Recently, a Roku Box was installed into the home entertainment system, with the sincerest hope of canceling the TV portion of our cable bill. Except it’s not possible. Yet.
The dream of many to be sure. To escape the grip of the cable company for television service. It started when I decided to stop using the teleco for phone service when I had a reliable cell phone. So far, 5 years and counting. Now, here we are, in the 21st Century, surrounded by high-speed internet service and the ability to get television programs streamed to computing devices. But not.
Using our friend Chuck Bartowski as an example. A show that has been on the fringe of being cancelled every season that it has been available. A show that seems to be saved by huge write-in campaigns and large turn-outs at ComicCon. A show that, as best I can tell, could easily be saved. How?
Allow streaming.
You see, on the Roku box I actually signed up for Hulu Plus, thinking that I would able to get all that was good and awesome about Hulu streamed directly to our television set. It would seem that is possible, as long as it is not a show that I’m a fan of. ABC programs? All of them are there. Crappy reality TV? Yep, it’s all there too. Family Guy, 30 Rock, The Office and SNL? Yep, those are all there too.
But drill down to shows like Chuck and The Cape on NBC. Burn Notice and White Collar on USA. Human Target on Fox. All programs that I watch on a regular basis. All shows that I enjoy on Hulu currently, from the confort of my office chair. But, not from the comfort of our sofa.
Why?
You see, when it comes to getting the word out and making sure something gets high ratings, I think that it needs to be in as many places to be consumed as possible. I think that in TV Land, that means as many eyeballs as possible to see as much advertising as possible. I think I’m right. No, scratch that, I know I’m right. Too toot my own horn, if you open the podcast section in iTunes under Games and Hobbies -> Automotive -> Audio, you will see that White Roof Radio is near the top of any list that contains audio programs. We get the word out. We make it available to as many people as possible, any way possible.
Which leaves me scratching my head about Chuck. If it’s close to getting cancelled all the time, why not allow it to be played on Hulu Plus on televisions? Is it because the revenue from iTunes and Amazon are too high? At almost $3 per episode, I would hope. But why not cash in on some revenue from advertising too? Why not make it available to as many people as possible, any way possible? It would cost almost nothing since it is already streamed on Hulu anyway. Win win.
So now we have a very fancy Roku box that rules at streaming NetFlix, Amazon and Hulu, just not the shows I want.
I just don’t get it.
Hey NBC (and CBS too. You guys are dead to me anyway), when the time comes and you are ready to join the rest of the world in the 21st century, give me a call and I will help you get everything sorted out.
Actually, my 2nd since moving to Arizona, so go me.
That is for my new place of employment, Encore Creative. Site is powered by WordPress using a few plugins to manage things like the contact form and testimonials.
This site is unique for me on a few levels. First is that the layout was created using a pre-made grid. I must say that I really enjoy using that as a base for a new layout and plan on using it again in the future. Second, this site I built a few conditional pages as well as building out separate theme pages for each section of the site. It’s one of the largest themes I’ve built in terms of files, but it’s also one of the largest sites that I have ever managed, weighing in at over 70 pages plus a blog!
Revisions will be trimming down the number of files by recycling some code and making a little more compliant with IE7 and 8. It looks good, but not as good as it should. Finally, tweaks to the header and the blog for some good, old fashioned, calls to action.
(Read on…)
You’ve seen this over on the side of the blog for sometime now, and since it’s happening in just a few days, I thought I would take a minute to let all y’all know that besides attending, I’m going to be volunteering my skills and knowledge to work the Genius Bar!
Just taking advantage of the opportunities provided to me. If you are going to be in or around the Chandler area on Saturday, January 29th stop by, say hi, and ask a question about WordPress! Or check out any of the great sessions that are scheduled for the day. I think online ticket sales are sold out, but it’s worth checking (click the logo for details).
Who’s going?
Finally.
As most of you that have been following along with my smart phone saga for the past 3 years know, I’ve not had the best luck.
Of all of these phones, the Blackberry Tour and Droid Incredible have been the best. The Blackberry would have remained my daily driver if it had a real web browser and Wifi. Since it did not have either of those, I’ve been rocking the Android with pretty ok success.
Like the Blackberry, it is great for messaging (email, SMS). Like the Blackberry, it has a great camera (dare I say better). Unlike the Blackberry it provides a great internet experience and gives me WiFi access.
Where it fails, however, is where the iPhone rules. Applications.
Sure the Android Market has something like 200k applications. Sure, the big players are there like Skype, DropBox, Evernote and Foursquare, among others. And these apps mostly worked as expected. But, then again, they don’t.
But where are the small players? Sure I have access to my DropBox, but where are the apps that sync with that reliably? What about Instapaper? What about all of the camera apps? What about in-phone video editing?
Nothing, nip, nada.
Not to mention the host of Podcaster specfic apps. High quality voice recording and editing, for example? There, but on apps that aren’t easy to use, aren’t nice to look at and are less than stable.
Finally, to further beat a dead horse, there is the battery life, or complete lack thereof. Sure I could get a larger battery that would allow for 7-8 hour of continuous use, but should I have to spend an addition $50 for that to happen? I don’t think so. Even the Blackberry would last 1 full work day under heavy to extra heavy use before needing to be recharged.
So, sadly, the day that I am able (read: afford) to, I will be placing my order either with Verizon Wireless directly or from the Apple store for a shiny new iPhone. I look forward to being able to have all the functionality that you have now along with the ability to reliably make phone calls.
A feature that many of you current iPhone users should be looking forward to as well. As soon as all of the AT&T haters jump ship.
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