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Matchstick and Mozilla Take On Google's Chromecast With $25 Firefox OS Dongle
An anonymous reader writes Matchstick and Mozilla today announced their open-source take on the Chromecast: a $25 Firefox OS-powered HDMI dongle. The streaming Internet and media stick will be available first through Kickstarter, in the hopes to drive down the price tag. Jack Chang, Matchstick General Manager in the US, described the device to me as "essentially an open Chromecast." He explained that while the MSRP is $25 (Google's Chromecast retails for $35), the Kickstarter campaign is offering a regular price of $18, and an early bird price of $12.
I really do like my Chromecast. Even if it is powered by Google. This device definitely has an uphill battle ahead of it.
The only saving grace for this unit is the open nature that ChromeCast really doesn't have yet.
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
Should've named themselves Washington Redskins.
It would have been nice if this had been posted before all of the $12 devices were spoken for. I went to the site as soon as this was posted but all 500 were taken.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
The deal under which Mozilla makes about $300 million a year putting Google as the default browser in Firefox is ending in November of this year. This deal provides the vast majority of Mozilla's funding. Does Google need to renew it? The situation has changed from 4 years ago - Chrome is the default on Android, People are installing it on their laptops to have the same browser as their phones, etc.
So maybe Mozilla can see the writing on the wall and doesn't care to "offend" Google any more. Making the Firefox phone OS, and now competing with Google Chromecast ... and on tablets, desktops, and TVs. Because there aren't already others competing for the bottom 0.01% of users in any of those spaces (hello, Canonical).
Because really, if Google doesn't renew the deal, or renews it a a much lower price, there's going to be a lot of pain and suffering at Mozilla. And if Mozilla signs with Microsoft instead, how quickly do you think people would put their default search back to Google? Microsoft knows that, so they're not going to be willing to pay big bucks either for a browser that has lost half it's market share and that most FF users will quickly switch back to Google for their default search engine.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
From the Kickstarter page, the computer they are trying to fund is going to be based around a Rockchip 3066 SoC.
Will this have the same proprietary blob required to function / use video like the various Broadcom (Videocore in Raspberry Pi) / Marvell chips are stuck with?
If so, it's not actually Free/Open hardware, because that mystery embedded RTOS can do anything to my system at any time. If Mozilla and/or Matchstick are working with Rockchip (or whomever Rockchip licenses their cores from) to fully document the toolchain, I'd be delighted. (I'm not holding my breath.)
I don't just want a Free and open-source graphics device driver, I want the full documented toolchain for everything on the chip.
o/~ Join us now and share the software
Why would they give me money as a reward for funding them with money?
They give you a $200 per diem at CES. But.. why not just make the reward level that much cheaper? I don't get it.
Is this actually Open Source or just lip service Open Source?
You might want to be more specific about your brand of smart TV. I got an LG and the Plex support is awful (even though Plex claims LG is a supported brand). Some stuff would play OK when it was encoded in something that was native for the LG, but transcoding just didn't work right. I ended up switching from Plex to the open sores Universal Media Player and that is at least working with transcoding. Clunky interface and slow to respond sometimes, but at least I can watch stuff that I couldn't watch with Plex.
I think the bottom line here is that there is a lot of variety between the various options. In my opinion the Roku 3 is probably the top end, and the "Smart TVs" are likely at the bottom of the list. The hope for this device is that it will be open and not go out of its way to prevent useful things from being done with it like Chrome cast did when they stopped many early apps from working. And I doubt that you are seeing may apps or channels being added for your "Smart TV" (I'm sure not).
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Consider a Raspberry Pi B+. You can add IR (or bluetooth), it's full HD, has four USB so you can add WiFi and other stuff, has a camera interface, there's a media player configuration to fool with right out of the (NOOBS) box, Youtube et al are all available over the web, etc... and it's pretty easy to move, too. HDMI cable, power supply, that's all. Presuming you've an IR or bluetooth remote working with it.
And it's all about as open -- hardware and software -- as most stuff tends to get, which is handy if you want to get all hammer and tongs on it.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The Rockchip 3066 appears to use ARM's proprietary Mali T-series graphics. No, thanks.
Quote from the dev lead on the Mali graphics:
o/~ Join us now and share the software
I really don't understand what this stuff (either Matchstick or Chromecast) is good for. Why don't you plug your HTPC into the TV? Are these things for oddly-shaped rooms where people just have to have the computer and monitor on different sides, without a cable?
Someone please ELI5 me (that's the currently hip way to ask for explanations, I hear) WTF the use case is for wireless HDMI?
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
I have a cheap $18 dongle I bought off of Ebay. Seems to work well enough.
Nobody's listening to you after seeing you "Run, Forrest: RUN!!!" from apk here http://yro.slashdot.org/commen... where your transexually twisted by estrogen doses to a male body dim brain shot its mouth off writing checks your ass can't backup disproving apk's points on hosts superiority to adblock by far in terms of abilities and efficiency doing a far better job than what a dullard like you suggested in almost all ads blocked.
Isn't it great to have weev back.
The thing with Chromecast is that you can take a tablet, hit the netflix app, play a video, push a button, and it's on your TV. There's a button to move back 30 seconds. A slider to move around in time. A pause button for restroom breaks. All controlled from the tablet while the video plays on TV. With Netflix, one episode ends and another begins. Very different from Cable TV where you have to be on time for the show to start and deal with all the commercials (even on PBS) or futz around with VCRs/DVRs. Pricewise, Cable TV requires converter boxes, subscription to massive numbers of channels nobody every watches unless it's to punish their kids, premium channel (HBO,etc) subscriptions, etc. It adds up to over $100/month pretty easily. It can break $200/month if you're not careful. (Accidentally ordering additional services with the remote is becoming a major problem. You can spend money by hitting the wrong button. Curiously, those are always the buttons that don't light up in a dark room.)
Netflix is under $10/month. The first month's savings pays for the tablet & chromecast. If people are sleeping, you can always just use the tablet and headphones. The only place it really breaks down is Netflix's reliance on Silverlight for computer (non-tablet) access, the requirement of HDMI-compatible video equipment, and the inability to time or space shift to non-internet-accessible locations. Mine you, those are not trivial to solve for Cable-TV either, but they are LEGALLY solvable if you have the money and time to spend. (MythTV anyone?)
So people, a LOT of people, are discovering Netflix. But they're using it through video game consoles and whatnot to put Netflix on their TV. This year, during the holidays, when everyone visits everyone, and everyone see's how to chromecast Netflix videos from the tablet... That's got to be a marketers wet dream!
You know, if they had decent advertising showing how all this works, Chromecast could take off a lot sooner. But I wonder who would accept such ads?
It is not even certified to work with Google's own Chromebooks.
I've been waiting for 2 years for firmware support by the manufacturer, but since they've released two new products to diereses the rk3066, and they're also only 720p kernels, I guess I will have to give up.
We have one TV. We don't have cable. When my wife wants to watch something on HGTV, she loads the HGTV app on her ipad and chromecasts whatever it is she wants to watch. When the midget wants to watch minecraft videos, she chromecasts that from Youtube. When the big one wants to watch crap on Netflix, she chromecasts it from her nook. When middle child isn't playing soccer, she tries to watch soccer through that app.
Of course, with 4 women in the house, when I try to watch TV, four women have 16 other things that I absolutely must be doing then, all of which, are, apparently more important than sitting down with a beer and watching TV. This is why I refuse to pay for cable.
I think you'll find it's well and truly thriving around the world, just not in your latte-sipping proprietary-startup loving neck of the woods.
I have a Chromecast because I was curious, and it was cheap (I have a Chromebook too, for much the same reason). I actually do prefer it to the Playstation or a Computer to view Netflix/Youtube, but yeah, not a lifechanger.
However, several of my friends that do not own game stations or special TV computers etc etc really love the device. They already have phones and/or laptops and it's cheap, and it's perfect for them. So maybe we're not in the main target audience. :)
Also, it's nice that any web site can add support for it without having to make a Playstation or computer application, for instance Swedish Television (think like BBC) has support directly from their website, streaming and archives.
As this product is open hardware/software, Could it be possible (by any kind of trick/tweak ) that it can support USB stick/SD card kind of memory device & play them on TV directly? Can such feature save energy compared to playing content via smartphone/tablet/PC? What is the hardware/software changes expected to include such feature? I know this product is promoted as streaming device.
is long term growth potential just a phrase to cover the fact something hasn't taken off yet? Sounds like Wall Street speak to me.