Google TV to launch this year

TV irrelevance

TV is becoming more and more of an irrelevance - and the TV companies are in part to blame.

They throw out more and more pap (they call it reality TV) and spend less and less on new shows. In Germany, the US content isn't too bad, because there are few players in the market and they offer FTO for most of the channels, but in the US, the channels are mainly subscription. That said, a lot of the German content is way better than most of the US import dross.

I think, especially in America, services like Hulu and Boxee are going to win through, where the user gets just the programmes they want to watch for a relatively low monthly fee, on demand and streamed movie rentals.

At the moment, I can't say that there is a single programme on television that I would stay home / stay up to watch; and I haven't bothered to record a programme since the early 90s. I probably "watch" about 2 hours of television a week, with it being on in the background for a few more hours, mainly with the girls watching some Schnulze.

GoogleTV certainly isn't something that would encourage me to buy a new TV. If the next TV (hopefully in about 10 years time) has GoogleTV, then I might use it, but it isn't something that I'd rush out to buy. My girlfriend sees the Internet as an evil waste of time and wants me to reduce her daughter's daily ration of Internet (currently 3 hours), because she is becoming less and less social, so chances are it wouldn't be allowed in the house! :-D

By big_D on 8 Sep 2010

Goggle box

Big_D I think you are looking at a bigger problem. One of my friends has decided that life is too short and now has no TV or broad band. using only the works internet to catch with new etc. at lunch times. I am tempted to follow suit. It may force me to get on with some of the house hold chores and interact with the family some more as well.


Back in the day everyone ate chocolate when they could because it was rare and expensive. now it takes 5 minutes to earn enough to buy a chocolate bar. some people don't eat them at all now, some on occasion, and some all the time. the last group are now paying the price for their indulgence and so are we as tax payers. I am not saying we should ban tv or chocolate but the proliferation of poor tv may just add to our social-economic woe's.

As for the google tv thing. would this not be the same thing as the offering from the beeb et all. also have you seen the 3view box which looks very good as well.

By SimonCorlett on 8 Sep 2010

No the BBC

No, this wouldn't be the same, it would be putting the TV signal in a PiP window and opening up search or Twitter or something else or running an App (maybe Hulu or the iPlayer).

The problem is, on a large screen TV, you are usually watching TV with other people, so you are likely to get lynched, if you PiP a season premiere in order to send out a tweet about it! :-D

By big_D on 8 Sep 2010