Who's your favourite?

Is it Sandy and Sandra in London? What about Scarlet in County Durham? Tell me it’s not that family on the south coast with the dad who’s standing for Ukip?

I refer, of course, to the ubiquitous Gogglebox.

The Channel Four telly show has proved what we all knew - that the telly is so rubbish these days that the people who are watching it are better entertainment.

The show, which was launched with little fanfare, is now a big draw with millions tuning in every week (when it’s on) to catch up with the off-the-cuff witticisms from families across the UK.

Much like the soaps on telly itself you have families that you identify with and also families which make your skin crawl, forcing to turn to your partner/spouse/dog and say “Urgh, I can’t stand them.”

Now the stars of the show are, well, stars in their own right appearing on other programmes, presenting awards at ceremonies and generally being interviewed on the like.

The trouble is they are charming (mostly) in their own homes but when we see them in the ‘real celebrity’ world (if there is such an oxymoron) they’ll slowly just become one of them rather than one of us.

That means when they’re spouting off about Gail on Coronation Street’s hair or how Still Open All Hours was as funny as being covered in someone else’s cold vomit we’ll look at them with a jaded eye and say “They’re your mate, how can you say that.”

Which will mean the families will move from the sofa and be replaced by news ones.

The only trouble with that is that they’ll have queered the deal for the new families and the programme will go the way of the Dodo.

And then what will we watch. It’s not like we can go back to the telly programmes that are made to entertain us with actors and plots and stuff is it?

Well you could soon be the star of your own show if you’re not careful as it’s been revealed that one of the new generation of ‘smart TVs’ is listening to what people watching it are saying.

I say listening to it – that’s a slightly anthropomorphic description of what’s going on.

I’ve previously talked to you about the ‘internet of things’ where stuff like your fridge is connected to the internet and hackers could turn your cheese mouldy with a single keystroke.

However Samsung’s smart tellies go a step further with their voice activation feature.

If you’re too lazy to use a remote (and that is soooo lazy) then as you talk while the TV is on, the box may be recording your conversation.

So what you may think. Well, the recorded conversation is then shared with Samsung and third parties.

I’ve not been invited to the first or second party so I’ll be hung if the third party gets to listen to my witty banter without so much as a by your leave.

Samsung said: “If a consumer consents and uses the voice recognition feature, voice data is provided to a third party during a requested voice command search. At that time, the voice data is sent to a server, which searches for the requested content then returns the desired content to the TV.”

So basically they seem to be saying that if you say your PIN number there’s no chance of it going anywhere but I’m still slightly uncomfortable with my words being whizzed all over the world – especially when I’m describing Adrian Chiles in words of three syllables or less.

So as you sit down for the night you can feel secure that your fridge, telly and phone could all be being controlled by remote organisations and may or may not be recording what you’re saying.

And you never know, maybe in China, the Philippines or some other far flung destination a family may be sitting down and laughing as you make a barbed quip about the state of Gail Platt’s barnet.