My heating/cooling desires are straightforward: unless I'm gone, stay in this range. I am not gone on a predictable schedule, any pattern it picks up will be incorrect.
The only thing the "ugly beige box" doesn't do that I want is remote access, and that would only have been handy a couple of times in the last 11 years I've been in this place. And that is not worth the surveillance or the freakishly buggy behavior some people report.
I'm increasingly convinced the major effect of "AI" will be to ensure that instead of bugs not being fixed because ultimately they aren't considered worth fixing, bugs will not be fixed because nobody understands them.