WTF IS TELLY?

Er, it’s a television…?

Very observant. But while the Telly has all the bits and bobs you get with other 4K TVS – a tuner, three HDMI ports, two USB sockets, Wi-fi – this is like no gogglebox you’ve ever seen before. For starters, it has two screens. The second one, which is separated from the 55in main panel by a built-in five-driver soundbar, works a bit like an Amazon Echo Show, displaying things like weather forecasts, sport scores and news headlines… but the most notable thing about the Telly is that it’s free.

Really? What’s the catch?

Well, the bottom screen is also used to show ads – so next to the latest stocks info, Kia will try to sell you a car and Pizza Hut will see if you can be convinced to order a large meat feast for dinner – but it also goes much further than that. When you sign up for your free set you must tell Telly things like how much you earn, what car you drive and which football team you support, plus the TV itself also collects data on what you watch and how long you watch it for.

Sounds super-creepy.

Yeah, it’s all a little bit Black Mirror. Telly has fitted it with a load of extras in the hope that you’ll think it’s worth sacrificing your privacy for a built-in camera, voice assistant and motion sensors, which enable things like Zoom calls, fitness apps and motion-controlled games. If you change your mind and opt out of the ads, you have to either return the TV or stump up $500 (it’s only available to our friends across the pond at the moment); but at least there doesn’t seem to be anything stopping you from just covering up the camera and sticking a large cactus in front of the ads.