That’s what Dave Smith of readwrite thinks. In an opinion piece published yesterday, the writer emphasized that “Apple needs to take a page from a different pioneer in order to offer something truly different.“
And that’s the crux of the matter, isn’t it? Apple making something truly different.
This is the company that revolves around the ethos of innovation, of thinking differently, of the crazy ones, the ones who dare.
Are they going to be able to do that with the Apple TV – in whatever final form it turns out?
In his article, Smith turns to Netflix as the road to success. Here’s a little scenario that I can imagine and would love to become reality:
For $10-12 a month, your Apple TV gives you total access to the entire iTunes Store. You get all the new movies and TV shows right after they air, and you can watch them as many times as you want. No more rental rules and restrictions. You still have the option to purchase these titles and keep them in your personal iTunes library, but your monthly fee just lets you stream those titles whenever you want.
That would work, right?
Of course, there is more to success than an iTunes-Netflix juxtaposition of sorts. There’s pricing, non-availability of an API or SDK, and so on. Read more about issues in depth here.
Ya, if people could replace their $100/month cable bill with a $15 iTunes bill, everyone would do it. But there is no way in hell this will happen. The service (even if you completely remove the movie portion) would have to cost $60+/month and would still be under valued. Remember most people pay $60-120 just for HD TV service with a DVR and still have to watch commercials.
This idea is so unrealistic as to be a waste of time to talk about.
I guess one can dream…
The cable company doesn’t get my hundred bucks a month any more. Nada. Zip. Zilch.