More options on the way for watching Netflix (NFLX) streaming movies in your living room: Beginning this spring, Korean electronics giant LG will build Netflix streaming directly into some of its plasma and LCD HDTVs, the companies will announce today.
This means that Netflix subscribers will be able to stream more than 12,000 movies and TV shows on their TVs without a separate set-top box or a PC. Today, Netflix and its partners offer several set-top box options for streaming Netflix movies, including LG and Samsung Blu-ray disc players, TiVo (TIVO) DVRs, Roku set-top boxes, and Microsoft (MSFT) Xbox 360 game consoles.
The move puts Netflix -- for convenience, at least -- ahead of its Internet streaming rivals like Amazon (AMZN) and Apple (AAPL), which require set-top boxes or computers for their movie streaming/rental services. (It's especially helpful if you don't have any more hi-def inputs available on your TV.)
And more deals like this could eventually put some pressure on cable companies like Comcast (CMCSA) to increase their on-demand libraries -- especially the stuff that's available for free.
What we don't know yet: How much LG will charge for the TVs. If they're standard fare, we could see this boosting Netflix's subscriber count. If they're overpriced, it probably won't help.
Likewise, while Netflix's streaming service is solid and keeps getting better, it would be most useful if the TVs were capable of streaming other Internet video, such as video from Hulu, Google's (GOOG) YouTube, etc.
When I was a kid, I grew up in middle of the sticks where my parents didn’t have access to cable TV. When satellite dishes first started to show up, my folks were early adopters and bought a ginormous pirate dish (that you’d actually have to crank by hand when you wanted to jump [...]
Nearly two years to the day that Roxio (finally) brought TiVoToGo video transfers to Mac owners, they’ve announced an updated Toast bundle that facilitates shipping video files to a TiVo. Whereas TiVoToGo enables one to download TiVo recordings to a computer, this new feature provides Mac users with a means of transmitting video from computer [...]
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Technology Predictions for 2009
TeleNav is already an excellent application on many handset platforms and carriers. For a more “dedicated” experience, I have a feeling the continually delayed Garmin Nuvifone will be too little, too late, and too buggy. So I’m going on the record and stating Apple will either introduce a [...]
As I discovered earlier this month, i.TV has indeed been working on TiVo scheduling. Their updated i.TV iPhone app now links to your TiVo web account to schedule recordings. And i.TV’s television guide sure beats TiVo’s own mobile site. Assuming you can get it to work. Although I didn’t have good luck (pic below), Alex [...]