Topic: TV
Roku Mobile App Relaunched With New Program Guide – Variety (Jan 17, 2017)
Discovery has been one of the biggest challenges in TV in the present era. There’s simply so much to watch, and so many ways to watch it, that the old interactive programming guide for live, linear programming simply doesn’t cut it anymore. Netflix has been a master of recommendations for ages now (and famously sponsored a big prize to improve its engine even further), but a variety of others have been working on this too, with Roku the latest. Interestingly, in contrast to Apple’s approach, this feature lives in the mobile app and not the main on-screen user interface, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it arrives there too sometime soon. Of course, the quality of the guide can only ever be as good as the partners that choose to participate – Netflix is a big holdout for the Apple TV app, and as far as I can tell it’s absent from the new Roku feature too.
via Roku Mobile App Relaunched With New Program Guide | Variety
Amazon Launches Anime Strike Channel for $5 Per Month – Variety (Jan 12, 2017)
Here’s the second story today about a tech company expanding in the video business. Whereas Apple’s video investments have almost all been happening behind closed doors, with very little public indication of where its strategy is heading, Amazon has been taking a different approach: drip-feeding piecemeal announcements that are slowly adding up to an interesting subscription video business. On top of the Netflix-like service bundled into Prime, it now has relationships with a number of standalone content providers like HBO, Starz, Showtime, and Cinemax, and this anime channel is its first Amazon-branded channel. This whole approach has now been branded AmazonChannels, and it’s actually a pretty smart strategy for building up to a more fully-fledged pay TV-type service. Anime happens to be one of those categories that has a small but passionate audience, and AT&T’s Otter Media has also invested in this space for similar reasons.
via Amazon Launches Anime Strike Channel for $5 Per Month | Variety
Best Buy launches cord-cutting campaign with website & how-to video – Rich Greenfield (Jan 10, 2017)
This move by Best Buy is both notable and clever – notable because it swings one of the biggest consumer electronics retail brands behind cord-cutting, and clever because Best Buy is selling far more than just online subscriptions here. It’s using the cord-cutting umbrella to sell lots of gear too, from wireless routers to antennas, and even offering to help with installation through Geek Squad and how-to videos. Stuff like this is just going to accelerate cord-cutting even further, pushing it closer to a tipping point where it will cause enormous disruption in the TV industry.
via Rich Greenfield on Twitter
Roku: 13 Million Monthly Users, 13 Percent Smart TV Market Share – Variety (Jan 3, 2017)
Roku has done well with standalone players in the past, but is also doing increasingly well in the smart TV space as a platform vendor. It claims 13% share of smart TV platforms in the US, and its TCL partnership seems to be really paying off. With Amazon also entering the market, this is going to be an increasingly competitive space, but it seems more and more TV vendors (with the notable exception of Samsung) are willing to consider outsourcing rather than owning the platform and interface.
via Roku: 13 Million Monthly Users, 13 Percent Smart TV Market Share | Variety
Dish unveils a 4K Android TV streaming box with Netflix, Sling TV, and local channels – The Verge (Jan 3, 2017)
Though cord-cutting is often seen as “breaking the bundle”, in reality many cord cutters end up creating their own stitched-together bundles of multiple streaming services, and in many cases an antenna for over the air content is part of the mix too. DISH’s Sling recognizes that, and this box combines the Sling service, Netflix, YouTube, and OTA channels into a single box running Android TV. That makes it a fairly compelling box – arguably more so than most of the other Android TV boxes out there.
via Dish unveils a 4K Android TV streaming box with Netflix, Sling TV, and local channels – The Verge
Amazon beat competitors in a new way this holiday season: Money spent on TV ads – Recode (Dec 29, 2016)
Most of the big online companies have eschewed traditional advertising in the past, and yet that’ starting to change – Google now spends money promoting its hardware, among other things. And Amazon is now spending increasing amounts – and more than Walmart or Target – during the holiday period. That can be read as a sign of confidence, but more likely it’s a sign that Amazon feels the need to reach out to new users (the 17%) to drive growth, which in turn may be a sign of a user base reaching saturation point.
via Amazon beat competitors in a new way this holiday season: Money spent on TV ads – Recode
YouTube Needs to Become a TV Star – Bloomberg Gadfly (Dec 29, 2016)
This analysis does a great job of breaking down a couple of specific challenges relating to ad revenue from YouTube – its relatively low revenue per user, and the need to break into traditional television to tap into a bigger video advertising bucket. YouTube has evolved – notably introducing a subscription model – since Wojcicki took over, but arguably not enough. And YouTube is critical for Google growing its overall ad revenue.
via YouTube Needs to Become a TV Star – Bloomberg Gadfly