“That’s Apple’s attitude toward the streaming-media device, said Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook, who spoke at a conference in San Francisco on Tuesday,” Sandoval reports. “This doesn’t seem to be a good time to toy with online video. Competition is turning white hot. On Monday, the nation’s retailing juggernaut, Wal-Mart Stores, announced its intention to distribute films and movies over the Internet. The company also said it had acquired Vudu, the former set-top box maker that now sells media-distribution software.”
Sandoval reports, “Well, right now, Apple sells films and TV shows for PCs and the company’s ubiquitous handheld devices, as well as the wee number of people who own Apple TVs.”
MacDailyNews Take: That “wee number” of Apple TV owners is likely over 7 million by now; without any promotion whatsoever from Apple. By the way, Amazon is estimated to have sold 2.5 million Kindles to date. If 7 million Apple TV units is a “wee number,” then what’s 2.5 million Kindles? Well, let’s go to today’s arbitrary arbiter of success, Greg Sandoval himself, who, at least a million Kindle units ago, described Amazon’s device as the “popular Kindle electronic-book reader.”
Sandoval continues, “What remains to be seen is whether [iPad] actually spurs sales of video downloads… What may be more intriguing is if Apple takes the same route as Netflix and begins streaming video to people’s TV sets via the Web? A film industry source told me a year ago Apple had discussed launching a streaming video service.”
There’s much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: What we’ve been saying forever, as recently as Tuesday: Again with the “hobby.” We don’t have much to criticize when it comes to Cook, but please stop referring to Apple TV as a “hobby.” The reason why Apple TV has sold “only” around 7 million units lies somewhere between content providers not offering enough reasonably-priced content to Apple TV and Apple treating the device like a red-headed stepchild.
When your cable company-issued DVR inevitably screws up, Apple TV is invaluable. When you want to catch a movie without any hassle, Apple TV is great (rentals more so than purchases, which are priced too high). For sharing music, home movies, YouTube content, podcasts, and photos, it’s excellent, too. Why Apple either belittles the device as a “hobby” or just completely ignores it and fails to promote it is beyond us.
We have Apple TVs. We use Apple TVs. We love our Apple TVs. Apple TVs are great devices that do many things well. It sells itself to people who see us run it through its paces. Why Apple hates their own product remains a maddening mystery to us.
Here’s a plan, Apple (and this goes for everyone from Steve Jobs on down):
1. Stop referring to your product as a “hobby.” You’re not just talking to analysts; everybody hears you. You’re denigrating the product for no reason. Why don’t you just come out and say “don’t buy it?” Idiocy happens at Apple, too; thankfully, it’s rare.
2. Start – gasp – actually promoting Apple TV and maybe you’ll even surprise yourselves by actually selling units beyond the relative trickle to those who are extremely-in-the-know and who sell your product for you via word-of-mouth alone.
By the way, Apple, if you make a TV ad, it helps to actually run it:
Direct link via YouTube here.
Here’s the problem with AppleTV: People have to pay for it. They don’t have to buy hardware for PPV or OnDemand movies. My Blu-Ray player can access YouTube, Blockbuster and Netflix, and it was $80 cheaper than an AppleTV. I can connect my MacBook Pro to my TV and rent via iTunes, NetFlix, etc. that way. So while Apple TV is nice, most people can’t justify the added expense just to rent movies.
Apple needs something seriously different than renting/buying movies it it wants AppleTV to be bigger than what it is. Simply linking to your iTunes and iPhoto libraries is not enough.
I suspect Apple has big plans for AppleTV, but either the content or hardware is not ready yet or cost-effective enough to warrant releasing it.
@daugav369pils
No worries, you can.
But when are you going to get your content? Hulu for some shows until they start charging or you have to sit through commercials. You can buy shows on iTunes but most people don’t want to own TV shows. You could get Elgato in order to have DVR capabilities.
None of them is the perfect solution. What happens when you need to work on your computer or leave the house. If you had other family members, they’d be out of luck.
I think Apple almost needs a home server sort of appliance to house all your content and stream to any and all devices in your home. Or maybe that ends up being stored on the cloud one day
…”The MacBook Pro display is 1440 by 900. Why can’t
I connect it to my 50″ plasma Panasonic?”
Did you try it? Does your TV have a DVI (or VGA) input? MBP supports full HD at 1920×1080 on the secondary monitor, so you should be able to do it. I have successfully done exactly the same thing with my cheapo Dynex 40″ LCD HDTV.
The hassle of doing it in the living room, though, makes AppleTV a very compelling purchase. My MBP sits on the coffee table. I have plenty of media on it that I’d want to watch. But I had hooked it up to my HDTV only ONCE (when I first bought the TV, to test it). While the picture is perfect, and all works as expected, my wife and I have yet to watch a single film that way. It’s just a major hassle, having to drag the laptop up to the TV, pull out cables (VGA, as well as audio), hook it all up, navigate to the movie file, make sure it shows on the external screen, and not have the ability to pause when someone wants to step out of the room.
While you CAN do all these things with your laptop/desktop, most people spend extra money in order to get the convenience. Hence, proliferation of Blu-ray players, set-top DVRs, etc.
1. Give tv an updated aluminum/black appearance
2. Increase HD capacity
3. Allow additional HD platters (same form but slimmer) to be added
4. Put iPhone/iPad OS on tv
5. Open up Safari
6. Allow iPod Touch, iPhone and iPad to function as remote/input devices
7. Add DVR capabilities
8. Let App Store apps run on your tv
Has anyone considered that the only reason they made Apple TV was to appease or lure the movie/TV companies into letting Apple sell/rent movies and TV shows? I think Apple doesn’t see the Apple TV as a long term solution. I mean, why buy an Apple TV when you can do the same things with an iPod/iPhone and a connection cable. It is the only thing that makes sense to me.
If Steve really thought Apple TV was the way to go, they would have by now.
@ disposableidentity
You have it right
I can see “AppleTV” evolving two ways.
It could become some sort of hard drive-free HDMI “dongle” (like an AirportExpress) that wirelessly streams video from a Mac/PC iTunes (or one day direct from an iPad).
The iPad on a coffee table becomes the primary way of buying and browsing content. (Similar to using an iPod Touch as a remote, but actually letting you use a “full” version of iTunes right on your lap).
I have an ATV and love it, but have thought about going the Mac Mini route, so I could use the web, skype, iChat
If they could make a small inexpensive wifi , ATV version to work with the iPad!!
I can still see an upgraded stand alone ATV with bigger storage, exct..
Not enough
The current version of tv does a lot of nice things but not quite enough to convince me to buy one.
Access to iTunes from the living room is great, as is viewing slideshows of your photos. Those almost make it worth it alone, but I keep feeling like Apple has more in store.
why would I want to buy any TV shows or Movies from Apple when I can buy cheaper on DVDs AND with subtitles!!!
Apple lacks any subtitles on their videos, at least most of them.
Ask much as I love apple, atthis tome they cannot touch netflix when it comes to streaming. I can stream thru my blu-Ray player, my macbookpro, my netbooks, anywhere that has a wifi connection. All for 11.99 a month which includes blu Ray and regular DVD rentals. And the quality is awesome. Just my 2 cents.
They should update the Apple TV software to include iTunes.
Then, it would be a great combination with the iPad.
Remember that the iPad need to sync with iTunes. Asking someone looking to replace their old computer with an iPad AND Mac will not work. Too expensive.
The iPad + updated Apple TV combo would be awesome!
@daugav369pils
Apple does not allow HD rentals on iTunes, for one thing.
AppleTV will be updated once the final pieces of the company’s multimedia puzzle are in place — the iPad, the next iPhone/iPod models, a new U.S. data center and revamped content contracts with movie studios and TV networks.
The new mobile devices are in the pipeline for April-July timeframe, the data center is under construction and should be ready by winter 2010, but the networks and studios have been dragging out a decisions about new contracts, to give competing content providers a chance to put together competitive offerings — they’re afraid Apple will run away from the market with a new delivery system and business model.
These changes all should come together with the opening of the new North Carolina data center (hopefully, later this year). After all, Apple has a reason for building a $1 billion, 500,000 square foot facility. Undoubtedly, it is big, and not just for a “hobby.”
Who pays guys like Greg Sandoval to plant these articles? Is it the studios who want Apple to give in on its pricing demands or Netflix who gets publicity from stuff like this?
I have an AppleTV and I have a large library of DVDs (over 500) and music (over 1000 CDs). I’ve long since converted my music library into Apple-Lossless (for home consumption) and 160Kbps AAC for on the road/ipod. When I was looking to convert my DVDs so that I could view them on the AppleTV, I didn’t relish the VAST amount of time it would take to convert them to MP4/mov format via Handbrake/VLC to view on the AppleTV. The answer for me was to install XBMC(http://xbmc.org) on my AppleTV. XBMC will run virtually every audio/video format out there. The UI is very customizable with numerous skins/themes. In addition to excellent media support, the library features of the software is awesome. While it takes a bit of tech savvy to install, you will be rewarded with the best mediacenter-type software out there. I still jump back to the main Apple UI to view podcasts I subscribe to. But, for music, movies, tv shows, pictures, it’s XBMC for me.
“For those of you requesting a DVR, it doesn’t make sense if they are also trying to sell TV shows and movies…”
And therein lies the problem.
I don’t care if adding DVR capabilities doesn’t fit with what Apple is trying to do. It fits with what I’M trying to do, what anyone with a TV wants to do at some point in there lives, and what VCRs, DVD recorders, and the Supreme Court has allowed us all to do for almost 40 freakin years.
10s-to-100s of millions of other people in this country, and 100s of millions-to-possibly billions all over the world, want TV recording capability in some kind of form factor, from any company willing to provide it. The market has already spoken on this.
Furthermore, cable and broadcast TV over the air is are a fact of infrastructure that will not be disappearing in any of our lifetimes.
These two irreducible aspects to the problem of making and marketing a device like the AppleTV can be ignored by Apple – that is there choice – but a relative few will choose to buy their product ‘hobby’ until they stop ignoring them.
Give AppleTV a DVR & OTA tuner. For full blown success, nothing else matters.
I hate Netflix. They keep sneaking their freakin’ ads onto my computer, even with adblock. I’ll never do business with them.
Fuck you MDN.
Mac-nugget
Times have changed
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewRoom?fcId=317366640&id=39
I want a blu-ray/dvd player. I seldom rent movies and don’t watch any TV shows on any channel. Yes, that’s right — I don’t have cable, satellite, or antenna. I did, however, put up rabbit ears to pick up the hour-away NBC channel for some Olympics. But we don’t watch TV and don’t care much for most of the movies out there.
We do watch videos but they’re not likely to be on the Apple Store. Plus the physical media is much higher quality and same price.