No. Please don't put words in my mouth. :) Cellphones are an entirely different product in several ways. Most notably, they are portable, need to stand alone without other helper devices, function as complete computers, and are upgraded approximately every 1-2 years by most users. TVs possess none of these attributes.

That's why it's great for a cellphone to run a full modern OS, and why it's NOT great for a TV to do so. TVs last across multiple tech generations. They should contain the bare minimum of software needed to display whatever content you pump into them. Nothing else.

'Most notably, they are portable, need to stand alone without other helper devices, function as complete computers, and are upgraded approximately every 1-2 years by most users. TVs possess none of these attributes.'

Each of these statements could equally apply to TVs (except, possibly, portability) and the fact that they haven't is merely circumstantial.

Yes, for the first 50 years of television's existence people tended to keep the same TV around for half a decade or more. But that's because fundamental changes happened between fifteen and thirty years apart - the switch from black and white to color, then the switch from broadcast to cable and satellite. The rate of innovation, and thus the turnover rate of individual devices, is increasing - just like with the telephone, which remained basically the same for the first several decades of its existence as well, until modern computer technology was invented.

Come to think of it the same thing is possibly true of desktop computers. My family was on the same computer between 1984/85 and 1993 - a Mac 512k. Then in 1994 or 95 we got a Performa 475. That lasted for about 5 years until I got a Mac clone - a Motorola Starmax 3000, which had a PowerPC processor. This laster about 2 -3 years. Then I built my first PC - that lasted for about two years. And each year since then I've used the same computer for 1 to 2 years at a time. The turnover period halved exponentially as computers got more and more sophisticated.

That TV above still has all the bare minimum to display whatever content you pump into it; the only part that's not functional in this post is its self-pumping, so to speak. As long as the TV can still function in dumb mode, having a smart mode is extra gravy that makes life so much easier. Now if I could pair a Bluetooth keyboard with it...

No. The part that's not functional is everything else. "Smart" TVs tend to have all kinds of idiotic things like splash screens (what? why?), ads (seriously? ads on my TV that I paid for? no thanks), stupid software vulnerabilities and instability that a TV has no business having (see the topic this thread is based on), and all kinds of other nonsense.

Add in the fact that good TVs are basically always made by the companies who are the Very Worst at software (Samsung most prominently), and you have a recipe for digital heartburn.

No thanks. Dumb TVs forever.

Also, to respond to another comment, there's no correlation between a TV being "smart" and achieving a simple A/V setup with a single remote and a minimum of hassles. Unless you mean a negative correlation. It's very simple to achieve single-remote nirvana with a dumb TV. Plus you're not stuck with a dumb company's remote and software; you can pick your own, because a dumb TV will work with anything and not get in your way.

Singled out for especially thorough beatings are those TV makers who put actual physical buttons on their remotes for websites that might be gone next week. Seriously? No.

Dumb TVs forever.

I can sympathize with the fact that Smart TVs have a worse overall experience for you. The ads and crapware that you can't get rid of just mess up what was once a simple experience of turning on the TV. However I think smart TVs are a good idea because the way that people consume visual media is changing. More people are ditching cable and turning to services like Netflix. If HBO ever decouples itself from cable, I'd imagine this trend would increase more so. Why should I watch YouTube on my computer screen when I can watch it on a larger screen (and in a more comfortable room)?

I don't think the problem is with Smart TVs, I think it's just the current execution of the idea.

The point of the thread is that Netflix and .mp4 files are more appropriately processed by a cheap smart box that plugs into an expensive dumb TV.

Currently, yes. I don't think that excludes the option of someone creating a smart TV that doesn't require an additional device to plug into it though.

Such a smart TV would have to be really well done in order to justify keeping the same privacy-invasive firmware around for the 5-10 year life of a TV.

Why should it even have to check a Samsung URL? Why not just let each "app" decide if it can get to what it needs to?

Imagine if your Samsung phone couldn't do anything that required an internet connection because Samsung's site was down. This is pretty much the same thing, IMHO.

Samsung's site being down or unreachable should have no bearing on the performance of the Netflix app whatsoever.

Which servers do you think your Apple or Google smartphones ping to check for internet connectivity? ;-) It's true that apps generally perform reachability tests on their own sites but global reachability checks can still affect the preference of wifi over cellular, for instamce. And the preferred method on Android to check for reachability, unlike iOS samples, uses the phone's checks rather than pinging a host of your choice.

So just for fun I turned off the WAN connection on my router. Effectively, I had no internet access but I do have a wireless LAN with some local devices.

Safari on iOS did not tell me "you don't have internet connectivity", but it did say that servers were unreachable (not surprising) and it let me use local servers without issue. iOS seems to prefer WiFi to cellular when it's available as it didn't fall back during my limited test.

This is the behaviour that I'd expect from the Smart TV. Just because it can't get to Samsung doesn't mean it can't get to Netflix.

When you connect to a Wifi network, iOS checks http://www.apple.com/library/test/success.html to see if you're in a captive portal (and pop up a full screen webview to let you log into the wifi, or cancel to fail out of it)

I imagine if Apple's DNS settings got screwed up or their server was throwing up something other than "Success" due to an error, iOS devices around the world would claim their Wifi needed a login and wasn't working.

edit: another comment further down linked this article that says that exactly the same thing happened to iOS http://www.zdnet.com/what-went-wrong-with-ios-6-wi-fi-700000...

I was actually hoping that I'd see some misbehaviour when I ran my little test, but on the surface it appears that Apple learned from that mistake.

The results might have been different if I had ran the test longer or turned WiFi off and back on or something.

I believe Apple has an agreement with Akamai. Here are some data points for just one household with two macs, two iPhones, and two iPads

www.isg-apple.com.akadns.net 571 requests in the last day

us-courier.push-apple.com.akadns.net 558 requests in the last day

.akamai.net 709 requests in the last day

and

.akamaiedge.net 1967 requests in the last day

--

I believe Google just uses *.l.google.com (my open dns says 1202 requests in the last day)

iOS and OS X uses http://www.apple.com/library/test/success.html for WiFi captive portal testing

"I bet Samsung knows how to do software"

Speaking as someone who is often forced to use Samsung software (particularly wrt/their Android phones), that would be a bad bet to make.

I have to agree with the parent post, at least partially, current smart TVs are useless. But.. next gen? Maybe they'll get better.

Smart TVs that exposed ubiquitous hardware - like i386 did for desktops and laptops - where you can choose to run Windows/Linux/BSD would be ideal.. I'd choose a mix of Plex and XBMC given the choice... They provide real value atop the TV platform. Samsung and friends have a huge amount of catch-up to do before they are real contenders when it comes to having the best software (and even then .. Plex/XBMC need to double down on their "Mom" useability..)

(I have a Samsung TV, and recommend them, but always tell people to avoid the SmartTV gimmick. Plex and a Chromecast give a 1000x better experience for those who download, and Netflix etc + Chromecast cover those who don't)

> Plex/XBMC need to double down on their "Mom" useability..

I happen to disagree. Post installation Plex is literally a pleasure to use if you use your smartphone/tablet as a remote and just beam content to your TV.

I've yet to see any semi-open system as powerful, functional, yet user friendly.