Google Introduces Chromecast - Threatens Apple TV and RoKu with Cheaper Streaming Content

Wednesday Google announced on it's company blog a new streaming device to bring all your favorite web and video content to your TV, Chromecast.

Chromecast has several key features which will make it highly competitive even with competitors already on the market. It's cheaper with a highly affordable price point of $35, it is compatible with phones, tablets, and laptops, it can work with Netflix, Youtube, Google Play with more apps promised to come soon and developers have already been outreached to.

The ability to use Apple products along with Windows products has been sited as competitive advantage, however Apple TV is PC compatible - though alternative smart phones are not cross compatible as they are with Chromecast. With 44% of Americans using tablets, and 84% of tablet web usage on iPads it is much more important for Google to be mobile and tablet compatible with Apple than the reverse.

Apple TV allows mirroring your computer screen so you can view on your laptop screen the same thing you're seeing on your TV which Chromecast doesn't allow. Meanwhile Chromecast allows multitasking so while you can use your phone as a remote control you're also able to continue tweeting, sending emails or whatever else you'd like without it interfering with your streaming content. The lack of a direct mirror feature with the benefit of multi-tasking makes for an expected trade off with Apple having a more controlled user experience and Google offering the more typical PC user experience of greater customization.

Additionally Chromecast has announced a beta feature to allow you to use a tab within your Chrome browser to directly stream to your TV. While Apple TV allows users to use iPhoto or Picasa, if Chrome works well - that opens the door directly to all sorts of web content already available. Unlike the Apple TV model which still users the Apple Store, partner organizations and programs as a gatekeeper on content. This more open ecosystem could prove attractive to those more interested in web-series, niche content, etc. as opposed to the mainstream TV content Apple has already partnered with. (ESPN, NBA, MLB, Sky News etc...) For example Al Jazeera has a live stream one could use this feature to view even though that content isn't available to many US TV watchers.

The Chromecast device is already available for $35 on Google Play, Amazon.com and BestBuy.com and it will soon be in Best Buy stores across the U.S. In a promotion almost worth the cost of the divice (two-thirds the cost actually...) 3 months of Netflix (Valued at $23.97) is included.

Comparatively the most popular streaming devices currently are Apple TV and Roku. Apple TV costs $99, and Roku devices cost between $49.99 and $99.99 depending on the model.

Given I personally don't own a TV and already use streaming content on a desktop, laptop, tablet and phone for entertainment - I'm probably not going to be in the market for any of these devices (though my parents do own a Roku box) however I look forward to seeing how this devices challenges Apple along with the reaction of mainstream content providers to compete with the freedom of web based flexible viewing especially given the increasing rise of Netflix as a source of original content.

You Don't Have Digital Privacy Thanks To PRISM

If you reconsidered using Verizon after discovering that the NSA was collecting your phone records, you should probably turn your computer off now. In another stunning publication the Guardian reported today about a program called PRISM which has been monitoring 9 large tech companies and thus most likely your email.

This program allows the NSA direct access to the servers of Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Paltalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, and Apple. To put that in perspective, When you're at work if you're using Google Apps for Business (like I do) you're being monitored. If you were an early internet user and still have your Hotmail, AOL or Yahoo email addresses - you're being monitored. If you're purchasing books or music through iTunes, you'd be monitored. Vacation pictures on Facebook? You're monitored...

The worst part of this all, Congress voted on allowing this in the Protect America Act without much of a debate voting quickly on a Friday in 2007 to avoid being seen as soft on terrorism. That program which lacked judicial oversight to begin with - has since been expanded into what we learned of today.

While those companies denied knowledge of the program and didn't know what PRISM was until this report came out earlier today, the reality is even those companies don't have the best track record with defending users privacy rights as shown in this EFF Report. Whether it is not requiring a warrant for content or not telling users about government data requests- it's hard to trust either the companies individual use of data and how such data is shared with third parties willingly, so when even that level of data security is frequently compromised without users being notified it's an even greater breach of trust when those companies don't know they're also being watched.

Previous scandals such as the Google WiSpy scandal, AOL search leak, Facebook App's Privacy issues and iPhone tracking illustrate those companies whether through a desire for more data, a lack of respect for users, negligence in managing data or interest in helping advertisers - are all guilty of having breached users trust in the past. And this doesn't even include what happens when all of that data is being tracked by the government.

Now the comments by Senator Ron Wyden in May of 2011 can be seen in context I think most will agree: "When the American people find out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will be stunned and they will be angry."

I know I am. Though I'm hopeful now that this abuse has come to light we can begin a serious conversation about privacy rights in a digital age.

RIP Steve Jobs

My facebook wall is flooded. My twitter stream is overwhelmingly monolithic in perspective. Google is simply and elegantly stating the truth. Apple has a simple image, minimalistic text, elegantly design. It begins to hit home: Steve Jobs is dead.

He is a man who’s influence is bigger than perhaps any contemporary will ever be able to say. I could say what I admire, the innovation, the relentless creativity, the artistry, the culture he created for technologists and the interest in what people could do with technology rather than how technology could be applied to old problems. 

I definitely admire the man.  And earlier today I posted on my facebook wall some of the inspirational things he said to Stanford's class of 2005.

"Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."

"You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle."

I will likely look to his quotes for inspiration again as I have often done in the past. But that doesn’t mean that his inspiring me and the Silicon Valley community I am a part of negates other effects he’s also had.

He acknowledges in 1985 in an interview part of the cost of new technology is old technology is obsolescent. I understand that. But it irks me how much the planned obsolescence is a part of Apple’s design. Simple things like the ability to change a battery without sending it back to the store makes all apple products irreparable, which is horrible for the environment. I am perfectly find with my iPhone seeming inadequate when the next generation comes along, but the inability to choose to use it because it will die in few years time is another story. There is no good way to get rid of it either- while the clean design and compact size are wonderful when I’m using it, the reality is after it’s life the only way to separate those components involves toxic waste which is generally outsourced to China or India – causing a great deal of harm to those who’ve never used his products.

I hate the human toll of ewaste and digital manufacturing. And although he created a culture of creativity for designers where innovation was central, where the budget for juice was over a hundred thousand annually – he also turned a blind eye to the use of conflict materials supported by slave labor. He turned a blind eye the suffering of those building his products when toxic materials were used by Wintek and when conditions were so bad at Foxconn that workers were driven to suicide. Meanwhile in his own offices LGBT employees were treated with respect and Apple was one of the first corporations to stand for marriage equality and against Prop 8 here in California. And the children of the next generation will grow up knowing about ewaste and environmental degradation due to watching Wall-e in their youth. So it’s complicated. He simultaneously pushed forward with radical change and made the computer and the tools it offers accessible to millions of households forever changing how digital media is made, received, distributed, what possibilities exist in film, music, and graphic arts and more – but as many before him, he left a wake of destruction out of sight and out of mind for those using his products.

He is indubitably one of the most visionary men of our era, and any one man could embody how the digital era has changed our way of life, it is him. And that is worthy of reflection. He might be part of a destructive capitalistic society - but he is also brilliantly disrupting elements of it. And inspiring the next generation of technocrats to think creatively, disruptively, and vivaciously. Unlike Bill Gates, he was never one to donate to charities or tackle social problems, but those things he did do, he did well and with passion.

Beginning in elementary school I’ve worked with iMacs. In junior high when running for one of the student council positions my slogan was “iNagrani, uVote4Me” (Thanks to Molly for coming up with that one!) Although my first mp3 player was not an iPhone, it was influenced by one. And I later was given an iTouch which I’ve used fondly ever since. I have an iPad that I carry around and has helped me by carrying emergency maps to help while navigating through Europe & Central Asia. My iPhone has become the way to check in with the world, read the news, and make all my morning calls before getting out of bed. Growing up in Silicon Valley the techies have always been household names and part of the conversational landscape- and so while I unfortunately never got to meet Mr. Jobs, I will miss him. His influence on my local community, the global community, the possibilities of technology and the digital era can never been forgotten.