CNN Money has today shared the second part of its interview with Apple SVP Eddy Cue. In the first part of the interview, shared last week, Cue noted of how the Apple TV has graduated from the “hobby” stage and sold more than 20 million units. While sales of the new fourth-gen box are unclear at this point, Cue did hint at some future features come to the device in part two of the interview, as well as Apple’s ultimate goal with the tvOS platform.
The current state of cable TV, as CNN notes, is in somewhat of a disastrous and outdated state. Cue, however, brags that the new Apple TV offers a “much better experience for consuming content” than other offerings on the market. The end goal, Cue said, is to entirely replace the need for a cable company’s set top box.
When asked if Apple would achieve this goal by revealing its own streaming TV service, Cue gave a handful of non-answers. Cue was specifically asked about CBS CEO Les Moonves’ comments when he stated “Apple is having conversations with everyone about doing their own streaming services.” Cue, however, simply responded with, “The great thing is that Les is actually on Apple TV,” referring to the CBS All Access app in the tvOS App Store.
Cue was then asked about the idea of buying a whole cable package through Apple TV, which he replied is already possible if cable companies let it happen:
“If Comcast or any other provider wants to do that, they’ll be able to do that with the current Apple TV. We want to get to the point where customers are able to buy whatever they want, however they want. We’re not fixed into ‘There’s only one way to buy it.’ Just like we’ve done with the App Store, where there have been things that have been free; things that you subscribe to; things that you pay for; things that are in-app. All of those capabilities will be here and we want that market to be able to develop.”
The main selling point of the Apple TV, Cue believes, is that it offers a way for developers to truly change how TV is consumed. It “offers a platform to truly innovate,” Cue said. The Apple executive also shot down the notion that Apple needs exvlusive programing to differentiate itself from the likes of Google and Roku. “We don’t try to do things that are exclusive,” he said. “What we try to do is build technologies that let developers do things that they can’t do anywhere else.”
However, when asked about financing its own TV shows, Cue was a lot more coy in his answer:
“We love working with our partners,” he said. “We’re great at technology and they’re great at creating content, and we think that’s a great partnership to have. I think there’s a tremendous amount of great content out there today, and we want to make it easier for customers to have access to it.”
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Give me 500 channels with many languages for dollar 30 a month and am hooked.
How is that coy? He said they have a good partnership with Apple as technology not as content providers.
If apple does this.
We can finally say fuckyou to Comcast and go somewhere else for internet.
The thing that is never addressed is the data caps provider gives you. Apple will have to get providers to give unlimited data to an Apple TV service. I have 300 GB data cap from Cable One which just went from 50 mbs to 100 mbs. With streaming from Netflix and HBO go alone i been nearing or going over my data cap the 2 months of the upgraded speed. Add streaming TV from Apple and i would always be going over my data limit.
People want 4k that would quickly eat up data caps and many people don’t have the speed for good 4k experience and add in their isn’t much content available besides youtube and videos shot on new iPhone 6s’s.
I wish Apple would offer a subscription to movies and tv shows already on iTunes. I can wait a few days to stream new shows as they are added to iTunes.
“I wish Apple would offer a subscription to movies and tv shows already on iTunes. I can wait a few days to stream new shows as they are added to iTunes.”
that would be AWESOME!
Those don’t seem like non-answers to me. They sound like Apple will create the platform for others to put their content on. Obviously if Apple is working on their own service Cue wouldn’t talk about it but more and more content providers and cable companies are offering internet services so does Apple really need get in that business? Apple’s never really been about making money off services anyway.
I think it’s a shame if Apple really isn’t considering creating in-house content. If they did, they’d probably do it in the Bay Area (unlike Netflix, who despite being in Los Gatos, does all their content production in LA). That could bring a whole world of new perspectives that you don’t currently get within the somewhat insular Hollywood community.
With that said, short of bugging their executive suite, there’s no way to know whether that really means “never” or just “we want to get all the major content providers on board solidly first, and provide them with enough revenue that they won’t pull out as soon as we start competing with them”. I’m hoping for the latter.