Slashdot Mirror
Apple, Google, and Amazon's Quest For One Remote Control Is Futile
smaxp writes: "If the cable and satellite live television providers were to comment on the latest Amazon Fire TV or reports of the new Google Android and Apple TVs, it would likely be in the voice and character of Charlton Heston: 'We will give up our remotes when they are pried from our cold dead hands.' Amazon's Fire TV and the rumored Google Android and Apple TVs excite and then disappoint. At first glance, it looks like cable and satellite television are about to be outflanked and the eternal struggle with the TV remote and set-top box will be solved with an intuitive interface to search both live television and archival content from streamed online video companies such as Netflix. Sadly, it isn't so. The cable and satellite companies that provide live television have made sure this won’t happen, because putting Amazon in the forefront would make live television providers’ brands less relevant. Amazon would then also have a wedge to pry its way into the live television ecosystem."
We will give up our remotes when they are pried from our cold dead hands.
Somehow, I just cannot hear Mr. Heston using the passive voice to say that.
What part of `yes no` don't you understand?
From the headline, this looked like customers were rejecting some new, ugly, TV remote app that Apple, Google, and Amazon each had released a variant of.
From the summary, this looks like cable & satellite TV providers have the gall to want their name on the program search menu, which deeply offends Apple, Google, and Amazon.
At this rate, I suspect the actual linked article is a rather bland study of the inter-penguin behaviors of a group of rockhopper penguins during a 4 month observation that was initially proposed because the researcher thought the penguin-keeper at the zoo was hot.
This is complete and utter rubbish. It may not be time now, but that doesn't mean that it won't happen. Media is converging, we are beginning to see a move away from traditional broadcasters towards creators dealing directly with the end users. It's going to take a little while before its possible, but it will happen.
The evidence? Youtube for one. The production values are increasing, more content providers are releasing via YouTube and surviving on the advertising revenue generated from there. WWE for another, they're in the process of going direct to customer, cutting out the middle man. More content providers will go this way once there is a reliable revenue stream.
If content providers go this way they will want their content to be available across all of these devices to maximise their reach. Perhaps it'll go the way of gaming, with the manufacturers paying for a small subset of exclusives initially but will that be sustainable in the long term? It's doubtful.
You may think me a tired, old, cynic. I'd have to disagree about the tired bit.
I don't know enough to answer that yet.
I would not really prefer IR.
If the bluetooth in use is extremely standard, so that other devices and even software can be used to "emulate" it, then I'm delighted, as I'll (eventually) be able to integrate the box with other stuff.
If it's doing something grossly nonstandard, that just happens to be implemented on top of bluetooth, then I'll be annoyed.
Really, most of us carry a computer in our pocket 99.9% of the time that dwarfs the entire Apollo space program, and nobody can figure out how to remotely control a plethora of network media devices in 2014?
Seriously?
-Styopa
"We absolutely support your ability to have one remote control for everything... so long as it's produced by us and we lease it to you for a nominal monthly fee." -- Every programming provider ever.
They screwed up the CEC control protocol so bad that nothing is compatible. They had a chance to spell out the CEC and then DEMAND that in order to use HDMI they must fully support CEC.
TV and device makers are all ran by major retards that think they need to have special "secret" command codes. and it's complete BS. a LG tv set should be able to control any HDMI device hooked up to it.
The blame lies at the feet of the idiots that Designed HDMI. They are the ones that need to be beaten with a sack of hot doorknobs.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I'm afraid that simply isn't in the cards for you :-(
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Probably didn't want to spend the money to fight the cable companies
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Sports.
It's the only sort of TV entertainment where the value of the product drops like a stone relative to the time since broadcast.
Game of Thrones? Awesome, can't wait, will download and watch it when I get some spare time.
Superbowl? I'm putting my life on hold so I can watch the broadcast in real time.
Live sports is the only sort of TV entertainment that is PIRACY-RESISTANT. That's where the money is, so that's where the content licensing battles will be fought.