“To some, Apple TV seems like a laggard,” Greg Sandoval reports for The Verge. “The web TV box that Apple has referred to for years as a ‘hobby’ is only now offering access to shows and events from HBO and ESPN — long after Roku and Xbox. The truth, however, is that the process of acquiring and delivering episodes of True Blood and SportsCenter isn’t as easy as flicking a switch.”
“Nothing is more time consuming than writing all the code involved and encoding HBO’s massive video library, said Otto Berkes, HBO’s chief technology officer, in an exclusive interview with The Verge. Apple TV was the first app that HBO created completely in-house, said Berkes,” Sandoval reports. “Prior to Apple TV, HBO teamed with third parties on its apps, but ‘this was 100 percent created by our software and design staff,’ Berkes said. ‘It marks a turning point. I would say we’re two times faster than just a year ago, and that will increase over time.'”
Sandoval reports, “One more reason that Apple may have appeared to dawdle getting content for Apple TV is that Cupertino was focused first to supply content for the iPhone and iPad. It stands to reason that those devices would go first, since a lot more people own those than they do Apple TVs. They were also likely an easier sell to cable and satellite TV providers, who were a lot less afraid of mobile devices initially than over-the-top boxes like the Apple TV.”
Much more in the full article here.
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