Android TV

Android TV is one of the myriad new things that Google announced this year at I/O, and the platform is very different from Google’s previous effort with Google TV, a project announced in 2010 and updated continually since but that still hasn’t managed to become a significant part of Google’s lineup.

Google is looking to change all that with Android TV. It’s a brand new platform, designed with simplicity and relevance in mind, with an interface that puts a strong emphasis on content first, and then offers up apps ordered based on your usage patterns and focuses finally on delivering top-quality Android games right to your big screen.

Content, apps and games; that’s it, and it’s a smart move by Google to pare down and focus on the core experiences that matter to TV watchers. Over and over, the company spoke to its new desire to provide the right interface for the right situation on the right device, and Android TV is a great example of that theory put into action, at least based on our early impressions.

It’s similar in many ways to what Amazon has done with the Fire TV, but Google’s interface is better-designed and less confusing, and it probably will have a better time incorporating content sources from third-party providers than will Amazon, thanks to its developer tools and the advantages devs have by building apps that work across Android wherever it happens to appear.

*** [10/29/14]

Google announces its Nexus Player.  It reminds the cordkillers folks of the Amazon Fire TV.