Here comes Google TV

People have been working on interactive/internet-connected TV products for years and thinking about the sort of services you can offer to TV viewers when you have a fast back channel. Even I was doing this stuff different start-ups and one big cable company in the late 90's

For example, think about what you can build when you know what a lot of people are watching in real time, or if you know what your friends are watching. Or to get feedback from your viewers (You think CNN and every other live broadcaster's fascination with Twitter is bad? It's the tip of the iceberg!). Or you want viewers to respond to your adverts.

Which set top box you have plugged in to your TV will be at least as important as the battle for dominance in the mobile phone space.

And, more importantly: There's certainly the room for some scrappy young start ups to make huge amounts of money from Google and Apple TVs app stores.

Well, most of the core features (flash games, streaming video from websites, pay video services) are already implemented by my Nintendo Wii or Xbox 360. So it feels kinda ho hum.

Google is a late comer to this field. They have to play catch up before they really gain traction in the consumer market. And no, being able to tweet from my couch, using my TV (when I could just as easily tweet ANYWHERE using my mobile phone) is not a killer app.

My thing is, whatever happened to Google just launching things without announcing them? They still do it for features, but no longer for products. Maybe it's something you can't do with physical products because consumers might postpone their buying decisions for competitors until after the launch. Still, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth when I see us announcing things that are not even nearly done yet.

Hasn't Hulu had a LOT of issues getting permission to be involved with anything designed to be displayed on a TV? They've blocked Boxee and several other similar offerings. Last I checked their content providers wanted it to be a "everything BUT TV" service.

Google might make money from advertising, yes. But, as far as the average person is concerned, Google means search.

Whether Google likes it or not, their name is synonymous with search. When someone says "Just Google it", they don't mean to go to your tv and start watching something. They don't mean to look at your phone and play a game. They mean to go to your computer, open a web browser and search for something.

Google search came before adsense, btw.

Also, you could say the same thing about facebook. It's not a social network, it's an ad aggregating company who merely used the vast network of people for enabling it's business.

Also, magazines, newspapers, tv, etc.

Basically, it's a tautology for anyone running ads.

I highly doubt that a TV with an embedded ARM processor running Android is any serious competitor to a state of the art game console with the ability to run 1080p 3D graphics, use seven controllers, and store massive amounts of game assets on Bluray disks. They don't even compare IMO. And yes, I have a PS3 and a Roku box and a TiVo HD...

I think Playstation is actually a separate company (SCEI) from Sony TVs. Although given the way Sony Music sabotaged the Walkman division, I wouldn't be surprised if SCEI tried to sabotage Google TV.

There's no connection. Live streaming will be driven by wide public availability, e.g., web browsers. It's not going to yoked to a specific piece of Android kit.

Are you aware of any cases where existing TVs gained significant new streaming features after the fact? This sort of integration is an inducement to buy, not an inducement to remain brand-loyal on your next TV purchase.

Not on your current TV. The current crop of Samsung devices don't have the processing power to run Google TV. I'm pretty sure the Sony Google TVs will be an upsell, unlike the current TV platforms the chipsets needed to run Google's platform are expensive I think you're going to need to pay for a "Google TV enabled" device, unlike the Yahoo widgets which you get for "free". This may change in the future but for now its not.

The big seller for me is Hulu, I mean right now I can use Netflix on the Wii and I can use Hulu with my laptop. Without Hulu or cable/satellite it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

You may be a better candidate for the Logitech offering.

I was just thinking the same thing. I love Boxee, but it's difficult to see where there will be room for them in this space once Apple and Google have carved it up between themselves.

It's about the only thing that can be relied on. Anything else is proprietary or obscure.

Netflix streaming in consumer devices (game consoles, Tivo, Roku, AppleTV, iOS gear, various televisions and blu-ray players, etc) never depends on a web browser. There's no cursor, no mousing, and no typing except with a ouija-board interface or an optional peripheral.

I used it with Chrome yesterday just fine. Maybe your Chrome doesn't have Silverlight correctly installed, for the on-demand video? For the video that's what really matters, the browser is just a container at that point regardless of which browser it is.