It probably helps that smart TVs provide one of the most lucrative environments for selling ads... although tbh I don't know if the hardware manufacturers get any kickback on that, but the people who develop the software where ads are shown almost certainly do.

They all develop their own smart tv functionality, originally at least. That was how they captured that ad revenue. The Vizio CEO actually stated the margins were non-existent but made up on the smart tv garbage.

There obviously is a different arrangement when you have companies like TCL putting in Google TV.

With TVs specifically, aren't their costs subsidized by the SmartOS features?

The US medical industry is the opposite of capitalism. Heck, most of our budget goes to Medicare and Medicaid.

No it's not. It's a state facilitated oligopoly situation, which is the ideal end state for any industry as part of capitalism short of a monopoly. Guaranteed high income for everybody involved and disruption essentially not possible.

Yeah it's weird explaining it to my kid:

"When dad was your age, TVs cost a heck of a lot of money, had terrible resolution, took several grown men to carry, and were almost as deep as they were tall"

"Last year I carried home a larger TV with 40x the number of pixels by myself, and paid for it with one day's work"

Same with laptops and PCs. I'm actually in awe of how cheap they've become. For sub-$500, I can get a high-performing work laptop that pays for itself over and over again.