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Television Movies Apple

Apple TV, Apple TV, Apple TV, and Apple TV+ (dcurt.is) 71

Posted by msmash from the what's-in-a-name dept.
Dustin Curtis writes about Apple TV: Apple TV is a hardware device. Apple TV is an app on Apple TV that curates content you can buy from Apple and also content you can stream through other installed apps (but not all apps, and there is no way to tell which ones). Apple TV is an app on iOS/iPadOS devices that operates similarly to Apple TV on Apple TV. Apple TV on iOS/iPadOS syncs playback and watch history with Apple TV on Apple TV, but only if the iOS/iPadOS device has the same apps installed as the Apple TV -- and not all apps are available on all platforms. Apple TV is also an app on macOS, but it does not show content that can only be streamed from external apps on an Apple TV or iOS/iPadOS device.

Apple TV is an app or built-in feature of other devices, like smart TVs and streaming set-top boxes, but when Apple TV is running on a third party device, it does not show content from other installed apps on that device. Apple TV Channels is a feature on all Apple TV apps that lets you subscribe to external services like HBO and Showtime, which then display content within Apple TV. When Apple TV is on Apple TV or iOS/iPadOS, though, most Apple TV Channel services also have their own app. If you are logged into the app, the service's content already shows up in Apple TV. Apple TV Channels can only be viewed within Apple TV; you cannot watch an Apple TV Channel service's content on any non-Apple TV device, app, or the web. [...] Apple TV+ is a subscription streaming service from Apple that functions like an Apple TV Channel but is not an Apple TV Channel. Apple TV+ content can also be viewed in a web browser at tv.apple.com; no other Apple TV apps, devices, or features can be used in a web browser. He adds, "other than that, though, Apple TV is relatively straightforward."
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Apple TV, Apple TV, Apple TV, and Apple TV+ More

Apple TV, Apple TV, Apple TV, and Apple TV+

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  • Public service message (Score:5, Informative)

    by Lucas123 ( 935744 ) on Wednesday November 06, 2019 @02:20PM (#59387782) Homepage
    The term "Apple TV" was written 44 times in this article containing a total of 465 words, meaning roughly 10% of the words used in the article consist of Apple and TV.
    • HA! I was just about to say the same thing!. This had to have been a marketing ploy.
      • Apple TV is really a platform. They are complaining about the term used so much? Facebook is a platform. Facebook is an app on iPhones. It's also an app on androids. It's also an API system. It's also... whatever. It's Facebook. This is Apple TV. Are there inconsistencies? Sure. Does it always work the same way? No. That's what updates are for. Software is NEVER complete. The Smart TVs dont yet have the APIs to control other content on installed apps the way iOS does. Apple is trying to solve a user exper

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Nidi62 ( 1525137 )

      The term "Apple TV" was written 44 times in this article containing a total of 465 words, meaning roughly 10% of the words used in the article consist of Apple and TV.

      This headline makes me think of the classic one-word sentence with a twist:

      Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo....in Buffalo.

    • That was kinda the point. But moreover, the summary contains the word "curate" which alone indicates that there is nothing of value within.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday November 06, 2019 @02:25PM (#59387812)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • ATT is doing the same with HBO, MAX, and there TV!

  • Okay, so do we post every brand that does this?
    Audi: Quattro: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    I'm sure we can name hundreds of brands; Disney anyone? No, this article is a low, slow, underhand pitch to try and start a "you said Apple" fight.

    • I was going to contribute, but got stuck googling google in Google.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dpille ( 547949 )
      No kidding. Would the story be any better if headlined "Dustin Curtis Too Stupid to Realize Trademarks are Adjectives"? Or "Dustin Curtis Deliberately Avoids Using Generic Nouns"?

      Nestle makes branded corn flakes and ice cream. How will I ever make sure I don't end up with ice cream for breakfast??
  • Apple is reusing their branding to cover a Device, a software and a service. Really all meant to run all together.
    So you Can have the Apple TV App for your phone which can Access the Apple TV service.

    Yes most companies will come up with a different names

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Luthair ( 847766 )
      I think the authors point is that its confusing. Also confusing is that you access your movies on ios via an application called Apple TV....

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by clive27 ( 889511 )
        Just like you open Netflix app to watch Netflix.

      • I think the authors point is that its confusing. Also confusing is that you access your movies on ios via an application called Apple TV....

        If we want to get pedantic about it (and why not?), only the Apple TV Device is actually called "Apple TV". The rest of the Applications and the "Apple TV+" Service are all actually named "TV" (or "TV+", respectively).

        Yes, there is an Apple Logo next to the Name; but that simply isn't the same thing.

        Well, ok, nevermind; it seems like Apple is indeed fomenting this confusion by including their Logo in the pronunciation of the "TV" App's Name:

        https://support.apple.com/guid... [apple.com]

        So yes, it is all a bit confusing,

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by guruevi ( 827432 )

        What's confusing to the end user? Calling your service 15 different things for every channel or calling it 1 thing that's the same on every device.

        I want to watch TV, open AppleTV on my phone, computer or TV gives me roughly the same experience with the only differences being where content license limitations crop up (eg. Apple can't license certain content for a mobile or non-STB platform, such as cable channels, the cable provider insists those go on a 'real TV' even though technically the only difference

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      Apple is reusing their branding to cover a Device, a software and a service. Really all meant to run all together.
      So you Can have the Apple TV App for your phone which can Access the Apple TV service.

      Yes most companies will come up with a different names

      Yes, but there are advantages and disadvantages to both methods. The single name to rule them all is pretty nice if it's focused on just that thing - so I can buy an Apple TV and get Apple TV service. Or if my TV has an Apple TV app, I know that's for Apple

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by _xeno_ ( 155264 )

        But this fails if something isn't available - like if the Apple TV service starts offering music, and you can't listen or access it on the Apple TV hardware device or the Apple TV app, in which case it all horrendously breaks down. So as long as it all works consistent across, it's fine.

        The reverse is kind of true already: you can use Apple TV (the device) to stream Apple Music but you cannot use Apple TV (the app) to stream Apple Music, that you can only stream through Apple's Music app. Except on the Watch. There you can only stream through the Radio app.

        The summary is intentionally unclear to play up the confusion, but all of these are referred to as Apple TV in various places:

        Apple TV (the platform): a physical device that runs tvOS and can run special tvOS versions of iOS/iPadOS apps.

        • It's already confusing because if you look at Apple TV, there's very little indication as to how you can watch a show, especially because it "rolls up" shows that are available across services into one. You can pick which service you use to watch it on after selecting it, but because it includes things you can rent through Apple, just because it shows you a result as being available doesn't mean you can actually watch it with your existing subscription.

          It really is as confusing to untangle as the author implies.

          The genius of the Apple TV App (on the Apple TV STB) is that "aggregator" functionality. Theoretically (and often, actually), this provides a one-stop (or one-search) place for Users to find content from "compatible" sources. Very much betterer than having to visit 5 different standalone Apps.

          The downfall of the Apple TV App (again, as realized on the Apple TV STB), is that there is no clear way to figure-out (AFAICT) exactly what Services are being aggregated into the search-pool. Sure, you set a bunch of

  • I had a chance to try out Apple TV+ (because it's free with new Apple stuff) and the UI is just ... confusing.

    What content is part of Apple TV+? I couldn't tell you. I found what is either a list of like all eight shows on Apple TV+, or maybe it's just recommendations, I quite literally couldn't tell.

    The Apple TV+ stuff is sort of mixed in with Apple TV content and Apple TV content. (That's Apple TV channels content, that is, channels you can subscribe to through Apple, and content from other streaming apps

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by janimal ( 172428 )
      I own an Apple TV, and have no idea what the new interface is telling me. I never want to watch recommended stuff, so having it all over the screen basically means I need to hunt for something I want in a sea of noise.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by anegg ( 1390659 )

        I have a couple of AppleTV devices; two 3rd generation, one 5th generation. The older devices had a pretty straightforward user interface like other streaming media terminals; different "apps" were different portals to streaming media offered by different sources. The latest device still works the same way, but a badly executed attempt to provide a "one ring to rule them all" overlay has been added. Unfortunately, due to inconsistencies in the way that it interacts with the individual streaming media por

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by _xeno_ ( 155264 )

          Unfortunately, it is hard (for me and my wife, anyway) to provide the right amount of "slide" to move the focus exactly where we want it, without overshooting/undershooting the target.

          It's not just hard. It's buggy, too.

          I've found that if you leave an Apple TV app open for "too long" the touch surface thing will just break, causing slight actions to send it flying and making the various "click while holding from this side" gesture things (did you know those exist? they do) completely break. It makes it so that merely brushing the controller will cause things to fly around randomly. Info will pop down as if you swiped down. The show will seek wildly.

          How do I know it's just buggy and not b

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by anegg ( 1390659 )

            I've found that if you leave an Apple TV app open for "too long" the touch surface thing will just break, causing slight actions to send it flying and making the various "click while holding from this side" gesture things (did you know those exist? they do) completely break. It makes it so that merely brushing the controller will cause things to fly around randomly. Info will pop down as if you swiped down. The show will seek wildly.

            I haven't had the experience you mention. I was aware of the "click from the side" actions as they are necessary for rewind/jump ahead functions. I'll pay more attention to any deviant behavior I see in the future. Cheers -

          • Good luck binge watching anything when you have to constantly restart apps just to keep the controller working.

            I have binge-watched plenty of things, and the only time I have troubles with the Apple Remote going wonky is in the Netflix App. It is a true POS. And it doesn't take leaving it open a long time, either. It just sucks.

            The only other time I had weirdness with the Remote was right after Upgrading to tvOS 13. Prime video's menuing and browsing functions were totally hosed. Rebooting the Apple TV cured the problem.

            Most of the time I use my Harmony Remote or iPhone to control my Apple TV. The tiny trackpad on t

    • I never could get on the Apple TV train so to speak. I was always more partial to single IoT devices, Plex, and third-party services to get what I wanted. While some may say Apple TV is convenient it's also restrictive, more so than I care to like.

      • I never could get on the Apple TV train so to speak. I was always more partial to single IoT devices, Plex, and third-party services to get what I wanted. While some may say Apple TV is convenient it's also restrictive, more so than I care to like.

        How is Apple TV "restrictive"?

        Please provide reasonable and realistic examples that would affect normal people; not "what's the wildest scenario I can dream up".

  • "What if I don't like spam?"

  • ...whose first four albums were simply titled "Peter Gabriel."

  • There is a new show on "apple TV" that I want to watch and am happy to pay for. Can I get it on iTunes or is that different? Do I really need multiple separate media accounts with Apple?

    Don't know and don't care enough to figure it out. So they don't get my money and I'll watch something else. I could figure it out, but why? I get paid quite handsomely to mess around with computers - why should I do it for free?

    Amazon has a lot of content. Sometimes I have to pay for it. That's fine. .

    • There is a new show on "apple TV" that I want to watch and am happy to pay for. Can I get it on iTunes or is that different? Do I really need multiple separate media accounts with Apple?

      Don't know and don't care enough to figure it out. So they don't get my money and I'll watch something else. I could figure it out, but why? I get paid quite handsomely to mess around with computers - why should I do it for free?

      Amazon has a lot of content. Sometimes I have to pay for it. That's fine. .

      Every Apple service or App/Media purchase is billed through your AppleID Account. You only need one of those, and in fact, if you start needlessly spawning multiple AppleIDs, it can get messy, and AFAICT, there isn't a convenient way to "consolidate" them at a later date.

      So Apple made it so there is no "figuring it out". One Account. One Signon. All media and services. What could be easier?

  • Malkovich Malkovich? Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich. Malkovich+

  • Serious question. I spent $35 on Chromecast and it works so well. I don't understand why I'd bother with Apple TV, it sounds like an expensive PITA. What's the benefit?

    • Well, Apple makes more money off you.

      Oh. What's the benefit to *you*.

      None. None whatsoever.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by anegg ( 1390659 )

      When I bought my 3rd gen AppleTV, the only other streaming media terminal I had used was a Sony BluRay player that had built-in media streaming. The AppleTV was a lot better. A while ago, when the Amazon FireStick went on-sale, I bought one. AppleTV was still the best I had seen (better performance in the user interface, no obvious visible differences with actual programming) but at the time AppleTV didn't offer Amazon Prime. Recently the FireStick is showing evidence of under-powered CPU for the execut

      • The new Chromecast that supports HD (I'm a luddite, I don't have an HD tv) costs like $69 on Amazon.com. I don't use Hulu, a quick google and it looks like Hulu's app supports Chromecasting. All the other streaming sources you mention support Chromecast.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by anegg ( 1390659 )
          I've had an HD TV (1080i, terrestrial/satellite broadcast anyway) since 2001 or so when I had to buy a stupid 46" Mitsubishi rear projection monster with a DirecTV HDTV receiver to get it. Got hooked on the detail/clarity especially as compared with the broadcast TV of the time. I haven't bought a 4K "ultra" TV because so far program sources haven't kept up. The claim that Internet streaming is "HD" is already somewhat strained, and 1080P does just fine with standard BluRay sources. So... if I need a ne

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Etcetera ( 14711 )

      Serious question. I spent $35 on Chromecast and it works so well. I don't understand why I'd bother with Apple TV, it sounds like an expensive PITA. What's the benefit?

      Well, the 3rd generation (black hocky puck) device came out a bit before the ultra-cheap media stick devices were a thing. Apple TV's biggest selling point (for me) remains Mac integration. Any Apple device can stream over AirPlay to it, and if you enable Home Sharing and have a box that always has iTunes running (still the main method for me as I have a PC always on), you can stream all music using a device interface without having to touch the iTunes Match/Cloud and pay for bandwidth.

      AirPlay remains one o

      • Any Apple device can stream over AirPlay to it, and if you enable Home Sharing and have a box that always has iTunes running (still the main method for me as I have a PC always on), you can stream all music using a device interface without having to touch the iTunes Match/Cloud and pay for bandwidth.

        Speaking of Home Sharing for iTunes (a/k/a Apple Music): I know you were likely talking about a Windows PC doing iTunes Streaming/Home Sharing; but for us Mac users, there is a hidden feature in macOS Catalina's "Music" Application that is a long time coming:

        Home Sharing for "Music" is now a Background Service!!!

        That's right: No longer do you have to have computer with iTunes Open to do use as an "iTunes Server". The computer just has to be up, and you can stream music to one or more endpoints!

        In other word

    • I don't understand why I'd bother with Apple TV

      I can tell you one thing you can do with Apple TV that you can't do with a Chromecast, and that's do peer-to-peer video streaming from an Apple device to an Apple TV, without requiring them both to be on the same physical network.

      The last time I looked into this for Chromecast, the responses in the community were "why would you ever want to do that???". However, if you have a meeting room in a facility with no guest WiFi access, and still want to permit guests to project their screens to an Apple TV connec

  • I'm running KODI hosted on an ASUS Chrome Box. It streams anything that my 24TB Raid 6 NAS can through at it!

    • I'm running KODI hosted on an ASUS Chrome Box. It streams anything that my 24TB Raid 6 NAS can through at it!

      There is a KODI App on the Apple TV, too.

      Same capabilities.

  • ...no one gives a shit about Apple TV in any of its forms.

    See also: "Glitter"

  • I loaded the app on my Amazon Fire Stick.

    It was showing me trending things to watch. Like Jack Ryan on Amazon. I tied to watch it. It told me I couldn't. I exited the app and watched Jack Ryan on the stick directly.

    Is there a way to set the app to only show me things that will play without incurring extra costs?

  • Does this make more sense in Mandarin? Otherwise, this is Monty Python Marketing Group.
  • I could sign up to the five streaming services that host my fav TV shows for $100CAD OR go to pirate bay. Their greed is disgusting. I am voting with my wallet.

  • Her: Quiet! You're waking the Vikings!
    Him: But ... Apple Tâ¦Vikings: LOVELY SPAAAM! WONDERFUL SPAAAM! ...

  • Replace every third occurrence of "Apple" with "Throatwarbler Mangrove". It reads more easily.
  • If you need to pay for each kind of Apple TV, it'll cost you a bundle and Apple will make a fortune. Perhaps you get a discount on the complete bundle of Apple TVs.

    • If you need to pay for each kind of Apple TV, it'll cost you a bundle and Apple will make a fortune.

      You don't. You only have to pay for the Apple TV (hardware) and Apple TV+ (Apple's streaming service). Apple TV the software (iOS/iPadOS/macOS/tvOS) is bundled free with each respective Apple operating system. None of them require any of the others.

      Yaz

  • To be fair:

    The fifth generation Apple TV device is officially called Apple TV 4K [apple.com] so it has a slightly more distinct name than this article implies

    The fourth generation Apple TV device (the first one that can run tvOS) has been retronymed Apple TV HD [apple.com] for about a year now. Granted, it's not the first one that can do HD content but as of right now if you try and go buy it on Apple's site it's called Apple TV HD.

    The third generation Apple TV device and prior were indeed just called Apple TV [wikipedia.org] but Apple doesn't se

  • Our company put some large-screen high-definition TVs on the conference room walls, mainly as monitors for screen sharing during meetings. Whomever did this picked Apple TV capable monitors and/or converter boxes. And hooked 'em up to the LAN.

    One result was they subscribed themselves to a service (Apple TV again I guess) and tend to screen-save by offering pay-per-view movies (when they aren't showing nighttime cityscape flyovers).

    Another was that the guys with Apple laptops can hook up to them over the L

    • Our company put some large-screen high-definition TVs on the conference room walls, mainly as monitors for screen sharing during meetings. Whomever did this picked Apple TV capable monitors and/or converter boxes. And hooked 'em up to the LAN.

      Another was that the guys with Apple laptops can hook up to them over the LAN via WiFi.

      From my Ubuntu laptop I was able to hit them with an open-source script. But then they downloaded a firmware update and the script stopped working (and I haven't found another that works with the higher garden wall). So now I have to plug in the HDMI cable. B-b

      No, you don't. Instead of feeling left out of the party, or even worse, actively try to ruin it for everyone else like you did, Just use AirPlay, like the guys with the better (that is to say, Mac) laptops:

      https://askubuntu.com/question... [askubuntu.com]

      There's this, too; but it looks a little sketchy to me:

      http://www.xindawn.com/ [xindawn.com]

      BTW, that took less time to find than your "Open Source Script", I'd imagine.

      • No, you don't. Instead of feeling left out of the party, or even worse, actively try to ruin it for everyone else like you did, Just use AirPlay, like the guys with the better (that is to say, Mac) laptops: ...
        BTW, that took less time to find than your "Open Source Script", I'd imagine.

        Congratulations. You found the one i was talking about - which worked at first, then broke when Apple updated the target.

        Did you actually TRY it? Or the other one?

        (If you did, and one of them worked on your configuration, l

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