Forum Discussion

johnlgoodman's avatar
johnlgoodman
Reel Rookie
6 years ago
Solved

Why did Roku change the way screen saver works?

Recently (within the last month) the Roku screen-saver takes the user to some random channel when the play button is pushed after the pause button was previously pushed.  For example, if you pause a ...
  • renojim's avatar
    renojim
    6 years ago
    boogernose wrote:

    renojim 

    What would be wrong about using the OK button???

    You seem to be directly contradicting me.

    I assume you know something.

    I'm pretty sure (but haven't tried in a while) if you press the OK button on one of those stupid screensavers that advertise other channels it will install the advertised channel, so it's a good idea to avoid using the OK button when dismissing any screensaver just to prevent developing the habit.  I stopped using any of those screensavers when I discovered they could add channels. 

    Just reading this thread it sounds like there's some kind of bug where the screensaver isn't displaying anything, but it's still installing channels?  It's hard to read between the lines.

JSAND's avatar
JSAND
Reel Rookie
3 years ago

Open YouTube TV

Start a show and pause using OK or >||

Wait for screen saver (default) to open

Press >|| 

Instead of show resuming the ROKU  channel opens which requires returning to home, reopening YouTube TV, and selecting show to resume.

 

renojim's avatar
renojim
Community Streaming Expert
3 years ago

JSAND, NEVER press Play/Pause to dismiss the screensaver unless you want to interact with whatever ad is floating across the screen.  When the screensaver is active, the first button pressed is ignored unless it's Play/Pause which will take you to the advertised item.  I know it's intuitive to press Play to resume your video, but get out of that habit.  You can also disable the screensaver or use one that doesn't have advertisements.  This is a very old issue and it's not about to change.

  • PearsonFlyer's avatar
    PearsonFlyer
    Reel Rookie
    3 years ago

    It's not "a very old issue". It started at the beginning of June when Roku changed their requirements and standards for screensaver behavior for channel creators.

    It's an extremely stupid decision. When you pause something, why WOULDN'T you use the play button to resume it? Of course you would. Instead, you get a download of whatever channel was being presented to you.

    The responses here from "community streaming experts" seem to be from people who have never streamed anything on Roku ever, and have no idea about how the behavior used to be versus how it is now, and why we might be angry that it's so clunky and different now, and ruining the experience of using Roku.

     

  • renojim's avatar
    renojim
    Community Streaming Expert
    3 years ago

    PearsonFlyer, all I'm going to say is you're wrong.  The ads in screensavers have been around for years as have the complaints about unwanted actions when Play/Pause is pressed.  You may just not have been using a screensaver with them or the channel/app had a private screensaver, all of which have been eliminated (I have no idea why).  I already said that it's intuitive to press Play to resume your video, but that first press doesn't do anything, so pressing Play doesn't resume the video anyway.  The "solution" has been posted many, many times.  Don't expect Roku to bring back private screensavers to fix this "problem".  When it comes to Roku, you either adapt with their changes (the reason behind many of which are hard to comprehend) or move to a different platform.

  • PearsonFlyer's avatar
    PearsonFlyer
    Reel Rookie
    3 years ago

    I agree, which is why I'll be moving to a different platform. Which sucks because I have several Roku devices in my home, but not for long.