 9k. Then they would have owned it and paid no license at all

[–] stein2027@lemmy.world 7 points 1 hour ago

I went all in on Roku years ago because it worked so well with Plex. The menus and remotes were consistent across all the TVs, so nobody had to learn anything new. Now Fox will probably turn it into another advertising platform. This sucks.

[–] cardfire@sh.itjust.works 1 points 22 minutes ago

Wait, is it Fox Disney, or Fox News?

I thought NewsCorp/Murdoch doesn't have ownership of MOST of Fox anymore, just Business, Sports, and News.

[–] ghostface@lemmy.world 4 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Roku used to be the safe haven from ecosystem lockin.

Now with free-my-tv and other projects, this can be resolved.

[–] Anarki_@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 35 minutes ago (1 children)

Slop btw

[–] oscarmeyer82@lemmy.world 1 points 19 minutes ago (1 children)

I think that makes a bit of a dilemma. Which is better slop software with quality issues or proprietary closed source which could be running any number of malicious processes?

[–] Anarki_@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 17 minutes ago (1 children)

Very true. Good thinking.

[–] oscarmeyer82@lemmy.world 1 points 11 minutes ago (1 children)

The problem is I don't know the answer! It's a case by case issue that takes real effort to resolve each time.

[–] Anarki_@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 7 minutes ago (1 children)

Yep, samesies.

My hate for slop battles the usefulness of some of the products.

[–] oscarmeyer82@lemmy.world 1 points 2 minutes ago

I'm flipping between this comment thread and another one about a tv that looks similar to mine saying it's out of storage with the discussion being about thee fact the storage has likely been filled with unsynced log files. I've been thinking about loading some custom slop firmware on my tv for a while now but I'd rather work on fun projects than have to ward off the onslaught of major corporations trying to abuse us.

[–] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 61 points 4 hours ago

Roku has been a poster child of enshittification for a long time. I struggle to think of any ways they could get worse. But I'm sure they'll think of something.

[–] ChunkyPud@lemmy.world 29 points 4 hours ago (2 children)

Last month I took my Roku offline but let it connect to LAN so the Jellyfin app would work (for now until it gets too out of date probably). I knew Fox would fuck things up somehow and I was right sooner than expected.

As an aside, it’s still connected to my pihole and for about a week it tried to send logging data to 2 different websites every 3 seconds for around a week. It was funny seeing my blocked percentage at 91.5%, even funnier that it’s programmed to give up.

[–] kieron115@startrek.website 1 points 37 minutes ago

Last time I put a Roku behind DNS filtering it just started spamming it's logging server because it couldn't make contact. I ended up just letting it through instead of going through the hassle of spoofing a response to make it shut up.

[–] Dagnet@lemmy.world 9 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

It probably gives up only not to accidentally DDOS their own telemetry servers

[–] 0x0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 2 hours ago

Or maybe it's just a reaally slow exponential backoff

[–] Damage@feddit.it 23 points 4 hours ago

Piracy is the only moral choice when it comes to large services

[–] solarvector@lemmy.dbzer0.com 103 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Roku will automatically switch the Aquatic Life screensaver on affected devices to the Roku City screensaver, another popular animation that includes subtle advertisements, according to the user notice

Ugh.

[–] buffing_lecturer@leminal.space 54 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Surprise! They're not subtle.

[–] greybeard@feddit.online 33 points 4 hours ago (2 children)

Yeah, it's literal billboards that slowly pass in the cityscape, looking like a flat PNG pasted over it, not matching tone or theme in any way. It's not subtle in the least.

[–] snooggums@piefed.world 2 points 45 minutes ago

The subtle ones are probably the movie references in the background. The Avengers tower is a subtle hint to watch the MCU, etc.

[–] PHLAK@lemmy.world 1 points 28 minutes ago

I have this screensaver enabled on my home TVs. One day I went to a restaurant and they had the same screensaver showing on some of it's TVs but they had these giant billboard ads scrolling by covering parts of the screensaver. That's the day I learned that AdGuard DNS blocks the billboards (not just the ad but the entire billboard).

[–] its_prolly_fine@sh.itjust.works 5 points 3 hours ago (4 children)

Any not terrible alternatives that my parents will actually be able to use without me?

[–] atrielienz@lemmy.world 4 points 3 hours ago

It's pricey but I have heard good things about Apple TV. I think someone else in the thread has a list of FOSS alternatives but you'd still have to set them up.

[–] snowdriftissue@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago

Google tv streamer 4k is pretty good but recently went up in price due to RAM shortages

[–] clarth@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 hours ago

Onn Android boxes work well for my parents. As long as you install Projectivy launcher to get rid of ads and clean up the UI. I make it so there are three app icons and nothing else on the screen, then it's easy to understand and navigate.

[–] goatinspace@feddit.org 0 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Not sure about parents but you could try building odroid with lineage os and rii i25 remote

[–] treesapx@lemmy.world 1 points 57 minutes ago

Yeah, the thing about parents in this case is that if the solutions isn't easy as fuck then they're going to give up immediately and go get whatevers at best buy.

[–] MurrayL@lemmy.world 19 points 4 hours ago

Same fishtank screensaver as you might remember from the early 00s, in case you’re wondering.

[–] Mcdolan@lemmy.world 15 points 5 hours ago (2 children)

I was curious what the reason was behind this. As good of time as any to setup some different streaming sticks/machines I guess. Anyone have any suggestions? FOSS is preferred.

[–] sandwich@lemmy.zip 6 points 3 hours ago

I know this goes against the fediverse but I pirate my shit via an outsourced (paid) plex provider [gasp] on an Apple TV box. The device itself is reliable and has no ads and has a very high spouse approval factor.

[–] RmDebArc_5@piefed.zip 3 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

Depends on your needs. If you just stream via Jellyfin/Plex I'd recommend Kodi+Linux on a raspberry pi or something. There are premade distributions like OSMC for this niche. If you need Netflix/Disney+ etc you're basically fucked on the FOSS front, the only option I know is either LineageOS's TV version though that isn't as well supported as the mobile version and there are some DRM shenanigans or just using Linux with a keyboard+mouse combo and a browser, though you will be limited by resolution. On the non FOSS front I have heard good things about the NVIDIA shield/apple tv though that is expensive, or using Windows with the native streaming apps and a frontend (eg Steam Big Picture).

[–] turmacar@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago

Pi devices have gotten so expensive due to RAM shortages you're probably much better off repurposing any of hardware you have or can grab from a secondhand place.