Kim & Clint Hocking their Swiftboat down the Amazon

[melmer]

Huh, clint wrote an article a few month back about the future of games being beamed to your tele from your mobile.

http://www.edge-online.com/features/in-the-click-of-it-the-last-generation/

All makes sense now

[Merus]

Honestly I'd see Amazon hiring actual game developers to be a good sign as it suggests they recognise game development is a skillset they don't have internally.

[Frenetic Pony]

Personally I wouldn't bet against Amazon because Wall Street seems happy to throw all the money at them regardless of whether or not they earn any sort of profit. Any company that can pull that trick off is not to be messed with.

 

Cough* The same wallstreet that made Yelp worth so much money, or twitter with no money, or etc. ? Amazon is good at providing mass service of one kind or another at the lowest cost possible. Entertainment is a different beast. They're still getting their asses handed too them by Youtube and Netflix for internet video in terms of traffic volume, and do worse in both quality and variety of service.

 

And video games are, if anything, a hell of a lot harder. Microsoft succeeded here by not only never giving up in terms of failure, which Amazon is good at, but also by having a massively talented engineering staff, which Amazon most certainly does not have.

[JonCole]

I'm still not convinced that this is comparable. The Xbox was $300, this is $100. The primary advertised function of this box is video, Xbox was games. Xbox games were $60, the launch exclusive for the Fire TV is $7.

 

Amazon will get an install base on the back of video much more easily than someone will pony up three times the upfront cost just for games. And the same money that could buy Amazon one AAA console game will buy them many more mobile games with just as much potential to succeed or fail. Take more, smaller chances, get more, smaller successes.

[SecretAsianMan]

I'm with JonCole.  Amazon already has their own Android app store.  Looking at Amazon right now, it seems like this is how they're going to deliver content to the Fire TV.  Their appstore, while not nearly as popular as things like iTunes or Google Play, has been gaining ground over their competitors.  Having actual first party hardware will probably only help this since they can make their store front and center.  For the average user, it won't seem any different from using iTunes or Google Play, even if those options exist.

[Tanukitsune]

I just realized, since this is like one of those Roku box and it's main appeal is accessing US only content, I don't think it will even be on sale in countries that don't have services like Netflix.

 

By the way, don't most US TV come with some sort of way to access stuff like Netflix directly without any additional hardware?

 

Then again at this price, if you have a TV that doesn't have Netflix, this is cheaper than buying one with it integrated and if you have a TV with this kind of hardware... You have more than one tablet device and can afford this easily.

[JonCole]

I just realized, since this is like one of those Roku box and it's main appeal is accessing US only content, I don't think it will even be on sale in countries that don't have services like Netflix.

 

By the way, don't most US TV come with some sort of way to access stuff like Netflix directly without any additional hardware?

 

Then again at this price, if you have a TV that doesn't have Netflix, this is cheaper than buying one with it integrated and if you have a TV with this kind of hardware... You have more than one tablet device and can afford this easily.

 

Many US televisions do come with interfaces baked in that allow access to streaming video services. However, most don't offer such a range of choices, usually something like Netflix and Hulu Plus for video, Pandora for music, and maybe one or two other things. Also, if you have a receiver it can sometime be a pain for those apps to properly communicate 5.1 from the TV back to the receiver.

[Polish Hill]

Many US televisions do come with interfaces baked in that allow access to streaming video services. However, most don't offer such a range of choices, usually something like Netflix and Hulu Plus for video, Pandora for music, and maybe one or two other things. Also, if you have a receiver it can sometime be a pain for those apps to properly communicate 5.1 from the TV back to the receiver.

 

Another complaint I've heard from friends with "smart" TV's is the UI is poor or out of date and updates are non-existent or difficult to obtain.  As a Chromecast and Roku owner my main concern with the Fire TV is how does all this fragmentation shake out in the next few years?  For now everyone is playing nice and I can watch Amazon video or YouTube on my Roku but I fear the day where one of these services is no longer supported or completely removed.  Maybe that isn't a reasonable business decisions but it still is early.

[sclpls]

Yeah, I know my friends that have an Apple TV are really surprised by how bad the UI is.