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0 pointsandsoitis11mo ago0 comments

> if you're making an app that benefits from a big screen and your customers are willing to buy a cheap dedicated device to easily use your app on a big screen, supporting apple tv might be a very sensible choice.

Compared to other HDMI-connected devices (e.g. Google Streamer fka ChromeCast, Amazon FireTV, Roku) or major TV platforms like Android TV or Samsung and LG, the market share that Apple TV commands is dwarfed. Apple TV devices are also very expensive.

A startup like Zwift that bets on Apple TV as a key GTM strategy is making an error in judgment. Apple TV is extreme long tail footprint.

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jitl11mo ago

AppleTV is much more similar to a game console than the mentioned devices. It has a small set of powerful CPU/GPU/memory combos vs the menagerie of disparate and mostly much lower power hardware under the broad tent of “Google related tv platform” stuff.

KeplerBoy11mo ago

Meh, I'd say it's a cheap addition when you already have to support iOS and iPadOS devices. Also market share is secondary if people are willing to buy it as a dedicated device and it is cheap (130$) when talking about people's expenditures for this hobby.

But yeah, I'm not an Insider and I'd love to know why they're supporting the apple tv but don't offer the Android App on the Google tv platform. Maybe something about non universal remote inputs or the wildly varying hw capabilities leading to support nightmares (but that's always an issue on Android).

andsoitisOP11mo ago

> cheap addition when you already have to support iOS and iPadOS devices.

Presentation form factor and input modality is different on LRUD compared to touch, 10’ vs handheld.

There’s an opportunity cost: it is better to improve the user experience on the vast majority of TV devices (eg Samsung or Android TV or Fire tv) than it is to support a tiny market share device like Apple TV that you now also need to keep up to date.

tough11mo ago

arent all apps just expo react webui wrappers nowadays?

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