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Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

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Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#401

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Turn wifi off for the existing TV (smart or not matters little if you don't connect it) and stick the same $50 HDMI stick and avoid throwing out the fully functional display? At this point, ads displayed to the users who use it as a smart TV probably subsidize those of us who use such TVs without connecting them to anything. My latest TV is enormous and 4K and under a few hundred dollars. The quality is fine, even if…

Hmm, avoiding the terms and conditions for a TV isn't exactly selling me on this idea, but yeah if you already have a smart TV obviously it's good to stretch its usefulness as far as possible. But when shopping for a new TV, just buy a dumb one or a projector.

That's what I'm saying, it seems like a smart TV is cheaper even if you use it as a dumb TV.

I think that they are selling them at reduced margins or even as a loss leader in order to get you to pay them for the smart features.

Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#402

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Two things can be true at once. Youtube is a platform that needs to make money to exist, and it can also help support creators at the same time. No one claimed it was a charity for creators. They are perfectly justified in making money off of any video on their platform. It's honestly astonishing to me that you think it's acceptable for a creator to be able to rake in thousands from their video, hosted entirely for f…

> you think it's acceptable for a creator to be able to rake in thousands from their video, hosted entirely for free, while also blocking Youtube from making a single penny Please don’t dictate what I think. That’s not at all what I actually wrote. Second, if anyone is operating at a loss, it’s the small creators. YouTube, operated by one of richest company on this planet, is the one profiting both directly and indir…

> Please don’t dictate what I think. That’s not at all what I actually wrote.

Then please explain because either you agree that Youtube should be allowed to override the "no ads" checkbox for creators that run in-video ads, or you disagree with it. I don't really see a middle ground here.

> I also can’t understand how anyone can claim small creators “only makes a few pennies” while “raking in thousands” at the same time.

It's simple; as with literally everything else Google does, scale. A few pennies, multiplied by millions of small creators, adds up very quickly.

But if they had to setup Creator deals with each of those millions of creators with 1-2 videos, then the economics would simply not work out. It's the same reason they have piss poor customer support on their free products. Those products only work because they have billions of users, but providing customer support to that many people doesn't work financially.

Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#403
post #193

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I'm not sure where the irony is, since Google doesn't have a captive app store, unlike say Apple.

Ah, well I suppose Google can just then instruct customers to side load into their Rokus, since that's straightforward and not captive.

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Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#404
post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure where the irony is, since Google doesn't have a captive app store, unlike say Apple.

Ah, well I suppose Google can just then instruct customers to side load into their Rokus, since that's straightforward and not captive.

Sideloading on a Roku is actually significantly more difficult thank sideloading on Android. You can also only sideload one application at a time.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think that Google has a leg to stand on here, but they're the least of the villains in this story as far as a captive app audience goes.

Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#405

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Roku is literally a device that you purchase for using media streaming apps. If there's a TV with Roku built-in, that's only one gateway to their platform and I don't think it's a huge chunk of their userbase.

Roku sells between 25 and 40 percent of all smart TV's in the US. I wouldn't be shocked if Roku TV makes up a significant amount of their userbase.

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Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Roku is literally a device that you purchase for using media streaming apps. If there's a TV with Roku built-in, that's only one gateway to their platform and I don't think it's a huge chunk of their userbase.

Roku sells between 25 and 40 percent of all smart TV's in the US. I wouldn't be shocked if Roku TV makes up a significant amount of their userbase.

> Roku sells between 25 and 40 percent of all smart TV's in the US.

Color me extremely dubious. Perhaps Roku TV + Roku devices connected to a TV are about 25-40% of "smart TVs" but I doubt even that.

I have literally never been to a single person's house with a Roku TV in their living room. But a Roku hooked up to their TV? You bet. We have 2, my mom has 1, and several of my friends have them as well.

Re: Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube

#407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? Roku is "hardware you purchased". Sure, you could go out and purchase something else to replace it. I'm not sure why you think that means it doesn't impact the hardware you already have.

Roku is more analogous to software than hardware. My phone OS updates at least every few months, and I don't have a problem with that. In fact, I'd wager that most people don't have a problem with that. Roku is as much "hardware you purchased" as calling Android "hardware you purchase." Even that isn't a good analogy, because unlike a phone, you can still use your TV without Roku. When I buy a TV, I'm not "buying" Ro…

You're correct. When I buy a TV, I'm not buying Roku, either. Because I have a Roku player https://www.roku.com/products/players
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