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MX Player, a Video App Used By More Than 175 Million Users, Debuts OTT Service. Android Enthusiasts Express Concern. (venturebeat.com)
MX Player, a video app which has been downloaded more than 500 million times across the globe, kickstarted its OTT (online video streaming) service in India, one of its largest markets, this week. MX Player, which is popular worldwide, has earned a loyal user base over the years for being the app that can run any video file you throw at it, even if your smartphone, tablet, or Android TV box doesn't have high-end specs or updated software. It was acquired by Times Internet, an India-based conglomerate this June, and now the big giant is beginning to show what it intends to do with the app. From a report: [...] All of these titles, including those produced by Times Internet, are now available to MX Player users in India at no charge, Karan Bedi, CEO of MX Player, told VentureBeat in an interview. Like most of Times Internet's properties, which include several TV channels and newspapers, MX Player will count on ads to generate revenue. Betting on ad-driven business model, a popular path in developing markets, could help MX Player quickly convince its existing user base to give the streaming offerings a try as it begins to compete in the Indian market. Star India's ad-supported service Hotstar, which offers about 80 percent of its catalog to customers for free, currently leads the video streaming market in the country.
Going forward, Bedi said, the company remains committed to making investments in what made MX Player so popular among customers: The ability to play a plethora of video files on low-end devices. The company won't be bringing its new streaming offerings to the paid version of the MX Player app, MX Pro, he said. Additionally, MX Player's streaming offerings are limited to India, one of its largest markets, for now, although Bedi said the company is working on the right content catalog for other regions. Over at Android sub-reddit, where this story has been discussed, dozens of users expressed their concerns on the direction MX Player appears to be headed.
Going forward, Bedi said, the company remains committed to making investments in what made MX Player so popular among customers: The ability to play a plethora of video files on low-end devices. The company won't be bringing its new streaming offerings to the paid version of the MX Player app, MX Pro, he said. Additionally, MX Player's streaming offerings are limited to India, one of its largest markets, for now, although Bedi said the company is working on the right content catalog for other regions. Over at Android sub-reddit, where this story has been discussed, dozens of users expressed their concerns on the direction MX Player appears to be headed.
Going forward, Bedi said, the company remains committed to making investments in what made MX Player so popular among customers: The ability to play a plethora of video files on low-end devices.
This gentleman got it wrong! he should have written that second sentence as follows:
The ability to play a plethora of video files on low-end devices, with no ads, let or hindrance. (Bold mine).
I can confirm to the poor fella that the player will be off my phone within hours after seeing the first ad.
If you're going to use obscure acronyms, at least spell them out once. I get tired of articles where I have to make 10 trips to Google just to translate them to something resembling English. Even those of us who are tech savvy cant keep up with all the latest shorthand.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
With VLC, I've been able to play any video file you throw at it, even if your smartphone, tablet, or Android TV box doesn't have high-end specs or updated software. VLC is open source so i trust it and it doesn't display any ads.
Has anyone here actually used MX? Sounds like a downgrade to me.
Well if dozens of people on a blog are concerned, who am I not to be?
I guess it really shows were /. is headed nowadays when the forum users are worse than some AOL group user in their ability to use the internet.
OTT is a well established concept ever since netflix came along. And for all the others who hear this the first time, they can use google.
The first entry I get in my localized google version is a special wikipedia link since basically google itself tells me the definition. However it's in pretty much any wikipedia version, including the international one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
It's a video service without their own distribution service (antenna, dish, copper lines, etc.) instead only using the internet.
VLC's tracked 2 billion downloads, and that figure doesn't include installations coming from Linux distros, app stores, or other third parties (I get mine from packman.links2linux.de).
I saw the article title, and my first thought was, "Why are we posting stories about a 30-year-old ballistic missile program?"
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
FYI even the early symbian phones were "spyware phones". And every single modern phone is.
There's a reason why state security people require that any high security meeting, no phones are allowed in the room.