YouTube TV Removed From Roku Channel Store Amid Google Contract Dispute (axios.com) 26
YouTube TV has been removed from Roku's channel store, after Roku and YouTube TV parent Google failed to come to a distribution agreement amid accusations that the tech giant made anti-competitive demands. From a report: These spats happen regularly between Pay-TV providers and linear TV networks. But in the digital era, this is one of the rare times in which consumers will have a major streaming network removed from their platform's channel store due to a breakdown in negotiations. The channel will still be available for existing YouTube TV customers, but new users that wish to download the app from Roku's channel store will no longer have the ability to do so. Roku is keeping the app available to existing users so that customers don't get caught up in the messy negotiations. Earlier this week, Roku notified customers that YouTube TV may be forced off its platform if it couldn't come to an agreement with Google over a distribution deal. Notably, the dispute between Google and Roku is not over financial terms.
Kudos to Roku... (Score:5, Informative)
Re: Kudos to Roku... (Score:1)
Re: Kudos to Roku... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Re:Kudos to Roku... (Score:4, Interesting)
https://www.protocol.com/youtu... [protocol.com]
That doesn't feel so draconian. The search results thing, I can see some argument for, but at the same time, if I were using an app that had a search feature, I absolutely would expect it's search results to be in app results.
And the AV1 codec thing. I absolutely call bullshit on Roku.
Re: (Score:3)
1. AV1 is just something the industry needs to get behind to kill off MPEG-LA.
2. Showing Youtube voice results inside the YouTube app is entirely reasonable. That's what a user expects.
3. But forcing Roku to show YouTube search results in its own search app is entirely unreasonable. That said, Roku ought to provide search hooks in its API and aggregate results from any installed app, but Google should not be able to abuse its market position to force this issue. A tiny app wouldn't dare insist on it, so i
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According to the article #3 was already done in the past, and I do agree, that if that's what Google did back then, that's not really fair. However the limited googling I spent on this doesn't find anything about that dispute. I mean if Roku hand-selected certain apps to display results from, but explicitly excluded others (i.e. preferential treatment based on whatever terms Roku decides) then I don't think an unreasonable contract negotiation stance from Google would be, well you need to display result f
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"The search results thing"
Is ultimately question of perspective.
When you talk to an iphone, you get whatever siri wants to give you. You aren't talking to the app you are in, you are talking to the siri app.
When you talk to your roku, are you talking to the roku app, or are you talking to the app you are in?
Nobody would ever imagine Apple backing off on having siri do whatever Apple wants siri to do. Why should roku allow google to fragment its voice-assistant functionality in a way Apple, Microsoft, Amazon
Re: (Score:2)
"But if you were using a DEVICE that had a voice search feature, and the DEVICE search feature could return results from multiple apps -- and in fact this is one of its competitive advantages so you don't have search for a movie or song in 4 apps... what would you expect then?"
This is the part where I said that I can see some argument for it. So I do mostly agree with what you're saying here, but I think it boils down to how roku presents the voice search capability. If it's clearly an external search, th
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I have two roku devices, a streambar and an ultra. Both work the same:
You push the mic button on the roku remote so the roku is "listening", and you say your command.
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Very much so, Google's demands are ridiculous.
Re: Kudos to Roku... (Score:2)
Asking for av1 support isn't unreasonable considering it's royalty free. It's not just google that would benefit from it either.
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Roku demands either 30% of the ad space or complete management of the ads and keeps a 30% cut of the revenue.
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And Twitch, and HBO MAX... What were google's draconian demands?
According to Roku, Google is demanding that if a Roku user has the regular YouTube app open, the platform cannot display search results from competing third-party services like Netflix, Disney Plus or HBO Max.
Google also is asking for special access to Roku user data and wants the ability to dictate hardware requirements to Roku in the future for running its apps, Roku alleged.
What's google's point of view?
YouTube said its offer to Roku âo
Roku is a shit company. (Score:2)
With terrible support. I haven't used one for like 10 years but still, fuck them.
Nothing of value (Score:4)
And nothing of value has been lost.
Some important bits to note. (Score:5, Informative)
1. This is for the Youtube TV app - that is, the pay-per-month TV replacement, not the regular old youtube videos.
2. Folks that have the app already installed on Roku keep it and can keep using it no problem. It's only new installs and account setups that are prevented for now.
Ryan Fenton
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Agreed here. I see too many people mistakenly thinking that Youtube was dropped and arguing that the APIs aren't so hard, etc.
Re: Some important bits to note. (Score:2)
"YouTube TV" -- a branding faux pas that's rivaled only by Microsoft's repeated attempts to use the Windows trademark to sell smartphones.
Yes, it is possible to hire too many engineers and not enough marketing people, and this is what happens when you do.
Like satellite / cable (Score:2)
Yet another way the new boss will eventually be just like the old boss. The only difference will be that the programming is on-demand.
Got this today (Score:1)
https://tv.youtube.com/learn/u... [youtube.com]
This is about open source 4K codecs (Score:2)
Roku doesn't want to allow YouTubeTV to install open source codecs for 4K streams. Since that's how YouTubeTV will support 4K streams on other platforms, YouTubeTV doesn't want to have its Roku support crippled by having to do without them here.
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It's not that Roku doesn't want to let them install codes, it's that they don't want to have to move to a more expensive chipset moving forward to get a hardware decoder that supports AV1. A huge chunk of Roku's market is people who pick up their low end devices under 20 bucks at the local walmart. That particular price point would not be impossible with a higher end chipset.
None of the chips in this class are capable of 'soft' decoding hardly anything. They have dedicated hardware decoding facilities for t
BBC (Score:2)
I just wish the BBC would drop their stupid checks on what model of Roku the app is running and refuse to run if it detects and unsupported model. I have a Roku Ultra that is a couple of years old, but the BBC app refuses to run on it, forcing me to keep an older Roku just for the BBC.
To make matters worse, one of the other UK-based Roku apps won't run on my older Roku, so now I need 2 Rokus just for UK-based apps.