A debate as old as TV itself reignited at IBC 2026, centered on different methods of detecting or sensing who is actually in the room watching TV at any given time. User profiles have become the de facto model on TV platforms. But that model was borrowed from personal computing and works best when there is one person and one device. On a phone or laptop, the device is effectively the profile. The main TV screen is different. Multiple people are often watching the same screen, and switching manually between profiles across multiple connected TV apps is hardly the frictionless future the streaming industry keeps promising. As soon as you start watching something as a family or a friendship group and the profile model effectively falls apart altogether. The industry has therefore…