Comment by squigz
3 days ago
> When it comes to CRTs this is probably more true today that it was when this was written. I can imagine a future though where more people seek to repair their non-CRT monitors as stores stop selling normal computer monitors to push "smart" monitors filled with ads and anti-features.
I sort of doubt this will happen. Computer monitors are used by professionals in every industry all over the world. Going the way of smart TVs - which are more consumer-facing - would not make any sense.
Smart monitors are being widely sold already and getting more common. The fact that they generate continuous income for the manufacturer after the sale is too tempting for many companies to abandon entirely.
Most likely we'll see non-smart monitors only sold in bulk to business customers, or as highly overpriced displays with limited features (like we do now with TVs) or there will be enterprise options in software (probably though management software) to disable some (but not all) of the advertising, screen-capturing, and AI functions which is just what we see now with Windows and other hardware used by enterprise customers.