Roku Updates Its UI For the First Time In a Decade (engadget.com) 33
Roku is rolling out its first major homescreen update in a decade. The UI doesn't look too dramatically different, but users will notice more personalization-driven changes, including frequently used apps, "top picks," household-specific layouts, and recommendations based on viewing habits. Rest assured, Engadget adds, "Everything is still in various shades of purple and Roku City is still available as a screensaver." From the report: Today's update certainly brings more clutter into the mix, including a new "marquee" ad spot that takes up a large chunk of the screen. It's worth remembering that Roku makes most of its money on ads and not its hardware. "More than 100 million households will feel the difference the moment they turn on their TV -- and it opens up a better, more powerful experience for our partners as well," CEO Anthony Wood wrote in a blog post.
The update does bring one novel feature, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The company says the new homescreen platform will adapt to how households use Roku devices. This is to accommodate "multiple people living in homes." For instance, a child's bedroom TV might have a different homescreen than TV in the living room, and so forth. This expansion is rolling out right now to US-based customers, though it might take a while to reach every user. Roku says "additional countries will follow in the coming months."
The update does bring one novel feature, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The company says the new homescreen platform will adapt to how households use Roku devices. This is to accommodate "multiple people living in homes." For instance, a child's bedroom TV might have a different homescreen than TV in the living room, and so forth. This expansion is rolling out right now to US-based customers, though it might take a while to reach every user. Roku says "additional countries will follow in the coming months."
Pi-hole ftw (Score:5, Interesting)
I have Roku to thank for my newest Linux pc hardware purchase late last year, with a 4GB Raspberry Pi that I set up specifically to block ads on our Roku players. This was the first dedicated Linux hardware that I had picked up in a couple of decades and I opted to go with a headless configuration, which also allowed me to get back into the CLI and relearn a few things I had forgotten over the years.
Fun geek project to play around with for sure and a bit of a reacquaintance with Linux. Cheers, Roku! :)
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Would you mind sharing a little more about what you learned from your experience setting this up? Was there a guide you found particularly useful, or things that you discovered on your own?
I have a couple old Raspberry Pi boxes lying around, and I wouldn't mind following your example if there are no issues with performance or high availability.
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They were probably talking about Pi Hole.https://pi-hole.net/
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I did the same. Roku is extremely chatty. It's easily the most chatty device in our home (thousands of connections per device outbound to their telemetry per day). It didn't take much time to block everything and then gradually figuring out which was absolutely needed for the level of functionality I wanted. Everything else gets dropped on the floor. Roku gets "desperate" and demon dials home base when you block connectivity to the data harvesters. Luckily only the small raspberry pi needs to be invol
Everything is becoming a variation of (Score:1)
endless scrolling, a never-ending click-bait engine.
Re: Everything is becoming a variation of (Score:2)
The future is now. And that future is endless scrolling while drool dribbles down our chin.
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Imagine using any of Roku's competitors then!
Anyone who thinks $30 is the most important measure is a perfect target for Roku.
Re: Big fan (Score:2)
I don't think that's what they said.
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Dumped Roku 2 years ago (Score:2)
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This. Roku had the best set top streaming device for years. Roku held no allegiance to any platform and provided decent hardware at a decent price. Unfortunately, they started changing things that were not good for their customers. As my Rokus age out I will not be replacing them with Rokus. In the meantime, they get restricted internet access.
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Annoying (Score:3)
I got this update a couple of weeks ago, and it is ANNOYING.
Trying to shove crap I could care less about in my face, plus MORE ADS.
It takes a bit of work, but most of it can be turned off.
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Same here. And it puts all of this new shit at the top, forcing you to scroll past it each time.
They should have put some effort into fixing whatever memory leak keeps me having to reboot the ting every few days.
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MBA 1: "Hmm, how can we squeeze more revenue out of this gizmo?"
MBA 2: "Short term revenue or long term?"
MBA 1: "Short term of course! It's all we do."
MBA 2: "Then stuff it with more ads!"
MBA 1: "Brilliant!
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Trying to shove crap I could care less about in my face
Isn't that a good thing? If you could care less about it that means you want it right? Personally I couldn't care less about that stuff and don't want it.
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I wouldn't mind if it were a static image, but it's that Gemini ad that's constantly writing and erasing text. It's definitely cut down how long I stay on the site.
Solution: "Factory Reset" and then never connect.. (Score:2)
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1. Factory reset restores default settings - it does NOT roll back system updates.
2. A Roku device not connected to the internet is going to be lacking its core functionality. If your goal is to use it as a dumb display, or to solely just a local media library (eg Jellyfin), then maybe, but 99% of all Roku users want to do more than that.
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Solution: "Factory Reset" and then never connect it to the internet again. I did this after the last UI update put a 3rd or 4th row of ads on the home-screen and it's made my life a whole lot easier.
Never connect your Roku to the internet again? How does that work, lol?
"users will notice more personalization-driven..." (Score:2)
Pervert (Score:2)
a child's bedroom TV might have a different homescreen than TV in the living room
How do you know it's in a child's room? Turn off the camera, pervert!
Right to the point (Score:2)
opens up a better, more powerful experience for our partners as well
Nothing like a CEO knows how to sell enshittification as a good thing.
Roku TV bult into Westinghouse Smart TV (Score:2)
I'm sure I'm just an outlier here. But I bought a cheap big screen LCD smart TV at Best Buy 3-4 years ago. It was a Westinghouse branded set running Roku TV.
At some point, they updated the firmware to consolidate the TV guide in it so it displayed all the streaming content and your over the air TV stations in the same guide. (Used to be, you had to pick a Live TV icon/button to look at your OTA content in its own place.)
Ever since that happened, the TV forgets all my OTA stations regularly so I have to go
And their update is, without question,... (Score:1)
...the same standard garbage that many, many companies before them have done to try to figure out where they can "add value" (meaning make more money doing exactly what they're doing now) without bothering to innovate again. Think AVG, Avira, MalwareBytes, Office, blah blah blah. More benign or useless features masquerading as a face lift while their memory footprint quadruples ...or worse. Microsoft has been re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic since Windows NT got a bump from v3.51 and Windows M
I remember when Roku was mostly free channels..... (Score:2)
Enshitification Stage 2 (Score:1)
> More than 100 million households will feel the difference the moment they turn on their TV—and it opens up a better, more powerful experience for our partners as well,
Literally the second stage of Enshitification.
Roku UI (Score:2)