So basically GoogleTV and our Revue units run on the Android operating system. The same (more or less) operating system that their phones run on. What you use to access the web is a version of Google's Chrome browser which allows you to access the web. You can see websites in the same way you can see them on a computer. Instead of seeing it as another way for people to consume their content, movie and TV companies flipped out and thought that Google was using this box to attack their pay TV options. So that's why those content providers that Google didn't check with first blocked access.
Sites can be specially formatted for the GoogleTV interface and remote controls. These sites are listed in the Spotlight section of the Home screen. These sites are built using HTML5 and don't require any installation on the users part. You essentially point it at a web address and off you go. You don't have direct access to the GoogleTV hardware and are limited to whatever the browser is capable of. This is as far as people have been able to go with GoogleTV so far. But this will change when our Revue boxes will one day be updated to the latest version of Android - 3.1 Honeycomb and are given access to the Android Market.
The Android Market will be a place for us to go and see software that other people have made specifically for our GoogleTVs and our specific hardware. These native apps are first installed by us and work better then browser web apps since they are not limited by the capabilities of the browser. A native HBO Go app for example, would be hopefully faster and would be more stable than it's current web app that is in the Spotlight section. Probably the easiest example of a native application that would be on the market would be Games, but really since Google is for the most part open on what can be in the market. You could go back there once a week and eventually once a day and find something new to try out if the platform takes off. We won't have to wait for Logitech to slowly fix their media player and roll out updates slowly over the course of a week. They could push out new builds more quickly using the Market or hell someone else could take over and port their own media player app with better codec and playback abilities.
So I hope that helps you to answer some of your questions, or maybe I just made you think of even more. I don't know but, I really think that with access to the Android Market, apps made by people who already make great apps for phones and tablets, and a better version of the OS goes a long way to making the Revue more useful than what it is now. There's just so much potential here that's Scott's "turd" could really become something shiny!
Sites can be specially formatted for the GoogleTV interface and remote controls. These sites are listed in the Spotlight section of the Home screen. These sites are built using HTML5 and don't require any installation on the users part. You essentially point it at a web address and off you go. You don't have direct access to the GoogleTV hardware and are limited to whatever the browser is capable of. This is as far as people have been able to go with GoogleTV so far. But this will change when our Revue boxes will one day be updated to the latest version of Android - 3.1 Honeycomb and are given access to the Android Market.
The Android Market will be a place for us to go and see software that other people have made specifically for our GoogleTVs and our specific hardware. These native apps are first installed by us and work better then browser web apps since they are not limited by the capabilities of the browser. A native HBO Go app for example, would be hopefully faster and would be more stable than it's current web app that is in the Spotlight section. Probably the easiest example of a native application that would be on the market would be Games, but really since Google is for the most part open on what can be in the market. You could go back there once a week and eventually once a day and find something new to try out if the platform takes off. We won't have to wait for Logitech to slowly fix their media player and roll out updates slowly over the course of a week. They could push out new builds more quickly using the Market or hell someone else could take over and port their own media player app with better codec and playback abilities.
So I hope that helps you to answer some of your questions, or maybe I just made you think of even more. I don't know but, I really think that with access to the Android Market, apps made by people who already make great apps for phones and tablets, and a better version of the OS goes a long way to making the Revue more useful than what it is now. There's just so much potential here that's Scott's "turd" could really become something shiny!
