Hacker News Reader

Comment by ksec | Hacker News Reader

Non Youtube contents such as TV broadcast needs to get streaming done right. And they haven't done it. Apple or Google could have helped here. Where All Broadcast TV are in one place / App just like a normal TV. And the content will be streamed in decent quality. But neither are they interested as Youtube belongs to Google and Apple is going with Apple TV+ direction and wants to own TV itself.

It is such a sad state of things since Steve Jobs passed away both Apple and Google have a complete lack of taste and product sensibility to deliver something truly helps the customers. Instead every product and features are marketing or sales driven.

View on HN

In an ideal world, each streaming service would provide the service itself, users can pick whichever app they like, and connect that app to the services they use.

In the real world, each company wants to be THE number one streaming platform, and wants users to use their app above all else. So each company reinvents the same things, and users need to deal with the mess of N apps for N services.

The idea of cooperation is completely alien in big tech companies. Descentralisation is perceived as dangerous, since it doesn’t let each individual be the number one.

In the end, because everyone want to be the number one and screw the rest, they all end up sucking. This is obviously predictable, but management everywhere remains oblivious of it.

> In the real world, each company wants to be THE number one streaming platform, and wants users to use their app above all else. So each company reinvents the same things, and users need to deal with the mess of N apps for N services.

The companies do not care about app usage. They care about subscription fees, which are highly (though somewhat elastically) dependent on a platform's available content. They don't give a damn what you watch with, they just want you to pay. They already know there will be no 600lb gorilla in streaming, so it's all about getting another month of fees from you, and that is unrelated to app usage.

The app usage isn't the end goal, but it's an important middle step to the strategy. While you're using one platform, they don't want you to be reminded that other platforms exist or easily browse them.

I wonder what it's like in various countries. I was surprised that Japan came up with that, TVer which basically all broadcast shows end up on for at least one week, shown with ads. AFAIK it's driven by a coalition of broadcasters with nothing to do with the big platforms - where there's a will there's a way I guess.

Apple and Google tried that for years on their TV platforms and the content providers aggressively blocked them.

E.g. Netflix outright refuses any kind of integration where their content would be surfaced next to other services - their product managers DEMAND that people go to their app into their owned experience to access content.

And designers/product managers at other content providers are the same.

Because they want you to pay for Netflix. It isn't hard.

Netflix refusing to integrate is a huge pain. I recently set up an Apple TV box for a non-technical parent, and while most services can be effectively navigated with the system-level voice search, Netflix is the odd one out and so I suspect Netflix is going to go mostly unwatched.

Netflix wants 100% of your attention on _their_ content.

Instead of "channel surfing" and picking a competitor's production they want to keep viewers inside their walled garden.

This could easily have happened. Apple especially lets anyone fit their catalog into the TV app. It's the non-Apple and non-Google part of the equation that chose the current system.

There are additional requirements involved with getting the catalog in TV App. And Apple obviously are not willing to share accurate user count numbers as well as a lot of other data. Once they said they are Apple's customer and not those TV / Broadcasting customers that was the end of the conversation.

> All Broadcast TV are in one place / App just like a normal TV. And the content will be streamed in decent quality.

Isn’t that what YouTube TV is? The problem with YouTube TV is that it’s essentially the old expensive cable model that everyone was trying to get away from in the first place.

BBC has been doing streaming likely longer than you've been aware of streaming -- it left beta in 2007, same time that Netflix started streaming in the US.

The content is nowhere near as addictive as youtube though, partly because the format is still television and still built with a television executive mindset.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com