Oh hey, I've been toying with this idea for a while
SmartTVs don't have a lot of great options for privacy. Discussions here and elsewhere usually end at one of the following:
- doesnt matter/every option is bad
- appleTV is the best worst option
- sail the seas matey
I'm dissatisfied with these conclusions. Unless you're willing to do crime, you have no practical steps to take
The unavoidable issue: streaming services are incompatible with privacy. You are accessing copyrighted data on a remote server. The providers can and will track your usage & data (though users can attempt to approach anonymity when creating accounts via best practices)
The gains I'd like to see: there is no reason for the operating system itself to also be spying on you. Your options are limited with individual streaming apps, but there isn't a great alternative to the Amazon/Roku/Android/apple TV operating systems
I'm in the process of doing as OP mentioned: using an old laptop over HDMI to build a setup on secure blue, using Trivalent to access streaming platform webapps. Though Graphene would be an upgrade in my eyes, as the PlayStore apps have better UIs than the websites