I’m curious as to what the near future is for the Apple TV (say 3 years)
After the next Apple TV gets a nice spec bump presumably to improve gaming performance
I see Apple moving away from relatively simple streamers. I don’t see a huge push into
8k streaming because of severe bandwidth costs.
Here’s how I’d like to see it play out.
The Apple TV app will continue to get delivered with your most popular TV Vendors reducing the need for external hardware.
This will allow Apple to maintain two hardware product like they do today with a few wrinkles.
Low End Apple TV (LE-ATV) will cater to gaming and those upgrading older TV where the Apple TV app doesn’t work so well or is nonexistent . It’ll contain most of the functionality of today’s 4k Apple TV with spec bumps.
A new High End Apple TV (HE-ATV) will be announced that is aimed at enthusiasts. It’ll not only have the most power for games but it’ll usher in a new form factor that is larger because it’s going to be configurable with a 3.5 inch Hard Drive because this HE-ATV will be able to download iTunes movies and larger games directly to the hard drive. Base configuration could be a 8TB HDD upgradable to 14TB through the Apple Store.
What’s going to drive this?
-.Broadband caps make streaming 4k difficult
Games require a lot of space and processing power if quality visuals are desired
Subscriptions for gaming is the present and the future
VVC (Versatile Video Coding) providing a near 50% in data rates over HEVC (h.265)
So Apple will be able to deliver 4k downloads/streaming in the same data rates that they download today with
1080 h.264. With hard drives hitting 18TB today looking out 2-3 years the 8TB should be relative given the success of Seagate HAMR technology which could see
22TB and 24TB drives by 2022
For enthusiasts of Gaming, Movies and Music I see value in a box that plugs directly into the TV which neatly sidesteps the average poor quality
Wifi and Ethernet networks of homes and delivers high bandwidth content to the TV and can stream low bandwidth content like music to other
Computing devices on the network.
What is really needed low cost mass storage which we appear to be heading towards and an exceptional CODEC (VVC) that can handle today’s
Modern technology. Again we’re shooting for a couple of years from now as we need faster and more Encode vendors and faster chips for
Decoding VVC for playback.
I though about simply just getting a Mac mini and via HDMI going straight to the TV but the issue is having a viable UI for managing video content.
I also think that content providers are afraid to have high quality content stored offline and a full on computer. I think with a lack of filesystem access Apple can assuage their fears a bit by having a solution that is locked down enough to thwart piracy while still offering offline support for games/movies/music
I think Apple in the future will continue to push Apple TV more toward content aggregation and discovery, as well as the focal point for Apple’s own content, and a vehicle for encouraging more subscription and other content revenues.
Apple going the same direction as Roku, away from hardware to do “Apple TV included” deals with monitor manufacturers seems to be contrary to Apple’s overarching strategy to control its physical and digital platforms for quality and revenue reasons.
Agree it’s the myopia of the content creation industries. We’ve gone to primarily Digital distribution of music and because of broadband improvements video content was always the next step.
They’re not. going to bother with 8k Blu-ray and 4k Blu-ray is slowly being phased out. I will say as a movie collector, the pricing of movies has never been better. They have done an excellent job of making it easy and affordable to build a library.
It’s time to take it to the next level. Digital movies are really no different than an application. The same model that drives some creative applications with the ability to extend them via essentially IAP would be an ideal mode for video content. I know Home Theater buffs that would gladly pay for a “Bombastic Mix” of some of their favorite movies. Everything we do today is limited by the constraints of physical media. Once the physical media is gone we can move to Digital economy. I think future generations will grow up expecting purchased media to be attached to them and be extensible as improvements come to fruition.
Id love to know the internal roadmap of Apple TV because I. do think it can potentially become a great content aggregator. It will never have the catalog of a Disney or MGM but I don’t think it will have to. I eventually see Apple marrying content from major studies “and” Indie projects (think Youtube but classier) . I’ve opined about Apple acquiring Vimeo for years.
Apple has a lot of synergies here. They have Final Cut Pro X for content editing, they have a Content Distribution Network and a micro-payment processing platform.
They could literally offer a platform that has a workflow that takes a project from ingest to distribution on say “Apple TV + Social” and dis-intermediate Patreon and Paid sponsors by facilitating secure payments for premium subscriptions and managing paid sponsorships.
I watch a lot of YouTube but I’m not interested in YouTube Premium. Apple’s social network would be a lot more sanitized and curated.
is restructuring its media and entertainment divisions, as streaming becomes the most important facet of the company’s media business.
On Monday, the company revealed that in order to further accelerate its direct-to-consumer strategy, it would be centralizing its media businesses into a single organization that will be responsible for content distribution, ad sales and Disney+.
