Episode 590 - Hacking the Echo Dot

On this week's show: your smart TV is probably spying on you, so we talk through what to turn off and why “just don’t connect it” keeps sounding smarter; Matter 1.6.1 finally locks in Groupcast to help grouped devices act like a group; a local Sofabaton integration gives Home Assistant users more remote-control fun; Crestron and Hubitat get a pro-friendly upgrade; D-Tools says the CI market is growing and also very much not growing, depending on who you ask; plus a pick of the week, project updates, and so much more!
• LinkedIn CringeBot 3000 (cringebot3000.com)
• Free LinkedIn Post Generator (AI-Powered) | Postiv AI (postiv.ai/free-tools/linkedin-post-generator)
• HomeTech Headlines• There are ways to protect yourself from your spying TV (theverge.com/tech/997682/every-tv-company-is-s…)
• Sofabaton X: local Home Assistant integration for the X1, X1S and X2 (community.home-assistant.io/t/sofabaton-x-loca…)
• Crestron-Hubitat Integration Driver Gets a Major v2 Upgrade (restechtoday.com/major-new-release-crestron-hu…)
• D-Tools 2026 Midyear Report Finds Widening Performance Gap in CI Channel (cepro.com/news/d-tools-2026-midyear-report-fin…)
• Matter 1.6.1 finalizes Groupcast and adds chime sound controls (matteralpha.com/industry-news/matter-1-6-1-fin…)

• Home Gadget Geeks - The Average Guy Network (theaverageguy.tv/category/tagpodcasts/htpodcast)
• GitHub - loryanstrant/HA-CustomComponentMonitor: Reports on whether you are using your Home Assistant custom components (github.com/loryanstrant/HA-CustomComponentMoni…)