Google TV? Future evil or gospel?

·   Introduction: 

  

    Back to there were only few networks, watching TV is pretty simple. You turn on the TV and if you don't like what is playing then you change the channel. But these days, TV can be very complicated. Figuring out what you want to watch is hard enough and that's only the beginning. Once you have chosen a program, you have to figure out when it's playing and which hundreds of channels it is on. It means you have to change your schedule to fit in TV's schedule. 

      In fact, many of us end up watching our TV on the Web because it's easier to find what you want. I mean think about it, more and more our favorite shows are showing online today and you can get them very easily whenever you want just by typing up what you are looking for. The problem is the smaller screens don't compare with our home entertainment system which leads to a pretty big question: 

      if the Web is so smart and the TV is so fun to watch, why do we have to choose? Why can't they work together? 

      Now they can. Google TV is the result. 

      Google TV brings to you everything you love about your Web into television. Some new TVs are comes with the built-in or you can get a separate box. Either way, the way it works is pretty simple. You simply type in anything you want to watch. Google TV is seamlessly combined your TV, DVR recordings and the entire Internet. Whatever you can watch via your laptops can be watched on Google TV. People can also customize their Google TV with customized home screen in which people can easily edit or add their favorite channels or shows. Finally, people also can use apps and have access to the Android Market which is a new feature of Google TV 2.0. Google has also use chrome serch engine to search their shows.

    Except YouTube，Amazon，Flickr，Napster， Pandora，even Twitter can be used via Google TV by just a click. Intelligence Mobile terminal can connect iPhone with Google TV. This year Google and Android developers using apps to increase the amount of selling video games.

     

How it works?

Google TV is a essentially a platform where several products function together.  According to Patel, "The platform is based on Android, but instead of the Android browser it runs Google's Chrome browser as well as a full version of Flash Player 10.1. " Although Google TV has some differences compared with other TVs such as Apple TVs or Boxee by D-Link. "According to It’s core is still running Android on an Intel CE4100 MEDIA processor, which is essentially a 1.2 GHz Atom Core that’s been combined with some extra graphics hardware capable of capturing and decoding 1080p video" stream and MPEG-4 support, and 3D graphics capabilities." That's joined by some custom DSPs, and things like WiFi, HDMI, and Bluetooth. Of course, the Android used by the Google TV isn’t the same as the one used on phones.  
The coolest feature for Google TV is recording which gives millions of mothers a better option when they decide to go shopping or watching their deperate housewives.  

In fact, the flash that the Google TV runs is fascinating. Everything that people search via Chrome will be played on the Google TVs is Flash video. So far, we got an Intel processor, Android which is Linux underneath and a flash browser with a keyboard and mouse. It feels like a big screen TV with a PC inside it. Also the Google TVs has a lot of interaction options, all the interaction options serves different areas which leads to a most surprising function is DualView. Using DualView can gives viewers double screens which you can watch TVs and search Webs at the same time. Google TVs certainly has features and tools to browse, however, some of the research that I made showed that ABC, CBS, NBC and Hula have blocked the assess for Google TV. The good news is Netflix’s first generation can still show on the Google TV.

The biggest fear for ABC, CBS and NBC is the threat of losing advertisement’s revenue. This is not only the matter of distribution of e-commerce but using the developers to predict what are audiences’ favorite shows.

Controversies:

The blockage of the ABC, CBS and some other websites turns the entire Google TV’s value upside down. Some people may have the same question as I do. How does Google TV make money? It seems the only place the Google TV can make money is the advertisement that played on the YouTube. Google owns YouTube and it claims that they can put APIs together and help app develops to sort things easily. Since the selling price of the Google TVs was set so high, some customers may choose other alternatives. Compared with $299 for the Google TVs, $99 of apple TVs seem more appealing to customers.So it is really hard for companies to actually make a lot of money in the short term. 

Here is the thing. Google TV devices have a QWERTY keyboard and some sort of mouse tools with some additional standard arrow key layout. Some Android apps that can control GTV devices are also in it. But none of these input methods are related to each other. People can’t seamlessly change this method one to another without unexpected consequences. A lot of big companies such as Sony, it's CE complained about losing money to make Google TVs which may relate to the fact that the hardware which is build in Google TVs are expensive. 

The other most disturbing drawback for Google TVs is  a holdover from Android phones -- upgrades. Just think about how long it's taken many phones that are still on contract to subscribers to get the latest software patch, and people may wonder if Sony will have any interest in updating into Google TV 3.0 Parfait in 2012 instead of just selling you a new flat screen instead.