Chromecast with Google TV
store.google.comDon’t forget Google already abandoned Google TV once: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_TV
I bought it as a gift for someone once and they cancelled it and deleted the SDK.
Back then, "Google TV" was its whole own OS initiative. This was years before Android TV was a thing. But Google TV had far less wide-ranging industry support than Android TV has today. And Google TV needed industry support, because it was literally just an OS platform (like Android TV) rather than something Google was able to push by shipping its own hardware. No third parties interested in integrating the platform? No point.
This go-around, "Google TV" seems to be just some first-party Chromecast hardware running an OEM skin over Android TV OS. Much lower CapEx. Far easier to justify as a Google project.
(And it's a logical strategic move, too. A lot of smart TV manufacturers are shipping crap Android TV implementations that plaster advertising everywhere; and the advice everyone gives to get around that is to get an Apple TV, because Apple's tvOS doesn't force ads on you. That gives the Apple ecosystem a foothold in otherwise-Google-ecosystem homes and businesses. Google is likely willing to spend a lot of money to prevent Apple getting that foothold.)
Google literally just added auto-playing semi-fullscreen video ads to Android TV in August:
https://9to5google.com/2020/08/05/android-tv-homescreen-ad-c...
As long as Google makes its money selling ads every one of their services is just one lousy executive seeking "synergies with the ad business" away from ruining the experience.
This is incredibly wrong. Android 3 honeycomb was the basis for Google TV. Most of those APIs were quickly deprecated. Please read:
Wikipedia has moved the discontinued Google TV page here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_TV_(discontinued)
don't know about google tv, but chromecast is wildly successful.
Combing both Chromecast and Android TV (e.g. Nvidia Shield) has a less than 10% market share.
Making it smaller than Samsung, Amazon, and much smaller than Roku (market leader). It seems to have a hardcore audience that think the world of it (or who haven't tried anything else), but most of the market moved on years ago.
If anything this Google TV "Chromecast" is designed to make Chromecast relevant again.
> If anything this Google TV "Chromecast" is designed to make Chromecast relevant again.
Chromecast has always had the issue that it's main users are the tech savvy who are comfortable controlling everything via smartphone. That's not a huge percent of the population.
By adding the remote and going for the play of helping you navigate cross app, they seem to be trying to extend out to less savvy users who need a more guided product.
Overall it seems like the longterm plan is to push their subscription services, since I can't imagine they make great money from the devices themselves. Increasing user base is the best way for them to achieve that goal.
I'm quite tech savvy, but I vastly prefer using a remote control that I don't need to look at to control the TV that I'm already looking at.
Worth asking where the gesture & other potential touchless interface experiments are. Project Soli was supposed to be the high tech radar option to let one gesture above a phone to control things, but just picking it up & using it like a wand would be not-hard to experiment with.
I'd consider how much software adoption there is for Google Cast (nee Chromecast). A good number of web pages have dedicated cast support (better than browser's built in support), for ex Spotify. Most podcast & audio apps on Android have Cast support (pocketcast, spotify, &c).
While there may be more appliances out there, & some popular ones, they are kind off all off on their own with some random native apps cobbled together out of whatever random sdk the hardware has. The apps almost never coordinate very well with your phone.
Cast is absolutely dominating. Playing a far better game than everyone else. Easy for developers to work with (so easy with the web platform support being built in). Software adoption within a web page makes all the sense & is so easy & flexible. We haven't even seen multi-phone "multiplayer" cast apps get popular but it's easy to do. No one else can compete.
Please let OpenScreenProtocol start getting some traction so we can continue advancing these capabilities & start freely building systems that can work together.
Android TV is used by more than 160 operators worldwide, more than 150 TV brands and 80 retail devices.
That's not an "hardcore audience" to me. https://www.androidtv-guide.com/
Isn't Amazon's FireOS just a modified version of Android?
Both are just a modified Linux.
They're distinct ecosystems though because Android TV/Chromecast use the Play Store for content/app delivery, whereas Fire TV/Samsung/Roku use their own respective stores.
If one supported both the Play Store and their own, the definitions might be more subject to question, but as it stands they don't officially allow that.
It's fairly straightforward, Amazon patches Android, not Linux.
To create their own distinct ecosystem, which is what we're discussing.
Pointing out both Android TV and Amazon Fire is Android OS based isn't particularly relevant to market mineshare. Linux too is used by both (and others), but it would be pretty strange to try to combine them all under a "Linux streaming stick" moniker.
Yes
Chromecast is still a hit with anyone who torrents or streams live TV from local sources, and VLC users.
I'm not believing it. Those folks are using Android boxes, but they're not from Google.
I'm sure someone followed instructions they found on Medium and want to show it off to their friends. That's fine. Those aren't the majority of users though.
For half the price of a Chromecast, Android STBs are the 'hit'.
most of my friends are not into tech, yet they all own chromecast for exactly the reasons I cited. your milage may vary, but you have no reason not to believe it.
Isn't that the Nvidia Shield's niche with its local Plex support?
No clue, I'm on a Mac and no knowledge of Nvidia Shield. Plex is great for a lot of things but it's not perfect, has a lot of format support issues, and isn't as direct and fast as choosing a Chromecast Renderer in VLC
I've heard that outside the US, Android TV is very successful.
At least in China, so many TVs and projectors and set top boxes use Android under the hood, but they are so heavily customized it’s sometimes hard to tell. And it’s definitely not standard “Android TV“
Android, yes. Google, no.
There are so many knockoffs of knockoffs of Android STBs that you usually pick them up for < $30.
Is product success a useful metric for whether or not Google cancel services?
>> Is product success a useful metric for whether or not Google cancel services?
Yes. Unsuccessful products get cancelled.
The successful services get to stay but the customers get hit with "insane price hikes":
https://www.geoawesomeness.com/developers-up-in-arms-over-go...
Except for Reader, Inbox, Cloud Print, the Nest API, Code, among many others I'm sure. It doesn't seem to matter whether they're successful or popular.
I was a big reader person, but google is victim of its own success. These products were barely above a few million users. At google scale,1% is more than 15m person, and usually 1% is not justifiable
Yes. But also no. RIP Reader.
Probably didn't help that there wasn't an easy path to monetization for Reader.
Huh? If Google didn't want to charge a fee for use (which doesn't seem to be how Google works), then they could easily have inserted their own adds into the RSS feeds. Or had an ad bar in the Reader interface.
It seems like Google of all places would have been able to figure out how to support that with ads.
I just don't think that they wanted to. It didn't fit into how they thought people would be interacting with the Internet in the future, and I can't say they were all that wrong...
Too small of a product for google scale. See my other comment in this thread.
Usually yes.
Maybe this will be a product which Google cancels twice then.
Would that be a first?
"Anyone can rat, but it takes a certain amount of ingenuity to re-rat."
-Winston S. Churchill (quote likely true but original provenance unknown)
Looks like someone moved the wikipedia link to https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_TV_(discontinued)
... so now my post looks inaccurate
Oh boy, let me tell you about my LG Google TV (55GA7900). It was awesome when it was brand new, I really enjoyed being able to install various apps (this is pre-roku days where it wasn't common place). After a couple years, they moved on to Android TV - but everything still worked and they still pushed out some occasional updates. Well, a few more years went by and it became EOL. LG pushed out one final update which fixed a few things and disabled the update feature altogether (Android 4.2.2). Well guess what? The update was junk and made it where you could not scan for over-the-air channels. The scanner would just crash and no channels would be found. There was no way to go directly to a channel or manual add channels - scan only. So here I was with a smart tv that couldn't even watch TV over the air. I'm sure LG was also to blame, not just Google, but I sure wouldn't buy or recommend a google TV. Looks like they are now switching back to Google TV and the poor folks who were duped into getting an Android TV will be the next to experience abandonment.
More info on Google TV: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_TV
I have an LG Roku TV, and I can't manually add over-the-air channels. It's maddening that I can let it scan for 30 minutes and it won't add all the channels. And the Roku remote doesn't have a number pad, so you can't just punch in a channel number either. Also, there is no control to delete a WiFi network. So the only way to kick this thing off my WiFi is to change my WiFi password.
Google TV is software which runs on Android TV devices made by Google. It's not a replacement of Android TV. It's akin to Windows Media Center running on Windows XP.
Google TV was a predecessor to Android TV. Source I have one of each in the house, but also the wiki article in the post you replied to. Google TV may have run on top of Android, but it was its own Shell. The OS was still useful until a youtube update killed youtube on it. The TV came with a full keyboard on the remote.
The new Google TV is more akin to iPad OS and iOS splitting, where the TV and Phone variant can have their own identity, but from the looks of it, its starting out as just a single android app, and not a full on shell fork.
Yes I know. My point was that Android TV is already an operating system in itself (which already has it's own TV features), and Google TV is a rebranding of the software running upon that OS. Namely, the new home screen app.
Is that the case? Or is Google TV an app that you click from the Android TV home screen? I thought in this context Google TV is more akin to Prime Video or The Roku Channel. Can you escape the Google TV app and get back to the old Android TV launcher? Can you install the new Google TV app as an app on older Android TV, or is it an OS upgrade?
Maybe the line is so blurred between shell/launcher and app now that its a distinction without merit. They can just keep nesting shells inside apps recursively, ad infinitum.
I have the Google TV app on my phone already (the Movies & TV app auto updated.)
According to this article, it looks like another rebranding, which is exactly what happened 6 years ago when Google TV was rebranded to Android TV. Its a simple way to drop support for existing devices.
https://www.xda-developers.com/android-tv-rebrand-google-tv-...
In my country consumer protection laws say they would have to give you a new TV if the TV stopped displaying TV channels, even after all those years.
I had that TV years ago. I went through three of them before giving up and buying a Sony. Mine crashed every couple hours. LG sent a repair person to replace the main board. This fixed the crashing, but broke the tuner.
Given this happened twice, I sensed there was an issue with the complete model line and bailed. I actually boycotted LG products for a few years as a result of this experience.
Perhaps you just got the latest broken update when they replaced the board. It was certainly a software issue and if you were lucky and had already done a successful scan, then there was a way to work around the bug: https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/help/help-lg-google...
It's why I like a dumb tv with seperate 'smarts' as an external attachment.
I generally keep my TV much longer than I keep a laptop/computer.
IMO, Apple TV has been one of the strengths of the iOS ecosystem over Android. Chromecast has a lot of good integrations, but the dongle’s lack of a standalone UI with independent controls made it awkward for communal living room use. Looks like this could be a strong competitor and the price greatly undercuts Apple. I’m excited to try it out.
The BIG difference here is that Netflix is fully integrated with the search/queue/discovery experience, along with all of the other major streaming services like Prime. Apple hasn't managed to land that one yet – having access to their content baked into the experience is a huge advantage, let alone not alienating Netflix as Apple did in the past with the TV app: https://9to5mac.com/2019/03/18/netflix-apple-video-service-t...
Apple is really trying to get to this too. To give some examples, HBO Max, Crunchyroll, and Disney+ all already integrate into the "TV" app on iOS (and almost certainly on Apple TV) where their shows/episodes are searchable and your incomplete watches show up in 'up next'.
Netflix won't play ball because of Apple TV+, was likely a massive strategic error for them to jump to that when they couldn't negotiate deals with TV channels
Android TV already does that on versions 10 and 11.
If I recall correctly, this is more due to Netflix than Apple. Not sure if it is business terms or data privacy, but Apple seems open to as many TV App participants as possible.
It's the other way around – Apple imposes certain demands on content owners to appear in the app, one of which is basically treating them as dumb content pipes under Apple's brand – so Netflix, IMO wisely, said no. https://9to5mac.com/2019/03/18/netflix-apple-video-service-t...
I think that's on Netflix, and I wouldn't be surprised if it is because Netflix won't agree to whatever privacy rules Apple stipulates. Other services are searchable in the TV app.
Given the amount of Netflix chatter my Pi Hole blocked from my Roku when I wasn't even using Netflix, data harvesting seems to be a big part of their operation.
It's not about privacy rules of any kind, it's about Apple demanding too much control – similar to iOS, I suppose – meaning a bunch of big providers opted out. I get it. https://9to5mac.com/2019/03/18/netflix-apple-video-service-t...
I wonder if the search/discovery/queue for Google TV will also work with Plex and services like Trakt.
Currently on Apple TV I’m just using each service’s app (Netflix, Plex, Amazon) to watch different shows, but one UI that kept track of everything would be neat.
I've had an Apple TV for about 2 years. Last year I bought a Chromecast (against my better judgement) for my parents because their "smart" TV apps are awful. I would've bought them an Apple TV but they didn't want me spending that much on them, unfortunately.
But long story short, like you're saying the Apple TV's UX is on another level from the (previous) Chromecast since it lacks its own UI and controls. It's definitely one of the painpoints that I've noticed my parents having difficulty with.
Whereas Apple TV has an easy to use UI (other than individual streaming apps sometimes making their own media player UI, like Disney+ and Amazon Prime, which are awful).
i agree. at the time i purchased an AppleTV because ChromeCast was just awful. I'd lose connection from my iPhone, browser, friends would lose connection. Streaming from Plex was terrible. I liked just being able to have a dedicated box but didn't want to get a Roku/FireStick.
I'm glad they finally introduced this but it's a bit too late for me .
I hate that you can't browse media on your iphone while broadcasting to your appletv. Any video that comes up will take the place of what's playing on your TV
A chromecast is not in the same product category as a an AppleTV. You'd want an Android TV box/stick for that. Chromecast is more like a cloud connected miracast/DLNA target.
With part of the cost of anything Google related is your privacy....
I don't understand why this comment was downvoted. This is priced the way it is because the profit isn't in the hardware, it's in the viewer data. It's very cheap only if you set the value of your privacy to some very low number.
Anecdotally, techies are tiring of vague statements about privacy and 'you're the product', especially about Google. If theres a tangible cost beyond enabling ad targeting, people are still amenable (this has always been true for the general populace, Google has a more trustworthy image than Apple! Imagine that)
I think you're right about the attitude among techies - especially those around San Francisco - and I think that's part of the reason why our reputation is in decline. A lot of America sees us as a bunch of creeps spying on everything they do and they aren't wrong about that.
Video records are a special class of data covered by the Video Privacy Protection Act. The tangible cost is the risk that your viewing history would be used to attack you. It happened before and that's what spurred the creation of that act.
To put it more plainly: Americans love tech and trust it, and not so oddly, in reverse order of how _tech people_ appreciate the companies.
Look at these ratings, theyre in direct contradiction with your guess of what they are as well as your thesis: Amazon and Google both have above 90% trust, Apple has 81%.
I've meditated on them a lot, and came to the conclusion there's a lot of class issues in tech spaces, and a borderline condescending paternal instinct towards users. Over 90% of people know their information isn't being 'sold'
https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/2/21144680/verge-tech-survey...
I'm assuming you put sold in quotation marks because you are being generous and are really talking about disclosure in a broad sense.
Maybe those 90% haven't read stories like this one (which is about Facebook):
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-46618582
Or maybe they've never heard of a data broker? To be clear, I don't think Google sells user data, but do they share it with anybody like Facebook has a history of doing? That I'm not clear about. I think they may share it with other Alphabet companies. I think they do buy data from brokers.
And that law has no effect on Google. Google doesn’t sell data to advertisers. It sells access to you. Meaning they aren’t going to send advertisers a list of 20-35 year olds who like action movies. Advertisers are going to ask Google to target their advertisements to that demographic.
I'm not 100% sure, but I think there are also data retention limits and opt-out requirements as part of that act. Some states have stricter rules as well.
There is an opt out. The only retention policy is that records must be destroyed within one year after the account is terminated.
Why else would Google be producing hardware and selling it so cheaply if not to monetize usage data? Is there any world where the thin if any profit margin on Chromecast like devices are worth the revenue for a company the size of Google?
Roku - the leading company in the space - made $1.19 billion in revenue. I doubt anyone thinks that Google will approach Roku’s market share.
Roku is all about obtrusive advertising. Why would Google be any different? Do you think Google put a hard coded Netflix button on the remote out of the goodness of their heart?
> Google has a more trustworthy image than Apple! Imagine that
By what metric?
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/11/amazon-beats-apple-and-googl...
Apple has sold tens of millions of Apple TVs. Apple doesn’t break out the revenue in their earnings reports but they have definitely made billions in revenue from the business. With that large install base, Apple has growing power to promote services in the video streaming market which is worth hundreds of billions. The more power Apple has here, the greater their ability to extract a cut from streaming service revenue as platform owner. This is relevant to Google as a player in the video streaming market, who also owns platforms that compete with Apple’s. It would be stupid for Google to not put up a fight in this market.
Tens of millions?
No one thinks that Apple has sold tens of millions of TVs.
https://macdailynews.com/2020/09/02/strategy-analytics-apple...
The global population of TV and video streaming devices has now exceeded 1.1 billion, with Apple TV / tvOS holding 2% share, according to the latest market share analysis from Strategy Analytics’ TV Streaming Platforms service.
And this is from MacdailyNews. Definitely not an anti Apple rag. Apple has been calling the AppleTV a “hobby” for over a decade.
There is a reason that Apple is making deals left and right to get AppleTV (the app) on competing platforms and now they are making deals with Roku to support Airplay.
Doing the math on your numbers, 2% of 1.1 billion is 22 million, which is tens of millions. The 1.1 billion appears to include TVs with included “smart TV” software, which explains why it’s such a huge number.
Back in 2015 Apple said they had already sold 25 million: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2...
Anecdotally they’re common in households where people have iPhones. IMO, they currently have the best user experience to control a TV.
25 million is nothing. Apple sells close to 200 million phones a year. 25 million over a lifetime is minuscule.
Besides that, Apple talked about how hard it is to be “HDMI 1”. Especially now that all of the TVs have “smarts” and most people still have cable. Not to mention that an Apple TV is $149-$200. I have two ATV4Ks that were both free when AT&T was doing their deal. We don’t even use it on one of our TVs that have Roku built in.
Besides that, sales before 2015 are almost irrelevant. That was before it had an App Store. A lot of the new streaming services don’t even support it. Roku wasn’t being integrated into low end TVs left and right.
There is no better experience for most people than a TV with Roku built in. One remote controls everything.
I’ve found that the built-in smart TVs, including Roku, have a laggy and frustrating experience compared to Apple TV. Also, most smart TV software stops working entirely after a while.
I’m not saying it’s better. I’m saying it’s good enough that most people aren’t going to drop an extra $150-$199 for an AppleTV4K.
AFAIK, every TV with integrated Roku support is still getting updated.
Even if that’s not the case, you can pick up a Roku stick from Walmart for $30. That’s not to even mention game consoles.
Google already knows so much about you, it doesn't really care about your TV watching habits.
But maybe, they'd like to put highly targeted ads on your TV.
You don't think "likes action movies" or "watches romantic comedies" or "binge watches on weekends" are targeting segments that advertisers will pay for?
It seems like search intent data would be a great source of this kind of information that Google already has. I think this product is more about competing for market power as platform owner in the video streaming business, which is worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
I’d guess it could tie into the ad business by showing attribution when ads for media result in conversions that play on the Google TV, although I’m not sure how big the opportunity is there.
Who searches on Google for the movies and TV shows they want to watch on their TV?
I think I’ve searched on Google for most movies I’ve ever watched. Maybe that makes me a weird person, I don’t know. If you search for a movie on Google, you get a lot of information, including reviews, actors, links to rent it on Google Play Store, Amazon, watch it on various streaming services, etc. There’s money to be made being the place people go when they want things. Actually that’s how Google makes most of its money - companies pay a finders fee to have that demand directed toward them. Content ads are a smaller business.
That’s not what most people do. Most people are watching movies on their TV. The Netflix recommendation engine is a huge driver of what people watch. Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu and YouTube are the big four. I’m not sure how many people are actually watching YouTube on TV though.
You turn on your average smart TV or device, it’s also allowing you to buy movies on the device.
If you are binge watching TV, your TV knows. It knows what you watch, when you watch, etc.
I think what you’re saying here pretty much agrees with what I’m saying. By owning the platform where video is watched, Google will have more market power in the video streaming business. In the long run, that means getting a cut of revenues earned by video services on the platform, or preventing Apple from charging them that cut if they own the platform. It’s a much more integrated version of what happens now when you search for a movie on Google.com.
Apple already doesn’t get any money out of Google. You can’t buy YouTube Live TV nor YouTube premium via in app subscriptions.
VOD rentals from Google Play Movies isn’t making money. I doubt anyone is making money on it. Everyone is charging the same thing. I assume that’s because there is no room to reduce prices.
Apple, Amazon, and Google care so little about revenue from digital movies that if you buy a movie from one service and link your account to Movies Anywhere, all of the other services just count it as purchased on their services. It’s a feature not a product that couldn’t be above break even.
If you search for a movie on Apple and it is available free on another service you subscribe to, Apple will just tell you.
The only play for Google here is advertising and collecting user data.
There is no realistic alternative where Google is any more than a bit player when you have Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney, and all of the other players with real content. Google already gave up on originals on YouTube.
I think they can statistically analyze which category one belongs to among those categories.
Whether they can sell that capability to advertisers ? I don't know.
So exactly how would they do that without my viewing data and why would advertisers pay for that when they can get better information from Roku and the smart TV manufacturers?
How would Google possibly know the types of shows I watch unless I am watching something on YouTube without a connection to my TV?
Here is a link to the US store that works globally: https://store.google.com/us/product/chromecast_google_tv
The current article link (https://store.google.com/product/chromecast_google_tv) just goes to Google Store homepage for me (Finland).
Thanks, this was helpful for me accessing the Google Store from outside the US as well.
@dang, could we please change the thread link to the one above?
The Netflix offer is difficult to ignore if you already have the Netflix standard plan, it essentially makes this device cost only $12.05 ($12.99 * 6 = 77.94 - $89.99).
That kind of offer isn't itself surprising, but it being available to existing Netflix subscribers is unusual.
Tempted by the offer being open to existing subscribers, but seems odd they are selling a 4K/HDR supporting device, but not offering a 4K based plan!
They let you apply the value of this offer to the 4K plan, from the terms:
> You may apply the value of the offer to a different Netflix streaming plan.
I'm confused why they are not pushing the 4k plan as well, maybe that would put it out of a price target they were hoping to hit?
From the terms of the offer, it does look like you can apply the value of the offer to a 4k plan at a reduced duration.
* Offer value may be applied to a different Netflix streaming plan under the same account; exchanges in this manner may alter the duration of the offer. Netflix price plans subject to change and the duration of the offer value may be prorated accordingly.
4K streaming while everyone is stuck at home has been kind of a mess.
The device only cost $12.05 because it's being subsidized by data collection to track your viewing habits and make targeted ads.
Is it just me or is Google consistently awful at product marketing? They've already had a Google TV that they killed. They've also already killed Chromecast Audio. Now this thing is called "Chromecast with Google TV". I think consumers are going to be confused.
The ability to bundle in 6 months of Netflix for $40 is so random. Why not offer a YoutubeTV bundle? Where is the product synergy?
It's nice that Stadia will come later but that the fact that it's not available at launch is a huge missed opportunity.
It is most definitely not just you. The disconnect between the team that created this product and the YouTube TV/Android TV/Stadia/Google Home teams just shows that the leadership at Google must be extremely poor. I don't blame the engineers and product managers for making a siloed product. It probably a fine product on it's own. But the failure to connect the dots and capitalize on the synergies across the org speaks to a big executive failure. What could have been a big push for monthly recurring revenue through both YouTube TV and Stadia with enticing package deals is instead just a $50 gadget. Why does Google even bother with consumer products and subscriptions any more? The only thing I can think of is these tiny projects in disparate areas are just there to supply panel data they can feed into their ad profile algos, just enough data to be statistically significant and only ever popular by accident.
Marketers are a waste, let the engineers run product teams. /s
The integration with Google search and Nest devices looks so awesome. An easy to access platform independent watchlist is quite convenient.
I am surprised that they gave a button to Netflix as well on the remote. Though it does make sense considering YT and Netflix is what I use mostly on even Fire TV when not watching sports.
Partnering with Netflix is most likely to compete with Apple and Amazon. Enemy of my enemy is my friend.
How is Netflix an “enemy” of Apple? Apple has made sure Netflix runs well on all of their devices since the first iPad.
If not an "enemy", a competitor. Apple has Apple TV, Google has YouTube Originals of course but I see Google partnering with Netflix much more than I see Apple doing so
Google is also very bad at making its different divisions work together.
Which is pretty neat when you work on a competing product (and way better than having them use their dominant position to help prop up a new product).
I worked on a music streaming service for a long time. We had a stellar relationship with Google.
It felt a bit weird that they did not push Play Music more .. in my opinion it was at one time a great music service. Still, we did not complain.
Apple on the other end sees everything iTunes related as mission critical and working with them was a nightmare.
So, not surprised to see AndroidTV (which afaik has no relationship with youtube people) partnering with netflix.
And looking from the outside.
The Apple TV app works with third party providers along with Siri.
And Apple participates in Movies Anywhere. If you buy a movie from a participating studio from either Amazon, Google or Vudu, among others, it’s counted as a purchase in iTunes. The same is true in the other direction.
How much more “partnering” can you have than Netflix being one of the first streaming apps on the iPad and the third Gen AppleTV - which didn’t have an App Store.
There isn’t quite the integration between Netflix and the TV app as there is with other providers only because Netflix didn’t want it. But if you search for a movie in the TV app and the movie is available from both Apple and Netflix, they will show you it’s available in Netflix instead of trying to get you to buy it.
Apple sells hardware. You can’t sell streaming hardware that doesn’t work well with Netflix.
I doubt Apple sees AppleTV+ by itself as a profit generator any more than Amazon sees Amazon Prime as a revenue provider. It just makes the bundle more attractive which gets more people into the ecosystem.
Apple and Amazon have all types of bundle deals/discounts if you buy other streaming services within their apps.
I did not notice until you pointed that out. I'd be willing to pay extra for a remote without the YouTube and Netflix buttons.
> I'd be willing to pay extra for a remote without the YouTube and Netflix buttons.
My TV also came with such buttons and it’s one of the reasons I absolutely refuse to use that remote.
On a side note, anyone else get janky behavior trying to scroll on the homepage here? It feels like a janky/simpler version of what you see for the Apple product pages.
Yeah, the initial scrolling experience was insufferable. I had to resort to using pagedown and eventually just grabbing the tiny scrollbar instead of my mouse scrollwheel to make any sort of useful progress, and even then it was made difficult by absurdly "long" animations and visuals instead of actual information. The thing that really got my goat is how areas shifted in contrast for entire pages for single sentences of text.
It feels like there were maybe two to three paragraphs of text total on that page. I want to read the text. I do not want flying, fading out images all over the place.
This low-information-density design trend is an incredibly user-unfriendly experience for desktop users.
Yeah, the scrolljacking performance on Linux Firefox it atrocious for me.
Yes, that page was brutal, I really struggled. Took waaaay too long to figure out what the heck they were even trying to sell there.
Yes. It jerks based on the scroll wheel.
If you use smooth scrolling by middle mouse click then movement it works OK.
I still have the Sony TV with built in Google TV, which is a brick now, because I can't update it anymore and google has abandoned it. Not doing the same mistake again.
As opposed to other built-in OEM smart platforms, which definitely have a long life filled with useful updates?
The real solution is that the smarts should be in a Chromecast or Apple TV or Roku, that way it's easy to replace or upgrade.
Absolutely. A TV should be as dumb as possible. It's a large monitor with one video input and no speakers.
is a charge back or small claims court an option when the goods are taken away from you long after purchase?
probably not worth the time it would take, but this kind of behavior from companies like google is just so toxic.
Yeah, screw this. I already have a 2018 900€ Android TV from Sony and it really frustrating to a point this whole OS just makes me angry. It is really bad.
I've been a long time Roku user, who didn't like chromecast because I prefer a UI and a hardware remote.
The advertising suggests it organizes all services into one screen. That is promising. But I am willing to bet it only covers certain streaming services and wouldn't cover Plex (or apps like it).
I'll read reviews with interest.
Since it uses the Google TV app (previously known as Play Movies & TV) as the data source, it supports whatever that does, which almost certainly does not include Plex or similar.
On the other hand, it probably does support streaming from any Cast enabled app, so it probably won't be any worse than a classic chromecast, even if direct on device content is probably highly limited.
The real question is if it supports installing Android TV apps, to extend the built-in UI or if it is limited casting and the content from the app.
Another screenshot shows a "My Apps" row on the homescreen, so I suspect it might actually support installing additional apps. I tend to doubt they get to integrate with the launcher in any meaningful way though.
Android TV did allow that, but they seem to want to be able to support things like a single playlist across the android Google TV app and the various new Google TV devices.
This looks like the Apple TV interface for people who don't live in the Apple device ecosystem.
And probably pay less as well as get casting feature on non-Apple devices.
Disc: Googler.
Looks great, been waiting to get out of the roku world for too long.
Curious what the shortcomings of Roku are for you? I'm not a heavy user but my ultra has been great.
Also curious, I love my Roku. The fact the remote has navigation buttons and has a headphone jack when others are sleeping is amazing.
Not OP but I find the interface to be quite ugly and dated. Also some apps are missing (might be a region issue, though).
Google TV seems to be the most complete solution now. Next to Apple TV and Shield.
Bingo! The UI isn't the best and it does feel sluggish at times switching between things.
Also I really don't enjoy the Roku Ads and feel like that's just going to get worse.
Ridiculous that this doesn't work with Stadia at launch.
FWIW, reports are that it does work, probably some bugs or testing didn't make it in time for it to be official.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/29/21494161/google-chromecas...
Oh weird! Yes it seems like it will be coming in 2021. I bet that the latency of new Chromecast was too high and they'll need to spend 6 months optimizing before they can get it down where it needs to be, which means the 2 teams must have been almost blissfully unaware of each other.
This sounds like typical Google where the development of this product and Stadia were so separated that they completely missed the huge opportunity. What a frustrating miss. Stadia has been advertising like crazy and you'd need to buy the EOL Chromecast Ultra to play on a TV and they'll miss one of their strongest cross-promotions going into the holiday season. They could have been undercutting PS5 and Series X with a $50 device that played the same AAA games with the Bluetooth controller you already own. This company is a zombie.
Compared to LG webOS, which I already have, this doesn't seem to bring any value. LG already has the headline features here: voice search and find content across apps. I can search for a title by voice and my LG TV shows me which app offers that title. I have Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Google Play, YouTube, etc. And I can cast to the TV from YouTube on my phone.
On top of that I really appreciate how efficient webOS seems to be. Since the apps are just HTML/JS the updates are very unobtrusive, sometimes downloading a few kilobytes only. Not at all the horror show that is Android app updates.
It seems to have multiple streaming services (I see The Boys from Prime, stuff from Disney, stuff from Netflix, etc) is that correct? Or do you need to go into Crave/Prime/Netflix to see the respective shows?
Not sure about this but I’ll mention The FireTV stick will show you shows from multiple services without entering those apps. And any given show/movie has a “more ways to watch” Option to show where else it’s available (such as when a specific app has it for free). I can also watch HBO shows directly in the firetv’s native viewer without entering the HBO “app”
The AppleTV also has these features.
Headsup, for me (Mainland europe), this instantly redirects to the general google store homepage, which is currently selling the 'nest audio' product above the fold.
Not sure where to find the real product page.
Edit: Link: https://store.google.com/us/product/chromecast_google_tv
Does this mean the old Chromecast and all its functionality is EOL soon? Given Google's track record I don't see them supporting it for much longer.
Chromecast is nearly perfect for me because I don't need to clutter my TV or a device with apps I could always just use my phone apps that already were logged into everything to play videos.
I wonder if you can turn off the full screen ad? I'd rather pick my own background image.
Exactly, I love having my own photos as a screensaver with my current Chromecast.
Also I noticed with the latest upgrade they added the date the photo was taken on the screen, a small but very cool improvement.
So I guess they are still upgrading and paying attention to older models ?
Is Google TV rebranded Android TV?
The tech specs say it is running “Android TV OS”.
It is a rebranding and the new direction of Android TV. (https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/09/google-merges-chrome...)
> “But while Android TV is the foundation of the new Chromecast, the whole experience feels very new. Because unlike TVs from Sony and set-top boxes from Nvidia and other brands that run the traditional version of Android TV, Google has created a new “Google TV” layer atop the operating system that completely replaces the old home screen experience.”
From https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/29/21494298/chromecast-googl...
It looks like it's the rebranded version of "Play Movies & TV" based on the android app's title:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.and...
I think Google TV is the name of the device. From the launch livestream it looks like the same software will come to other Android TV devices as well.
So Google TV is a device which runs Android TV, which obviously supports Chromecast, because any Android TV device supports that, and lets you run apps such as YouTube and consume a US-only service called YouTube TV, just like any other Android TV device.
What’s unique about this? It sounds entirely underwhelming.
And I especially say that as someone who enthusiastically bought a Nexus Player, only to get rid off it a few weeks later.
"Android TV" is literally any smart TV that runs Android with Google's blessing. Analogous with "Android phone".
Chromecast with Google TV is more in line with Apple TV, FireTV, and the now discontinued Nexus TV.
I'm totally confused. So I have an Nvidia Shield that I bought a few years back.
How is this different?
Nvidia Shield is in direction competition with Chromecast with Google TV.
Usually, the actual TVs that run Android are marketed as "Android TVs". It looks like streaming devices like Nvidia Sheild do so too when they're in fact not "Android TVs".
That you have to ask this question. Google naming is terrible.
I love my little chromecast dongle. Makes my cheapo dumb TV smart enough to play tubitv or vhscast.com from my phone and when people are over they can send stuff from youtube as long as they're on wifi.
does somebody here know if you could install live tv providers like you could do with the usual Android based devices? i am specifically talking about this[0] app. It probably highly depends on the availability of the app store or sideloading...
[0] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=se.hedekonsult...
I would love for them to open this up to more android apps and support bluetooth pairing. This would be a hit if you could use Steam Link or Xbox Game Streaming.
It does all of that actually. Has the play store, any AndroidTV apps work, they just need to list them. However, those apps can be sideloaded. The Type C power port is also USB-C input :) just add a Hub.
As a current YouTube TV subscriber this confuses the hell out of me. I can't imagine what your average non-techy consumer thinks.
This is just Chromecast with a remote. I don't need it, I can just talk to any of the microphones in the house.
Is there a way to use this without the remote? The microphone is a dealbreaker.
I just get a page with a bunch of Nest cameras.
Does it run Plex?
Fire TV is really awesome. Changed my perspective of TV.
Does Google TV provide any content itself, or is this just a wrapper around other streaming services so Google can collect better data on what you're watching?
Well, they have Youtube and Youtube TV. Also, content bought/rented on Play store.
Play Movies & TV has been renamed to "Google TV", so I expect buying/renting from google will likely be highly integrated into this, since it is supposed to do things like share a playlist with the android app, etc.
Google TV is a device + client software. Google does provide content itself...in the form of YouTube.