Hacker News Reader

Comment by andybak | Hacker News Reader

I wonder if this will finally prod Google into actually marketing Android TV?

Google has no clue how to market a product.

Google has no clue how to maintain anything approaching a traditional customer relationship. They sort of got lucky with ads and everything else is a side show in terms of revenue so there's no incentive to develop products or businesses further.

> Google has no clue how to maintain anything approaching a traditional customer relationship

Yeah, that's a good way to say it. It just seems as they don't even believe in their products themselves, whom they're for and how/if they'll maintain it. They're great at making "tech demos" (for IO specifically), but products? Nope, sorry.

It's not about belief really, it's about necessity. At google it basically rains ad money 24/7, that plus backbone internet traffic is where the vast majority of their money comes from, and it's a ton of money. For everything else it doesn't matter if it's successful as a business or not. In fact, the best case scenario is mediocrity and barely breaking even in terms of costs. Because that means there are no consequences, no bigger implications, no expectations for improvement, etc. Google is sitting on several enormous multi-billion dollar businesses (youtube and office tools, for example) but they don't care to actually develop them into such. Right now they can afford to not care, and all of the internal incentives are aligned to promote not caring.

I agree with you. The only downside of this attitude might be the customer trust on the long run and with their future products. Basically, how long can they afford to be mediocre in those areas and will they eventually run out of people who weren't burnt for their money?

Also upcoming public awareness about ads/tracking and how to block them might bring significant changes in their revenue success.

Ads in general are in a long, slow slide into oblivion, so google will likely eventually have to change, but when the crunch comes will they be able to?

I want them to succeed so bad. I try to support them.

But you're 100% right. The user experience for glass and google fi have both been pretty horrible. They don't even have a mechanism to receive feedback, yet they are purporting that I am "beta testing" for them.

I have a feeling when they want to know whats good or bad at about a product, they look 95% at a database.

They are a frustrating company to care about. They have so much that's so important that they're working on, but they're like some half-interested genius teenager with a short attention span. They just don't have a significant commitment to anything other than making money through ad revenue, and that's practically heart-breaking.

And yet Chromecast is a hit (#2 in all Electronics on Amazon).

It is also cheap. I bet many are now sitting unused in drawers.

So cheap that I almost bought one on impulse, until I realized that I have no idea what I'd do with it. I'm sure a lot of people don't make it to that second step until after they click the "buy" button.

I can't imagine doing without one. What's do you use to stream arbitrary content to a big screen?

I have an Apple TV and an Xbone. Between the two I stream everything I care to stream, as well as anything on the local NAS. I'm not saying the Chromecast isn't useful, it's just not useful to me considering what I've already purchased. IOW, in my case Google was late to the game.

I think its getting obvious that they are having problems with their OEM relationships. OEMs want their own Smart TV platforms for their own ends. TV OEMs are also seeing the low margins on Android phones and want nothing of that.

I think Google was forced to give up on AndroidTV and just expects people to buy the Nexus Player for $69. Considering how much better the Nexus experience is on phones compared to the skinned Android versions, in the end, I think this is probably the better move. Especially when I can just unplug it and move it to a different TV. I don't want my TV buying choices to be limited to whatever model supports Android TV.

Not to mention, the low end is probably dominated by the Chromecast. I have two, they're great. I don't need yet another box or remote in my life. I just want TV's with Chromecast (or a cross platform equivalent built-in). I don't need more smart devices. In fact, I need less. The internet of things is greatly over-rated.

Chromecast is working really well for them. Android TV would make them compete with themselves.

They aren't really actively marketing it, and Android TV is a fundamentally different product. A Chromecast is a dumb wireless adapter for your TV with a minimal interface largely controlled by a phone, while an Android TV (and Fire TV, Apple TV, etc.) is a small computer designed around a 10-foot interface.

The Roku is in a unique spot: it's got a channel store, so it can be expanded easily, and it can be operated with only a TV (no phone or tablet required), but isn't to the point where it can run full apps. It'll be interesting to see what happens, given the Fire TV (excluding the stick, which is closer to a Roku) and current iterations of the Android TV have been sales disappointments.

I hope so. I hope it also goads them into improving the search experience on it.

Perhaps a lot of what Apple showed off is already developed into Now on Tap (part of Android 6).

Hard to know, though. Haven't seen any android blogs report on it.

Edit: I'm also incredibly infuriated that Netflix works in Apple's Universal Search but not Google's. That is infuriating.

> Netflix works in Apple's Universal Search but not Google's.

This seems counterintuitive to me -- you'd think Apple has an incentive to push people toward iTunes instead of Netflix, but I can't figure out why Google would want to obscure that content.

This isn't Google's doing. Android TV's universal search is open to everyone. Netflix simply doesn't plug into any of the Android TV features.

* Universal Search (nope)

* Recommended to Watch (nope)

* Using your phone as a keyboard (LOL NOPE GOOD LUCK WITH THAT PASSWORD BRO)

Looking at it backwards - Netflix doesn't want to integrate with global search, because they want people to just open their app already.

Interesting! Integrating with global search would essentially turn them into a media server. Never thought of it that way. Would that be... bad?

Their app doesn't have ads, thank god, so I'm trying to figure out what the motivation would be. Is it just trying to get people to watch Netflix content they wouldn't have otherwise seen?

Yeah - every time you load up Netflix you're presented with a front page of their choosing, outlining content they would like you watch (/think you should watch). Although there aren't ads, they still want you to get the most from your subscription, so that you don't cancel it.

If they just become a cog in a larger search wheel then you'll just go directly to the one show you want to watch.

Well, there's a couple things here:

* Universal Search - which they're doing with everything else - the user is trying to find a very specific content.

* Recommended Shows - the user is looking for things to Watch

Netflix could easily plug into both of these to capture the user - but they plug into neither and instead opt to create a suboptimal flow for the user.

What they're doing here is that, when on Android I search for a Show I never see a "Watch on Netflix" button.

And there's never interesting movies to watch on Netflix highlighted on my homescreen.

They're not doing themselves any favors by NOT having this functionality.

They're not doing themselves any favors by NOT having this functionality.

I suspect they are - their catalogue is strong enough (and paid for) that people will seek out the app when they realise it is not included in the recommended watching list.

Man you and I have a very different Netflix experience. I generally bounce off Netflix when I realize they don't have what I want to watch. I also very rarely browse it for content to watch as that takes _forever_.

Their strength these days is not their catalog size, which is constantly shrinking, but their original programming.

Which is exactly the type of stuff they should be surfacing in the OS itself - as it's what makes people stay with Netflix.

Netflix also works in the Roku unified search as well. It's really just Google that they're giving the cold shoulder to.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com