tbh I think the "just vote with your wallet" strategy is probably insufficient. the flipside is that this means it requires people everywhere to start pushing back on this shit, across multiple countries. hard, but necessary

the positive side is that the outright harms of the tracking industry is more and more frequently becoming known to J Average person, so the fight may become easier

Re: Smart TVs, what works for me is a Roku TV, skip all of the sign-in shit (don't even connect it to the internet

update firmware via USB if necessary^1^). Then, plug in whatever devices and navigate to them. Close enough to a dumb TV for me.

I almost have Android TV figured out: Bought a cheap Onn Android TV box, sideloaded SmartTube in case I need to rewatch The Gemsbok's Video performing an existentialist reading of Fucking Dark Souls^2^, installed MullvadVPN^3^, and sideloaded whatever other apps I needed. The only reason I say it is almost figured out is I couldn't bypass the Google account creation/login

an insufficient stopgap is to create a throwaway account, though it's very hard to do this in a way that isn't linked to your real identity, I think.

(This will be part of my "how to privify/securify your shit" series, if I ever learn to write.)

1: it isn't
2: this sounds angry but it's more pumped up, this shit rules
3: note that "block connections without VPN" is built into regular Android, but not Android TV, as far as I can tell