by It looks like the review embargoes are being lifted with regards to the new Apple TV. Over at Yahoo David Pogue shares his thoughts on the latest Apple TV however he seems to class some searching problems as Apple’s fault and not those of Third-party developers.
From The Article
Breaking down the article the first mistake comes less than half way down the webpage, a page which does the thing we all love of auto playing a video.
“People always ask me, dave how do I stream internet video to my tv.”
You can almost feel the cheese but moving on. David drops the clanger “Sadly, this “speak to search” command finds shows and movies only in the libraries of Netflix, HBO, Showtime, and Hulu. It can’t find anything on YouTube, CBS, ABC, NBC, PBS, and so on. It’s a missed opportunity the size of Greenland.”
Which isn’t anything to do with the Apple TV but more developers getting an app out there at release time. It’s not like this hasn’t ever happened before with something called the Apple Watch. Version 1 of most watch apps were a “me too”
What you can ask Siri on Apple TV.
“Find ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.’
“Find some action movies,” or “What are some good sexy thrillers?”, or “Show me crime dramas.”
“Show me Bruce Willis movies.” Or “What are some good animated kid movies?”
“Show me that episode of ‘The Office’ with Amy Adams as a guest star.
If you have any dealing of being a programmer, searches are very much done in a logical data driven style. Think of a show / film and then add filters in your mind. Bear in mind this review was performed in the USA with an Apple music subscription. How well this will work in the UK or how much Siri’s responses will be hampered without a subscription will be seen very shortly.
One final though on what you can ask Siri on Apple TV. ““Find action movies,” then “The James Bond ones,” then “just the ones with Sean Connery.” Wasn’t that demoed at the latest keynote?
Too many bugs
Going back to what David has to say, all of the main gripes around bugs are limited around third party apps.
As I reviewed the Apple TV, I was a little shocked to see how buggy it was.
Try to fast-forward by voice in the PBS app? “Hmm…I can’t seem to do that in PBS right now,” Apple TV says.
Ask the Fox app, “Who’s in this episode?” “Sorry, I don’t know the answer to that,” Apple TV says.
Say, “What did he say?” in a Netflix movie. “Sorry, I don’t know what audio and video options are available,” says Apple TV.
Ask “What did she say?” in a TV episode. Apple TV does the 15-second rewind, but doesn’t show the subtitles like it’s supposed to.
Notice there’s a common theme here. all these problems are happening with third-party applications not provided by Apple. It’s not unlike Apple to hold back API access from general developers until everything is fully baked and working. Plus let’s not forget that developers have really only had hands on access to the Apple TV for 6 weeks. The best is yet to come.
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