It's beyond me why people are still buying smart TVs. I've juist looked on a large EU webshop (bol.com). You can buy a non-smart, full-HD, 40 inch TV for less than $200.

All the ad tracking in smart TVs has driven prices down. Tracking and ad data has turned a customer from a one time purchaser to a revenue stream for as long as the device is in use.

If you want a high quality TV for the best price your best bet is either disable/opt out of all the tracking data, or even better just never hook it up to the internet at all and plug an AppleTV or Chromecast on it.

If you look for a Samsung TV without “smart” features you pretty much have to find them under “commercial displays” and you’ll pay a premium for it.

> full-HD, 40 inch TV

are we living in 2010 or something?

Because for most people to get any utility out of it, they need to plug in a smart device.

It doesn't matter whether you run android TV from the TV itself or an external device.

All the popular streaming services throttle or block open devices.

There's no regulation on it, because regulators want locked-down hardware that can only take actions approved by them.

People want 4k, HDR, 60+ inches.

What keywords did you use? Dumb TV gives zero hits.

because 40 inches is tiny these days (sorry boys).