LG entering mobile CPU market - what are they thinking?

Yesterday, ReCode reported that LG is getting into the mobile CPU game:

“With this in-house solution, we will be able to achieve better vertical integration and further diversify our product strategy against stronger competition,” LG Mobile chief executive Jong-seok Park said in a statement. “Nuclun will give us greater flexibility in our mobile strategy going forward.”

A Porter's Five Forces analysis would show the mobile CPU industry is extremely competitive.  Intel can't even buy its way into mobile.  The size of the market is also limited because Apple and Samsung already design their own processors.  Although LG have experience in microelectronics, they don't have much of a semiconductor business.  They will be contracting wafer fabrication to TSMC rather than spending billions on a foundry, but bringing any semiconductor to market is still an expensive, time-consuming, and risky endeavor.

So what the heck is LG thinking?  It has to be all about differentiating their own mobile devices.  LG has been a distant fifth in smartphone market share at around 5% for a few years.  Perhaps this is their way of doubling down on the smartphone market to combat Samsung and lower-priced devices from Chinese rivals.

However, I can't help but wonder if end-users will really notice enough to drive sales.  I'd argue that an easier and perhaps more effective way to differentiate their devices would be to design a custom image sensor for a new camera design, or a new power management subsystem for longer battery life or faster charging.  On the other hand, HTC is continually praised for best in class audio and that hasn't done much for sales of the One.  Maybe LG should just spend the money on marketing?  HTC tried that too with a $1B ad campaign starring Robert Downey Jr.

No Android vendors have been able to meaningfully differentiate on software.  Motorola made a few nice enhancements to the Moto X, but sales still lagged.  Samsung's Note line does have some large-screen-specific software features that help set the device apart.  Most vendor's software tweaks are criticized by reviewers, who seem to prefer stock Android.

LG knows all this.  Maybe in their quest to set themselves apart, they've chosen an expensive and risky strategy to differentiate on the brains of the smartphone.  We'll see in a few weeks when the LG G3 Screen goes on sale in Korea.

What the Apple product lineup may look like in 2017

I've been thinking about what Apple's future product lineup may look like ever since they announced the Apple Watch and new iPhones.  In the past week we've had an iPad and Mac event, plus an earnings release that has shed a little more light on how the lineup may evolve over the next few years.  Here are a few predictions based on past observations, some hunches, and a dash of logic.  I can't wait to see how wrong I am.

iPhone and  Watch will finally kill the iPod line

Apple quietly discontinued the iPod Classic in September, but the Shuffle, Nano, and Touch still remain available although sales continue to decline.  In today's earnings release quarterly unit sales were down another 24% year-over-year to 2.6 million units.  Apple also announced they would start including iPod sales in the 'other' category instead of reporting their results directly.  iPhone (and the smartphone category in general) continues to grow, which has clearly hurt iPod sales and may also now be hurting iPad sales.  The Watch, which will have the ability to play music over bluetooth, has the potential to hurt iPod sales further.

If Apple were to upgrade just one of the iPod models it would probably be the Touch, which reportedly makes up about 50% of iPod sales, carries a higher price, and brings people into the iOS ecosystem.  The Touch runs the 3.5 year old A5 CPU, the same chip that powered the iPhone 4s, iPad 2, and original iPad Mini.  These devices are a little long in the tooth, and don't run iOS 8 or the newest apps as smoothly as they should.  However, I don't think it is worth their effort when so many people clearly prefer to listen to their music on an iPhone, and some may prefer a Watch in the near future.

Perhaps Apple will keep the Shuffle and/or Nano around for several more years without updating them, as they don't really need the latest processors or more RAM to provide a good user experience.  Even if this is the case, I think we will effectively witness the slow death of the iPod over the next few years.

Redefining the iPad

Personally, I think the iPad is a great product.  I also don't need to own one.  As phones get bigger and laptops get more iOS-like (better battery life, quicker wakeup, etc), iPads are getting squeezed in the middle.  Apple sells twice as many iPads as they do Macs, but the iPad growth curve is going in the wrong direction.  Apple and its developers need to invent new use-cases for the iPad.  They need more people to think 'I need an iPad because it is the best possible device for task X.'  Today, it's easy for many people to complete that sentence for a smartphone or a laptop, not so much for iPads and other tablets.

Perhaps a larger iPad Pro that really takes on laptops for light productivity will spur sales.  I don't know what the answer is, but I'm pretty sure it's not to make thinner/lighter/faster rectangles of glass year after year.

Another new iPhone size

I think we'll see another new iPhone size by 2017 - except instead of being called iPhone nano, it will be called Apple Watch.  I am confident the technology will be ready for a wrist-worn device capable of making phone calls over cellular, getting directions through GPS, and lasting a full day on a charge.  I think this was Apple's plan all along, but it will take them a few years to get there.  If Apple is successful, I think the Watch could have the same impact on iPhone sales that the iPhone is currently having on iPad sales.  That is, iPhone sales growth will stall and Apple Watch will take off.  That's a big 'if' though.

What they won't do

An Apple television set.  I've outlined the reasons before, and they still hold true.  This product simply doesn't make much sense.  Apple has enough work to do on the Watch and their existing product categories.  Perhaps (hopefully) we'll get a more capable set top box, but that's all I'd expect.

More gold?

There's a lot more speculation to be had on the iPhone and Mac product lines.  One thing that wouldn't shock me is if they started making products out of different materials for the purpose of price discrimination.  Gold iPhones, stainless steel MacBooks anyone?

Why HBO and CBS are launching standalone streaming services

Today, CBS launched a new standalone streaming service that includes live streaming in some markets.  Yesterday, HBO announced their intention to offer some type of streaming product in 2015.  As I've written before, the major cable companies have no incentive to break apart the bundle.  So why are HBO and CBS apparently doing so? First of all, I'm highly skeptical that HBO will offer the full HBO GO product without a cable subscription.  My hunch is that new content will be delayed, or it may not include any movies, or it will be very expensive ($20+ per month).

As far as CBS goes, they probably have less invested in the cable bundle than any other major TV network.  The only other major channels they own are CW and Showtime, with some other smaller ones such as CBS Sports, FLIX, TMC, and the TV Guide Channel.  Showtime produces some nice premium content, and CW targets younger viewers with shows such as The Flash and Vampire Diaries.  Perhaps they have similar plans to launch streaming services for those networks or to make that content available without cable in other ways (similar to the deal they did with Amazon Prime to make episodes of Under the Dome available shortly after they aired).  College sports from non-major conferences makes up the majority of the programming on CBS Sports, and they already have a college sports streaming service.

CBS doesn't have much to lose by breaking apart the bundle, certainly much less than the other big networks.  It makes sense for them to make their content available in all sorts of ways.  I doubt any of the other major networks will follow suit, but perhaps some of the smaller independent networks will (AMC, Discovery, etc).

Product categories the  Watch will make obsolete - do they add up to a large enough market?

I was confused after the announcement of the  Watch - partially because it wasn't what I was expecting, and partially because the presentation was muddled and generally not up to Apple's standards.  They never really answered the question 'why does this exist?'.  After thinking about it some more and reading Ben Thompson’s piece, I’m convinced that Apple’s ambition is to create a general purpose computing platform (eventually with its own cellular and wifi connections, GPS, and the ability to run native apps, all without an iPhone).  That's what Apple does:  they design great hardware with the user experience in mind, make some nice apps for it, and let developers create new and interesting experiences for the platform.  They've done this with the Mac, iPhone, and iPad.  The iPod is their only major product category that hasn't fit this description. The iPhone and other smartphones that followed made several product categories all but obsolete:  mp3 players, point and shoot cameras, portable GPS navigation units, PDAs, and more.  I was thinking about the Apple Watch the other day on my run.  I always wear a watch when I run to keep track of my time.  Sometimes I take my phone to use a GPS running app and listen to music.  If I don't have my phone I usually take an iPod Shuffle.  All of those products would be unnecessary if I had an Apple Watch (well, a future version that had its own GPS).  I think future versions of the Apple Watch could kill or take a big bite out of:  pedometers and activity trackers, GPS watches and heart rate monitors, and small mp3 players such as the iPod Shuffle.

These categories are smaller than the categories smartphones killed.  In fact, they probably don't add up to a market large enough to support the Apple Watch's R&D budget and ambitions.  The smartphone market grew to be massive and is much larger than the combination of all the products it replaced.  Apple is clearly betting that its watches can do something similar, perhaps on a slightly smaller scale.  However, smartphones also made one other product category obsolete:  feature phones, which already had a huge and lucrative market of their own.  Furthermore, cellular phones had already made wristwatches unnecessary for many people, or relegated them to specific activities and occasions.

Wristwatches are the category smartwatches could most clearly make obsolete.  There is still a large market for wristwatches, but it is very fragmented with price points from $5 - $50,000 and up, whereas feature phone prices were all on the same order of magnitude with a few exceptions.  Many people wear watches as fashion pieces and expressions of their individual personality as much as they do for the utility they provide.  It's not clear to me that the Apple Watch can make a significant number of these timepieces obsolete the way smartphones made feature phones obsolete.

The question I have for the (future version of the) Apple Watch, then, is will it do enough to convince lots of normal people to buy it.  People that wouldn't otherwise buy a Fitbit or Pebble smart watch or $400 GPS running watch.  People that don't wear a watch every day.  I'm confident a few years from now the hardware will be at a point where the watch will work without a smartphone with a day or more of batter life.  Will developers create enticing use cases that only work on a watch (just like Uber and Snapchat wouldn't have worked without smartphones)?  I can also imagine the  Watch being a fashion item and status symbol.  I just don't know if all of that adds up to a large enough market.  I'm not betting against Apple, though.

Thoughts on the market for a large iPad

Speculation around a larger iPad won't go away.  The biggest rumored feature of the 'iPad Pro' is its 12.9" display.  The device will also reportedly have superior display resolution, higher internal specs, and perhaps an exclusive split-screen mode.  Perhaps there's fire near this smoke, perhaps not.  Regardless, what does the market for such a device look like? Studies have shown that tablets are primarily bought by consumers (as opposed to enterprises) and used as media consumption devices to watch video, play games, read books, view photos, etc, as well as for email, social networking, and web browsing.  Although portable in nature, tablets are primarily used in the home, in contrast to smartphones.

This is only anecdotal evidence, but I've noticed some people are using a tablet instead of a TV.  Children are using them to watch Netflix and YouTube in their rooms or the back of the car.  I also know some couples that use a tablet along with the TV to watch two different programs at the same time, even though they are both in the same living room.  A larger tablet could be useful to these types of users.  It might also be valued for video gaming, drawing, and other creative applications that could take advantage of the larger screen size.

However, roughly half of all tablets sold are under 8".  This is partially driven by the lower price points of the iPad Mini and several quality small Android tablets, such as the Nexus 7.  Personally, I prefer a smaller tablet that is easy to hold in one hand for reading, and this may be a driver as well.

So, could a big iPad bring new users to the tablet category and spur sales, or is it just a small segment that some existing users will upgrade to?  I'm leaning towards the latter.  I think it will be a nice product that some users will find valuable, but most purchases will be from replacements, not new tablet users.  If and when it is unveiled, the announcement may shed some light on Apple's thinking.  Perhaps the iPad Pro will be all about enterprise productivity, which likely has more potential to greatly expand the category.

Netflix and Hulu aren't disrupting cable TV

I’ve already discussed why unbundling cable won’t actually unbundle cable.  Now, I’d like to discuss how simply moving shows from cable and satellite TV operators to streaming services such as Netflix and Hulu isn’t disrupting the cable TV industry.  A few cable networks may go out of business, but the industry won’t truly be disrupted, and consumers may or may not end up better off than they are today.  What should be much more worrisome for the incumbents in the industry is highly relevant, short-form, (semi) professional content delivered to users on the devices they choose through a superior user interface. Clay Christensen’s theory of disruption states:

'a process by which a product or service takes root initially in simple applications at the bottom of a market and then relentlessly moves up market, eventually displacing established competitors'

This is typically accomplished with lower cost structures and/or alternative business models that are dismissed by incumbents at first, but move up-market until they are ‘good enough’.  Moving distribution of music albums to the internet did not disrupt the industry - piracy, the fall of the album, and the rise of the single did.  I believe the same thing will play out with television.  Presently, Netflix, Hulu+, and Amazon Prime are large bundles of professionally produced long-form content sold for a monthly subscription fee.  This is essentially the same model the cable TV industry uses, with the important distinction of focusing on live/first-run vs on-demand archived content.

The movie studios and TV networks and their production arms still produce the vast majority of content available on the streaming services.  Furthermore, other than the original content the streaming services produce, everything in their libraries is made available first elsewhere.  Several companies have tried, but none have been able to strike content deals to deliver a cable TV package over the internet other than cable companies themselves, and a product still hasn't been brought to market.  Although some content, investment dollars, and creative talent are moving to streaming services, this is clearly not disrupting the industry.

Even if more content is distributed first over the internet, much of it will still be produced and financed by the traditional players, and it will likely be sold to consumers as part of a large subscription bundle. This may lessen the need for TV channels that primarily air reruns of popular shows or old movies, but again isn't disruptive to the industry.

Consumers may actually be worse off in some ways during this transition.  Imagine having to continue paying a cable TV bill to watch live sports, the news, and some high-budget shows, while also subscribing to one or more streaming services for their original/exclusive content and on-demand library.  In some ways, this is already happening.  Hopefully, the streaming services do a better job of making their content available on all devices without complicated authentication procedures and time windows, and that makes up for the increased cost.

In the unlikely scenario that everything is shifted to the internet and delivery through cable/satellite completely goes away, the industry is just swapping one service provider for another.  The structure remains mostly the same, just delivered through different cables in the ground. The TV networks and studios would finance and produce shows, then likely sell them as a bundle to the video providers, and consumers pay Comcast online or Netflix instead of Comcast cable.*  This situation has the potential to be much worse for consumers.  Internet delivery could enable a single company to have a monopoly, or a situation could arise where every TV network wants their own subscription service (just like in the early days of online music where every record label wanted to operate their own store).  Hopefully, things would play out like they ultimately did with music and there would be multiple providers with mostly the same content, but the streaming industry isn't going down that path right now.

What does have the potential to disrupt the incumbents in the industry are platforms like YouTube and their huge base of content creators.  There is so much free ad-supported content available on-demand, some of which is very well done.  I already subscribe to several amateur or short-form YouTube channels related to my favorite sports teams and hobbies.  Now, an entire generation of people are growing up with the tools to create entertaining content in their pockets.  It will be interesting to see how storytelling, reporting, and entertainment evolve on these platforms in the future.  The biggest challenge may be content discovery, not the type of quality of content being produced.

However, this doesn’t mean there is no need for professional long-form content.  I have no desire to watch an NFL game streamed over the internet from someone’s shaky smartphone camera, nor do I want to watch breaking news coverage from bystanders with a camcorder and microphone.  Even in today’s world of free blogs there is still a need and a market for publications like the New York Times and Wall St Journal.

It will be interesting to see how all of this evolves, and what type of content will end up on what platform.  I’m not looking forward to a world where I need to subscribe to four different bundles to access all of the content I want.  However, I don’t want a single company to rule everything and slow the pace of innovation either.  I think there will be a long transition phase before all of the dust settles and the major players emerge.

*One dynamic that has the potential to change which I haven't touched on is advertising.  Will content delivered over the internet have typical advertising breaks?  Will it only be for live programs or pre/post-roll?  Will some platforms have advertising, while others will be subscription-only?  This will be very interesting to monitor.

Redbox Instant streaming service shutting down - were DVDs or a poor streaming library to blame?

From Redbox Instant via GigaOm:

'The service is shutting down because it was not as successful as we hoped it would be. We apologize for any inconvenience and we thank you for giving us the opportunity to entertain you.'

The service came to market with an interesting hybrid model:  $8 got you 4 DVD rentals and unlimited streaming each month.  It launched with a very weak catalog of streaming titles, and although the catalog improved it apparently never really caught on with consumers.  I wonder if this is more about consumers' preference for Netflix's catalog and Amazon Prime's benefits, or a general shift away from DVD rentals.

According to Redbox's parent company financial filings (Link 1, Link 2), the DVD rental business had been growing in terms of rentals, credit cards used, number of kiosks, and overall revenue until this summer, when things started to slow down.  Meanwhile, Netflix's DVD by mail service has been declining for years.  It seems natural that consumers would slowly shift away from DVDs (both rentals and purchases), just as we have with music CDs.

One piece of anecdotal evidence from the analytics on my streaming post on CordCutting.tips shows that consumers are more interested in Netflix and Amazon Prime than Redbox Instant.  Content may be king, but convenience may be just as important.  Redbox kiosks have a lot of great content at great prices, but it's much easier to rent a movie online or just stream something from Netflix.  Tying the Redbox Instant service to DVD rentals may have ultimately doomed it from the start.

iPhone 6 Plus impressions - too much of a good thing?

I got my iPhone 6 Plus yesterday.  I've wanted an iPhone with a larger screen for a while.  I used the iPad Mini as my smartphone for most of 2013 before moving to the 5" Nexus 5.  I got fed up with Android after 6 months and have been using an iPhone 5 for the past few months.  I found the Nexus 5 very manageable and figured an extra 0.5" of screen would be no problem.  The 5.5" iPhone 6 Plus feels a lot larger and heavier though.  The Nexus 5 is actually about the same weight and size as the 4.7" iPhone 6, though the iPhone is a few mm thinner. Holding and typing

The 6 Plus is great when using it with two hands to read, browse the web, play games, etc.  As expected, doing anything anything with one hand other than scrolling is all but impossible for me, a tradeoff I am willing to make.  I thought thumb typing with two hands would be a big improvement due to the larger keys, but it's actually somewhat frustrating.  In portrait mode the extra weight and height of the phone makes it feel top heavy, like it could slip out of my hands easily.  In landscape mode a few columns of keys have been added on either side of the keyboard, so the letter keys don't get any larger and they are located in the middle of the screen where it's a bit of a stretch to reach.  I tried out a 3rd party keyboard that has slightly larger keys and it's actually nicer to type on than the stock keyboard.

What is all that screen good for?

The big screen is really nice for watching video, playing games, and reading.  I primarily use my tablets for reading, watching short videos, and web browsing, and I was hoping the 6 Plus could pull double-duty and replace my iPad Mini.  However, a lot of apps and websites (mine included) simply scale up to show the same amount of content they would on a regular iPhone 6 or even an iPhone 5.  This doesn't really put that extra screen real estate to use, at least not yet.

Many of Apple's apps have a split-pane view.  For example, in Messages or Mail you'll see a pane on the left with recent message threads.  The home screen also works in landscape mode.  These are nice touches, but it's frustrating when opening something that doesn't support landscape mode, such as the Phone or Podcast apps.  I wonder if split pane views would work on the regular 6, I'm willing to bet some third party apps will try.  There aren't any other software modes or special apps that take advantage of the additional space (yet).

6 or 6 Plus?

I'm guessing that many of the software issues I've mentioned will be fixed, either by Apple or with 3rd-party apps.  There is also the possibility those enhancements come to the smaller 6 in time.  I still like the idea of a really big iPhone, but only if it does more than its smaller counterpart.  Right now I think I’d be happier with the 4.7” iPhone 6.  In most places I'd see the same amount of content, and it feels better in the hand to me.  Maybe I'd start to miss my iPad Mini though.  I'd be giving up some battery life, but gaining a hundred dollars.  I'm going to give it a few more days, but I'm leaning towards trading it in for the regular 6.

Why unbundling cable won't unbundle cable

Wouldn't it be nice if cable subscriptions weren't sold as expensive bundles, and instead we could pick the channels we actually watch and pay for them a la carte?  I might pick a few channels with live sports, high-budget dramas, and my favorite comedies.  If I could pay a few dollars for each of these channels per month I'd have an affordable cable package that included the majority of programming I'd want to watch. The unbundling discussions seem to have some major underlying assumptions:  everyone will pick the channels they want, the bad channels nobody is willing to pay for will go away, the TV networks will continue business as usual, and accept lower revenues and profits in the process.  There's a major problem with that line of thinking.  If cable TV is unbundled due to consumer demand or new regulations the TV networks and cable companies won't stand by idly.  Bundling will take on a new form, prices will rise, and only time will tell if consumers will be better off than they are today.

ESPN started to take off as a paid cable channel in the 1980's after they acquired exclusive rights to broadcast some college basketball games, notably the Big East conference tournament.  There wasn't enough airtime on the big national networks to broadcast all of these games live, and many consumers across the northeast were willing to pay for it.  After achieving some success broadcasting Big East games, one might think they'd purchase more college basketball rights to expand their geographical footprint while making their product more valuable to current customers.  ESPN had another idea, which has proved extremely successful.  ESPN knew if they only aired college basketball games they would only attract one segment of sports fans, but if they aired a variety of live sports they could conceivably get all sports fans.  So they moved into completely different categories such as auto racing, thus expanding their potential subscriber base far beyond college basketball fans in the northeast and eventually making ESPN a must-have channel for most sports fans across the country.

The reason I bring this up is because I see the same thing happening in an unbundled world.  If every consumer has the ability to subscribe to only the channels which he or she likes, each channel needs to appeal to the largest possible number of customers.  Thus, ESPN would like to broadcast a little of everything rather than all of one or two things, and other channels would take the same approach.  For example, an NFL fan might have to subscribe to ESPN, NBC, FOX, CBS, and NFL Network to watch every game, and that NFL fan would be subsidizing college sports, auto racing, poker, and everything else ESPN broadcasts.  If we take this up a level, ESPN could split content across multiple channels to attract even more subscribers.  For example, ESPN could put some high-profile college football games on ESPN2 or ESPNU in a bid to attract more subscribers to those channels.  Heck, they could even create channels for specific teams or conferences with large dedicated audiences.  Oh wait, they already did that with the Longhorn Network and SEC Network.  The sports leagues also like this model, because they can maximize the revenue they get from broadcasting rights and it reduces the risk of relying on a single powerful partner.

ESPN could also go the complete opposite route and buy up everything, creating a mini monopoly on live sports broadcasting.  Then they could conceivably charge whatever they wanted.  This would be much more worrisome for consumers, but I think much less likely, both from a competitive and regulatory perspective.

We can take this line of thinking up another level to ESPN's parent company, Disney.  As I've written about before in an article titled 'why a la carte cable won't happen', there are five large media companies that own the majority of TV channels in the US:

• Disney: ABC, ESPN, Disney, A&E, History
• Comcast: NBC, USA, Bravo, E!, The Weather Channel
• News Corp: FOX, MyTV, FX, Fox Sports
• CBS: CBS, CW, Showtime
• Time Warner Inc: HBO, Cinemax, TNT, TBS, CNN

A sixth company, Viacom, owns several mid-tier cable channels: MTV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, Spike, BET, etc.  There are also two notable independent networks: AMC and Discovery.  Then there is PBS, which is a non-profit.

These large media companies could either sell all of their channels together as a mini-bundle, or split their best programming across various channels to encourage people to subscribe to multiple channels.  For example, Disney could sell all of their family programming as part of one package, or split it up across several different channels like they do today.  Time Warner might split up their best dramas across TNT and TBS, then only sell subscriptions to HBO and Cinemax to people who also subscribe to TNT or TBS. (Or they could offer discounts such that it only makes sense to also subscribe to TNT or TBS, much like cable companies do with triple-play bundles today.)

Then, there is the issue of a la carte pricing.  It's easy to look at the affiliate fees a channel earns today and assume they'd sell it at a similar price a la carte.  For example, ESPN reportedly gets about $5.75 per month from each of the 100 million subscribers that have a cable package with ESPN (just the main ESPN channel, not ESPN2/U/news/etc).  In an unbundled world, far fewer than 100 million people would subscribe to ESPN, and they would have to raise rates to keep paying the astronomical sports rights fees.  Ben Thompson has a very detailed breakdown on Stratechery of what this would look like and concluded ESPN would charge about $15 per month a la carte (again, just for the main ESPN channel).

So, even if cable TV packages are unbundled, we may be forced to buy several more channels than we think we'll need at higher prices than we'd expect.  Depending on what you select, you may end up paying the same or more than you do today - and receive far fewer channels.  The only people who really benefit in this scenario are the TV networks, because they'll be able to discontinue all the programming that nobody watches without losing any revenue.  At least that's what I would do if I were running a TV network in an unbundled world.  Let's be careful what we wish for.

It's time to bring streaming video boxes out of the dark ages - a few improvements to increase usage and revenue

I don't have cable television, so I rely on my Apple TV and mobile devices to stream a lot of TV shows, movies, and sports.  Before the Apple TV, I used a game console or computer.  I've also tested out the Chromecast and products from Roku.  All of these devices are perfectly adequate for watching Netflix, Hulu, or watchESPN, but they leave a lot to be desired in the user interface and content discovery departments. When the Apple TV only had a few apps it seemed appropriate to display them in a grid on the home screen.  It was also familiar to iPhone or iPad users.  However, as the number of apps grew, this interface started to feel dated.  (It is possible to move or hide apps, which I've done, but that doesn't fix the underlying problem.)  Roku and its 1,000+ channels faces the same issue, perhaps more so.  Further complicating matters, there is no simple way to see what content is available through the various apps on these boxes.  When someone sits down on the couch to watch something they might check Netflix, Hulu, ABC, PBS, HBO Go, and Amazon Prime before finding something to watch.

Think how ridiculous it would be if TV guides worked this way, only showing a grid of all channels currently broadcasting.  Instead, a TV guide displays a list of what shows are on, whether they're new/live or reruns, and perhaps some info on the plot or cast.  TV guides are far from ideal, but they are fairly accurate and informative across hundreds of channels.

Roku's universal search feature does a much better job of content discovery across multiple channels than anything on the Apple TV or Chromecast, but it still puts the onus on the user to think of a title and enter it through a remote or companion mobile app.  Can I Stream It? is a great service to see where movies and TV shows are streaming, but it's still up to the user to manually navigate to the title after finding out what app it's on.  Neither of these is an ideal input method or user experience.

It's time to bring streaming video boxes out of the internet dark ages.  Why can't a 'now playing' guide be integrated into the home screen, showing new or popular content from the apps and channels I select?  Even better if the content is custom tailored to my tastes.  This guide could alert me when new episodes or seasons of my favorite TV shows are released,  display titles from seldom-used free apps such as Crackle or SnagOn that I may enjoy, big events currently live streaming, and display titles in my queue expiring soon.  It should allow me to jump directly to the title with one click.  I'm unaware if Netflix or other services have an API for their content recommendation engines, but this would be a natural fit if they did.

This guide could also enable an additional revenue source.  Sponsored content or advertisements could be listed along with the titles automatically being displayed.  Sponsored listings could take the form of native advertising, which advertisers seem to desire on today's web.  The Roku does display some titles on the home screen, but it was always unclear to me if these were at random, ads, or something else.

I love streaming videos on my Apple TV, but the experience of finding and selecting something to watch could be much better.  It could also generate more revenue for manufacturers and indie content producers.  I really hope Apple, Roku, Google, or someone else is working on this.