Items tagged with google tv
Be careful before downloading an app on your LG Smart TV. One user recently reported that their LG Smart TV had been infected by Cyber.Police ransomware, also known as FLocker, Frantic Locker, or Dogspectus. The infected television is one of the last LG Smart TV’s to use Google TV, a project that was discontinued in 2014. Software engineer Darren Cauthon revealed that his television was infected by the ransomware after his relatives had downloaded an app to watch a movie on December 25th. According to Cauthon, “They [the relatives] said they downloaded an app to watch a movie. Halfway thru movie, tv froze.” It is unclear whether Cauthon’s relatives downloaded the app from the Play Store or a...
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Google TV may in for a change, but not the kind you're thinking of. The web-based television service could end up rebranded as Nexus TV, tying it to Google's more popular and well received line of electronic devices, while shedding a name that's seen its share of disappointments and failures since launch. Just ask Logitech, which jumped on board the Google TV bandwagon early on, lost millions of dollars, and dubbed the experience a "gigantic mistake." A rebranding makes sense, especially if it's true that Google is getting ready to relaunch the service sometime in the first half of 2014, as reported by The Information (paywall). CNET, which scaled the paywall, says the rumor fits in line with...
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Google had ginormous plans for Google TV when it launched three years ago, and when the history books are written about this era, perhaps it will say that it was a concept slightly ahead of its time. In any event, Google isn't giving up on its core dream of dominating the living room with Android, though it is planning to officially retire the Google TV brand, which is arguably tarnished as this point after some early failures. In its place will be Android TV, according to an executive from a consumer electronics manufacturer who spoke with GigaOM. In the meantime, several of Google's hardware partners have already dropped the old branding, including Sony, which introduced a new smart TV adapter...
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The folks at iFixit had their way, tearing down Google's latest media streaming invention and now it seems the team at the GTVHacker blog has exploited the little fella known as Google Chromecast and rooted it with shell access on port 23 of the device. Google is known for stopping well short of locking things down, almost tempting developers and hackers to see what they can do with a new device. This "exploit" will give the community access to the Google Chromecast's environment with a chance to test custom software on the device, much like the community has done with Android smartphones over the years. Under the hood with Chromecast hardware - the software side is next... It turns out,...
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Here's a question: what company is going to be the one to reinvent television? Everyone in the world knows it needs to happen, and we're all just seemingly waiting indefinitely for it to happen. Will it be Apple? A start-up we've never heard of? Microsoft? Intel? Earlier this year, Intel confirmed that it would soon be shipping some type of set-top box to introduce its own spin on pay-TV and the entire living room experience, but we've heard little since. Shocking, right? The content creators and pay-TV operators are being remarkably rigid. The unbelievable amount of fear of having the industry change even the slightest is preventing any progress and innovation from seeping in. But according...
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The streaming revolution will be televised, but will Google TV be the star of the show? Companies haven't given up on the ambitious platform, and in fact Sony just announced its latest Google TV product, a sleek-looking set-top box (NSZ-GS8) with voice search support and a nifty remote control, combing both new school and old school navigation options into a single Internet appliance. Chrome provides the browsing experience (no big surprise there), though you can surf the web using only your voice. Simply speak into the remote and the browser will take you where you want to go. "You might wonder, why should I go with the Sony Google TV player instead of any of the so-called 'smart TVs' out there?...
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Well, well -- the fight for the living room continues. With Microsoft marketing the Xbox One not as a game console, but as an "all-in-one" living room product, it's clear that consumer companies are intently interested in claiming the eyeballs of those plopped down in front of the television. Google TV was Google's own effort to accomplish that, but it never really went anywhere. That said, there's always time for a second chance, and LG is looking to make that happen. A new Korea Times report suggests that LG Electronics could see its TV sales rise due to integration with Google TV. Presently, it's the only major TV maker that is shipping HDTVs with Google TV built-in. “LG is currently...
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Intel is trying to break into the streaming content business -- again. At the AllThingsDigital media conference today, Erik Huggers, vice president of Intel Media, told assembled journalists that the company has been hatching a new idea for the TV space. "We have been working for (the past) year to set up Intel media, a new group focused on developing an Internet platform," Huggers said. "It's not a value play, it's a quality play where we'll create a superior experience for the end user." According to Huggers, the new streaming service will have ala carte options that allow customers to pick and choose between channels rather than forcing them to buy pre-bundled packages. This last is of interest...
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Consumer electronics maker Hisense is tossing its hat into the Google TV ring with the Pulse, it announced today. The set-top box is slated for a November arrival and will be sold for under $99. As you would expect from this sort of set-top box, the Pulse is tiny. It’s under 5 inches wide and deep and only 1.37 inches tall, and weighs 1.5 pounds. The box has an HDMI input and an HDMI output and supports 1080p video (and H.264, MPEG-4, and AVC formats). It also has USB and Ethernet ports (one each), as well as Wi-Fi. The device also supports picture-in-picture viewing. It’s interesting to see how set-top makers are designing their remotes. Hisense opted for a two-sided remote that...
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Google TV's initial struggles are long behind it, and some noteworthy device makers are stepping up up to the plate. One of these is Vizio, which announced pre-orders for its new Co-Star Stream Player VAP430 at $99.99. That's a much better price than we've seen from some earlier Google TV devices, and it puts the Co-Star in the same galaxy as the Roku, price-wise. The Co-Star is expected to ship August 14th and, as of this writing, Vizio is sweetening the deal with free shipping. As we reported last month, the Vizio Co-Star is a do-everything set-top box. (well, almost everything. It doesn't have a Blu-ray drive.) The device makes your plain-old HDTV an Internet-connected TV (via Ethernet or...
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Google TV's getting even better. With 2012 being the year that Google finally tries to really hone in on making Google TV a product with a serious amount of traction, massaging YouTube into the mix seems like a sound idea. After all, billions of hours of content are consumed in what feels like a blink of an eye on YouTube, and making the whole thing more integrated in the Google ecosystem would be a strong, strong play. The company has this weekend announced that an update to the YouTube experience will soon come to Google TV. You’ll be able to update your app through Android Market, and you’ll see some big improvements. First you’ll notice the app works faster with smoother...
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Google TV. Remember that? Just kidding. While Google TV certainly hasn't been as popular as something like Gmail, it's a product that Google still seems interested in improving. This week, Sony announced a software update to the Google TV platform that powers the Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Disc player. This latest version not only powers existing Google TV features, but also adds the Android Market for apps. It'll roll out to connected Sony Internet TV devices by early next week. Today’s update brings a simpler and clean interface, improved performance, better search functionality and the Android Market to all currently installed Sony Internet TV and Sony Internet TV Blu-ray owners. Additionally,...
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Thought Google TV was as washed-up as Buzz and Wave? Not so fast. While Google TV had a ton of hype behind it, the high cost of entry and not-exactly-seamless integration left many critics and consumers wanting more. But unlike some efforts that fall flat for Google, the company isn't giving up hope on this one just yet. According to a new Reuters report, the company's CEO Eric Schmidt "sees more partners for Google TV." In fact, the fellow said that they are "absolutely committed" to Google TV, and when more partners (unnamed) join up soon, things will certainly be turned around. When asked to elaborate about which partners would be coming, he said the following: "I believe that they're both...
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No company wants a product that's returned more rapidly than it can sell them, but that's what Logitech reportedly has on its hands with the Revue. Logitech executives have stated that the Revue's revenue stream is "slightly negative," and the company has slashed prices from $249 to $99, reportedly in a bid to clear inventory (the unit is still listed at $249.99 on Logitech's homepage). We launched Revue with the expectation that it would generate significant sales growth in spite of a relatively high price point and the newness of both the smart TV category and the underlying platform,” Logitech chairman Guerrino De Luca said in a conference call on Thursday. “In hindsight, there...
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Blackberry developer Research In Motion is reportedly working on a media box that connects to televisions and streams content from Netflix, Youtube, and other nearby media devices. The box, which is code-named the Blackberry Cyclone, is intended to compete with similar products from Apple, Google, and others. The specs for the box, which come from an unnamed source, include HDMI-out, wi-fi connectivity with the ability to interact with other devices on a network, and streaming content from Youtube and Netflix with "more to come." The device supposedly looks like a larger version of the Blackberry Presenter, a BlackBerry smartphone accessory that allows users present Microsoft PowerPoint...
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Last month, we covered AT&T's decision to impose caps on its previous unlimited Internet service plans. An estimated 56 percent of Americans now pay for bandwidth-capped service, almost always at the same price point that once allowed them unlimited bandwidth. Now, toss in the fact that you can't swing a dead cat two feet without smacking into another company eagerly talking about 'cloud services.' The offers are varied, the promises inflated, and the terminology uncertain. In virtually every case, today's cloud services are nothing more than what we used to call 'web storage' or 'sharing content across a network / the Internet.' The difference between these services of yesteryear and today's...
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Google TV hasn't exactly been lighting up living rooms with Internet-enhanced television goodness, but an influx of fresh software might be in store. Google has just acquired Sage TV, which has been producing its own proprietary DVR software since 2002. Sage TV's software runs on Mac OS X, Windows and Linux. Google TV doesn't have DVR or placeshifting functionality, which Sage TV provides (placeshifting = Slingbox, basically). No financial terms have been announced. So far, it's only been announced via a post on Sage TV's website. However, although Sage TV has been reasonably successful on its own, the company said that "By teaming up with Google, we believe our ideas will reach an even larger...
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You may have forgotten about Google TV. We can't really blame you, nor can we say that Google TV has really been able to gain traction in the market. Google has shown a willingness to push things out into the market without actually knowing how it'll turn out; Android has taken off and become a huge success, while things like Buzz, Wave and Google TV have faltered. That said, GTV is still around in some fashion, and some folks are definitely still using it. And if you're one of those people, this new development is for you. Early on, Google released an Android application that enabled one's phone to be used as a Google TV remote control, but the millions of iPhone users wondering if they would...
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As of today, Sony is the only company producing televisions with Google TV built right in. There's a Logitech Revue box for adding Google TV capabilities to existing television sets, but Sony is the only one out there making entire TVs based around Google TV. But they won't have that advantage for too long. While Sony's Google TV-based sets will definitely fly off of shelves this holiday season, Samsung will soon be giving Sony a lot of needed competition. Samsung stands as the world's largest TV maker, and they're planning to make an announcement in January (maybe at CES?) that they will be producing Google TV-based televisions as well. There's clearly interest and demand surrounding it, and...
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The Google TV craze is just now getting started, and while Google is battling with NBC, ABC, CBS and FOX to enable users to view content via Google TV devices, other companies seems more than eager to do business with the search giant. Many companies are optimizing their apps and websites for use on Google TV; it's a great way to get users to experience something that they otherwise wouldn't bother to try. By getting into the Google TV spotlight, it enables Google TV users everywhere to hop in and get started with an app or content portal. And while Google TV is obviously focused on television, there are obviously other uses. Like radio! TuneIn Radio has already become extremely popular on Android...
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Most of the major television networks—CBS, ABC, and NBC, as well as Hulu.com—have blocked Google TV's from accessing their online offerings, on the grounds that allowing users to watch videos at CBS.com damages the website's ability to earn revenue. The networks' stance almost guarantees that the question of what is and isn't blockable will end up in court—but irate Google TV owners and hackers in general aren't waiting for a legal decision. According to a recent blog post on the subject, the Google TV block isn't based on a browser string or on the technical capabilities of the Google TV in question. Instead, the block apparently checks the Flash version ID. If it sees a version...
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With smartphones and iPods, game consoles and PCs, e-readers and tablets, Americans now spend a truly mind-boggling number of hours each week watching TV, even more than the mega-hours they spent as couch potatoes last year. Online viewing means far fewer commercials and broadcasters have begun to fight back and eliminate free TV shows on the Web. News Corp's Fox set off a firestorm when it blocked online access to popular shows like "Glee" to 2.6 million Cablevision Systems broadband Internet subscribers last weekend. This was part of a fee dispute over how much Cablevision pays Fox for the rights to carry Fox-owned television channels. The blockade only lasted about 12 hours, because viewers...
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