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You know what, good for Google. I hate to sound like a child, but Amazon fired the first salvo by dropping the Chromecast a few years back. This move only seems

You know what, good for Google. I hate to sound like a child, but Amazon fired the first salvo by dropping the Chromecast a few years back. This move only seems fair.

RIMR 9y ago
Amazon removing the Chromecast from their store was, if anything, verification at the Fire TV was not a product that could succeed on its own. I love my Chromecast and I buy new models directly from Google, because no matter what Amazon says I know the difference between Google's product, and Amazon's copycat version of it.
- dazc 9y ago
  Well, for me at least, amazon's copycat worked first time out of the box. Chromecast, alas, turned out to be an expensive plastic brick.
  - ct0 9y ago
    thank goodness that samsung TV's can play from both sources
    - jimnotgym 9y ago
      Until one of them falls out with Samsung, presumably?
      - ct0 9y ago
        pretty much, but since samsung doesnt enter the space of these competitors, it would be silly to have a falling out. Samsung doesnt offer too many competing products with amzn /goog
  - organsnyder 9y ago
    What issues did you encounter? And how can you call a $35 device "expensive"?
    - mcintyre1994 9y ago
      My brother took his to uni and couldn't log into the Wifi - I assume he has to enter uni credentials for it and the Chromecast doesn't support that Wifi authentication model.
      - clintonb 9y ago
        Authentication is one issue. The biggest is the fact that UPnP is disabled on many university networks. Chromecast relies on UPnP for device discovery.
      - mooman219 9y ago
        For setup, it need to be on the same subnet as the device you're using to register it. Most university networks are split into many subnets making this extremely difficult to do, and use after registration. The best workaround is using a router as a middle man for the phone and chromecast, but it's a pain. I have a chromecast, but gave up on making it work in university.
      - joshuamorton 9y ago
        As a partial aside, I'm going to gloat about how incredible my alma mater's networking infrastructure and usability is. Tell me how long it takes you to find explicit instructions on connecting a chromecast from this site[1]. I think most schools are just incredibly bad at managing their network infrastructure, and its really sad. [1]: http://www.wrecktechs.gatech.edu/ http://www.wrecktechs.gatech.edu/
      - ams6110 9y ago
        He probably needs to register the mac address with the university dhcp service so that it can get a routable IP address. University networks used to be pretty wide open but the days where you could just plug into any available Ethernet socket or hop on the wifi anonymously are gone.
  - nolok 9y ago
    No offense but I bought a lot of chromecast and even my most tech inept family users have "moved to the tech age" with it and never bother me to get it working. I'm sure amazon thingy works just as well, but your trouble with it are more anecdotal than the rules.
    - dazc 9y ago
      '...but your trouble with it are more anecdotal than the rules.' Hence why I said 'for me at least'.
- syshum 9y ago
  If they would give me an actual controller for the chromecast I might consider it I have no desire to control my TV with my phone. I may look into Roku as an alternative to FireTV now though,
  - rubyfan 9y ago
    I love the Roku. It’s a competitor to the AppleTV in our house. Great device.
  - clintonb 9y ago
    I am happy with my Roku Streaming Stick. I have access to every major media provider except Apple and Spotify (who neutered their app earlier this year). My biggest complaint (which isn't applicable to most users) is the limited SDK. I imagine this is why many of the basic video apps look alike.
  - Crespyl 9y ago
    I'll third the praise for Roku. The only annoyance is that they put ads on the homescreen, (but that can be blocked at the network level), and that different apps tend to have slightly different/inconsistent UXs, for example pressing "up" while watching Netflix will show you the timeline without pausing, but doing the same in HBO Now will take you back out to the show info page. The dedicated remotes are nice, though sometimes oddly slow to "wake up". Some models even have headphone jacks on the remote, which can be really handy. All the versions can be controlled through a really nice Android app, which lets you directly enter text rather than pecking around in a grid keyboard, and also lets you forward audio to your phone/headset instead of the speakers or remote.
    - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
      Roku, seemingly, accessed my device and disabled side-loading. An unlawful access (unauthorised access, unauthorised modification, both crimes under the Computer Misuse Act in UK). Put me off an otherwise stellar experience.
- hammock 9y ago
  >Amazon removing the Chromecast from their store was, if anything, verification at the Fire TV was not a product that could succeed on its own. Did anyone ever think otherwise? Content is king. Fire stick is just a raspberry pi with half-ass UI built in
  - threatofrain 9y ago
    But shouldn't Amazon have a content advantage? A metaphorical Raspberry Pi with a better GUI should've been enough.
    - hammock 9y ago
      I interpreted parent's comment to mean Fire TV could not succeed agnostic/irrespective of the content.
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    Can someone explain this to me. I bought a Chromecast and took it back the next day, it didn't do anything beyond mirroring content from a particular device (seems everyone who watches needs a device, or you need a 2nd device for a room to be casting from), which any Android device does (including FireTV). FireTV for me was a million times more useful, I must be missing something?
nolok 9y ago
They fired the second shot when they refused to make anything to stream from a kindle fire to a chromecast. That's literally a "amazon media playing thingy" and it can't stream to the market leader casting device. I love competition but this to me is a case of "ohh, screw that, just make whatever work with whatever"
- kuschku 9y ago
  > They fired the second shot when they refused to make anything to stream from a kindle fire to a chromecast. That's literally a "amazon media playing thingy" and it can't stream to the market leader casting device. Actually, Amazon had apps that did this. Google changed the Chromecast protocol, and demanded that app developers use their proprietary library. I once had an app that was affected by this, too. The fault is entirely with Google.
  - nolok 9y ago
    Vlc version 4 is now shipping with the ability to cast to a chromecast, without any proprietary library. Also, amazon makes a tablet is "easy dumb way to consume your media", and while it is not fit for me and probably not for you, it's awesome for the people who know very little and want a recommendation. Yet amazon screwed that up with that move. What does it matter to them if I use their 40e thingy or google's as long as I buy my media on them. Instead it's revert to Google and buy on Google play.
    - kuschku 9y ago
      > Vlc version 4 is now shipping with the ability to cast to a chromecast, without any proprietary library. VLC actually uses a proprietary library for it, but doesn’t ship it. Specifically, VLC asks the OS to activate the secondary display, which leads Android to redirect this request to Google Play Services. This feature does not work on Amazon Kindles, Replicant, LineageOS, CopperheadOS, or any other non-Google Android distributions. Also, for full Chromecast support, you need to use 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-cast:8.3.+' – which, obviously, is proprietary.
Ajedi32 9y ago
Yeah, normally I'd say two wrongs don't make a right, but if this move manages to convince Amazon to finally support Amazon Video on Chromecast, maybe it's worth it. Though on the other hand, this could just as easily result in a long-term standoff.
- mulmen 9y ago
  I thought that limitation was more on Google's side more than Amazon deciding not to develop an app.
Jayakumark 9y ago
Google should probably block amazon from any search results. That should get amazons attention if this does not. Its bad that they are not selling google home mini, chromecast , Nest products. What reason they have for blocking google home mini and Nest . For chromecast - they said it does not play prime video which amazon does not offer support for..
jimnotgym 9y ago
A store can sell whatever it likes, surely? If a store has become so dominant that it is impossible to compete if you can't get a listing, then shouldn't we be addressing that issue? If Amazon is in the dangerous position of manufacturer/retailer/marketplace owner (not to mention hosting provider) to the detriment of competition then Amazon needs breaking up. If Google is a content provider/directory/manufacturer to the detriment of consumers then the same is true. This tit for tat stuff over their sucky streaming sticks is not the issue
kuschku 9y ago
> Amazon fired the first salvo by dropping the Chromecast a few years back ...after Google intentionally changed the Chromecast protocol almost weekly to force app developers to use their proprietary library, and to prevent third-party implementations of the library from working. There’s dozens of open source implementations of the protocol from that era left on GitHub, all abandoned over the constant changes that were purely done to prevent anyone (Amazon or open source devs) from streaming to Chromecast, or receiving streams, without going through Google’s proprietary library.
mulmen 9y ago
Didn't Google block the ability to stream to Chromecasts? I'm not justifying anyone's behavior here but this is why the "they started it" argument is considered childish. These are all anti-customer moves which will hurt both companies in the long term.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > Didn't Google block the ability to stream to Chromecasts? IIRC, they made backward incompatible changes to the protocol (which I don't think was ever public, but had been discovered and independently implemented) which effectively broke apps not using the official API implementations (which are limited to Android [Play Services, not AOSP], iOS, and Chrome [not Chromium, AFAIK].)
gremlinsinc 9y ago
Agreed. The thing that pisses me off, is that Amazon video doesn't even support Chromecast for streaming, how hard would it be to code that in? I bought firefly from amazon thinking I could easily stream it to my chromecast, but nope.. -- I won't get amazon video, or support any of there video things till I can. They need to let bygones be bygones and accept each others apps/gadget/technology to make it so each other is a success. They're more a symbiotic relationship than rivals imho.
- kuschku 9y ago
  > how hard would it be to code that in? How hard is it to support a protocol that the vendor obfuscates, and changes frequently, to prevent you from streaming to it? Interesting question. From my own experiences trying to build an open source library to stream to it (and to receive streams): Very hard when the vendor is Google. The only way to stream to Chromecasts is with Google’s proprietary library, and Google will only license that to Amazon once Amazon kills their own App Store.
  - dhoulb 9y ago
    Is the last part about licensing true (or sourced from somewhere)? Surely Amazon could just drop the Cast library into their iPhone and Android apps and they’d be all set? I can’t see Google stopping them (well maybe they would now it’s escalated, but they wouldn’t have last year.) I assumed not supporting Cast was just an excuse not to stock Chromecasts etc on Amazon. BTW I totally agree with the frustration of the Cast protocol not being more open, a tonne of cool standalone ‘browser on TV’ usecases like screensharing/dashboards/multiscreen aren’t possible on Chromecast (and it sucks). I assume they’re under a load of pressure from MPAA type groups to keep it locked down. (As though the TV is some holy box that must be protected.)
    - kuschku 9y ago
      > Surely Amazon could just drop the Cast library into their iPhone and Android apps and they’d be all set? The cast library doesn’t contain any of the code required to cast – all that code is in the Google Play Services in the system app, not in the library. And you can obviously understand how Amazon can’t just reuse that.

You know what, good for Google. I hate to sound like a child, but Amazon fired the first salvo by dropping the Chromecast a few years back. This move only seems fair.

RIMR 9y ago

Amazon removing the Chromecast from their store was, if anything, verification at the Fire TV was not a product that could succeed on its own. I love my Chromecast and I buy new models directly from Google, because no matter what Amazon says I know the difference between Google's product, and Amazon's copycat version of it.

dazc 9y ago
Well, for me at least, amazon's copycat worked first time out of the box. Chromecast, alas, turned out to be an expensive plastic brick.
- ct0 9y ago
  thank goodness that samsung TV's can play from both sources
  - jimnotgym 9y ago
    Until one of them falls out with Samsung, presumably?
    - ct0 9y ago
      pretty much, but since samsung doesnt enter the space of these competitors, it would be silly to have a falling out. Samsung doesnt offer too many competing products with amzn /goog
- organsnyder 9y ago
  What issues did you encounter? And how can you call a $35 device "expensive"?
  - mcintyre1994 9y ago
    My brother took his to uni and couldn't log into the Wifi - I assume he has to enter uni credentials for it and the Chromecast doesn't support that Wifi authentication model.
    - clintonb 9y ago
      Authentication is one issue. The biggest is the fact that UPnP is disabled on many university networks. Chromecast relies on UPnP for device discovery.
    - mooman219 9y ago
      For setup, it need to be on the same subnet as the device you're using to register it. Most university networks are split into many subnets making this extremely difficult to do, and use after registration. The best workaround is using a router as a middle man for the phone and chromecast, but it's a pain. I have a chromecast, but gave up on making it work in university.
    - joshuamorton 9y ago
      As a partial aside, I'm going to gloat about how incredible my alma mater's networking infrastructure and usability is. Tell me how long it takes you to find explicit instructions on connecting a chromecast from this site[1]. I think most schools are just incredibly bad at managing their network infrastructure, and its really sad. [1]: http://www.wrecktechs.gatech.edu/ http://www.wrecktechs.gatech.edu/
    - ams6110 9y ago
      He probably needs to register the mac address with the university dhcp service so that it can get a routable IP address. University networks used to be pretty wide open but the days where you could just plug into any available Ethernet socket or hop on the wifi anonymously are gone.
- nolok 9y ago
  No offense but I bought a lot of chromecast and even my most tech inept family users have "moved to the tech age" with it and never bother me to get it working. I'm sure amazon thingy works just as well, but your trouble with it are more anecdotal than the rules.
  - dazc 9y ago
    '...but your trouble with it are more anecdotal than the rules.' Hence why I said 'for me at least'.
syshum 9y ago
If they would give me an actual controller for the chromecast I might consider it I have no desire to control my TV with my phone. I may look into Roku as an alternative to FireTV now though,
- rubyfan 9y ago
  I love the Roku. It’s a competitor to the AppleTV in our house. Great device.
- clintonb 9y ago
  I am happy with my Roku Streaming Stick. I have access to every major media provider except Apple and Spotify (who neutered their app earlier this year). My biggest complaint (which isn't applicable to most users) is the limited SDK. I imagine this is why many of the basic video apps look alike.
- Crespyl 9y ago
  I'll third the praise for Roku. The only annoyance is that they put ads on the homescreen, (but that can be blocked at the network level), and that different apps tend to have slightly different/inconsistent UXs, for example pressing "up" while watching Netflix will show you the timeline without pausing, but doing the same in HBO Now will take you back out to the show info page. The dedicated remotes are nice, though sometimes oddly slow to "wake up". Some models even have headphone jacks on the remote, which can be really handy. All the versions can be controlled through a really nice Android app, which lets you directly enter text rather than pecking around in a grid keyboard, and also lets you forward audio to your phone/headset instead of the speakers or remote.
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    Roku, seemingly, accessed my device and disabled side-loading. An unlawful access (unauthorised access, unauthorised modification, both crimes under the Computer Misuse Act in UK). Put me off an otherwise stellar experience.
hammock 9y ago
>Amazon removing the Chromecast from their store was, if anything, verification at the Fire TV was not a product that could succeed on its own. Did anyone ever think otherwise? Content is king. Fire stick is just a raspberry pi with half-ass UI built in
- threatofrain 9y ago
  But shouldn't Amazon have a content advantage? A metaphorical Raspberry Pi with a better GUI should've been enough.
  - hammock 9y ago
    I interpreted parent's comment to mean Fire TV could not succeed agnostic/irrespective of the content.
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  Can someone explain this to me. I bought a Chromecast and took it back the next day, it didn't do anything beyond mirroring content from a particular device (seems everyone who watches needs a device, or you need a 2nd device for a room to be casting from), which any Android device does (including FireTV). FireTV for me was a million times more useful, I must be missing something?

nolok 9y ago

They fired the second shot when they refused to make anything to stream from a kindle fire to a chromecast. That's literally a "amazon media playing thingy" and it can't stream to the market leader casting device. I love competition but this to me is a case of "ohh, screw that, just make whatever work with whatever"

kuschku 9y ago
> They fired the second shot when they refused to make anything to stream from a kindle fire to a chromecast. That's literally a "amazon media playing thingy" and it can't stream to the market leader casting device. Actually, Amazon had apps that did this. Google changed the Chromecast protocol, and demanded that app developers use their proprietary library. I once had an app that was affected by this, too. The fault is entirely with Google.
- nolok 9y ago
  Vlc version 4 is now shipping with the ability to cast to a chromecast, without any proprietary library. Also, amazon makes a tablet is "easy dumb way to consume your media", and while it is not fit for me and probably not for you, it's awesome for the people who know very little and want a recommendation. Yet amazon screwed that up with that move. What does it matter to them if I use their 40e thingy or google's as long as I buy my media on them. Instead it's revert to Google and buy on Google play.
  - kuschku 9y ago
    > Vlc version 4 is now shipping with the ability to cast to a chromecast, without any proprietary library. VLC actually uses a proprietary library for it, but doesn’t ship it. Specifically, VLC asks the OS to activate the secondary display, which leads Android to redirect this request to Google Play Services. This feature does not work on Amazon Kindles, Replicant, LineageOS, CopperheadOS, or any other non-Google Android distributions. Also, for full Chromecast support, you need to use 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-cast:8.3.+' – which, obviously, is proprietary.

Ajedi32 9y ago

Yeah, normally I'd say two wrongs don't make a right, but if this move manages to convince Amazon to finally support Amazon Video on Chromecast, maybe it's worth it. Though on the other hand, this could just as easily result in a long-term standoff.

mulmen 9y ago
I thought that limitation was more on Google's side more than Amazon deciding not to develop an app.

Jayakumark 9y ago

Google should probably block amazon from any search results. That should get amazons attention if this does not. Its bad that they are not selling google home mini, chromecast , Nest products. What reason they have for blocking google home mini and Nest . For chromecast - they said it does not play prime video which amazon does not offer support for..

jimnotgym 9y ago

A store can sell whatever it likes, surely? If a store has become so dominant that it is impossible to compete if you can't get a listing, then shouldn't we be addressing that issue? If Amazon is in the dangerous position of manufacturer/retailer/marketplace owner (not to mention hosting provider) to the detriment of competition then Amazon needs breaking up. If Google is a content provider/directory/manufacturer to the detriment of consumers then the same is true. This tit for tat stuff over their sucky streaming sticks is not the issue

kuschku 9y ago

> Amazon fired the first salvo by dropping the Chromecast a few years back ...after Google intentionally changed the Chromecast protocol almost weekly to force app developers to use their proprietary library, and to prevent third-party implementations of the library from working. There’s dozens of open source implementations of the protocol from that era left on GitHub, all abandoned over the constant changes that were purely done to prevent anyone (Amazon or open source devs) from streaming to Chromecast, or receiving streams, without going through Google’s proprietary library.

mulmen 9y ago

Didn't Google block the ability to stream to Chromecasts? I'm not justifying anyone's behavior here but this is why the "they started it" argument is considered childish. These are all anti-customer moves which will hurt both companies in the long term.

dragonwriter 9y ago
> Didn't Google block the ability to stream to Chromecasts? IIRC, they made backward incompatible changes to the protocol (which I don't think was ever public, but had been discovered and independently implemented) which effectively broke apps not using the official API implementations (which are limited to Android [Play Services, not AOSP], iOS, and Chrome [not Chromium, AFAIK].)

gremlinsinc 9y ago

Agreed. The thing that pisses me off, is that Amazon video doesn't even support Chromecast for streaming, how hard would it be to code that in? I bought firefly from amazon thinking I could easily stream it to my chromecast, but nope.. -- I won't get amazon video, or support any of there video things till I can. They need to let bygones be bygones and accept each others apps/gadget/technology to make it so each other is a success. They're more a symbiotic relationship than rivals imho.

kuschku 9y ago
> how hard would it be to code that in? How hard is it to support a protocol that the vendor obfuscates, and changes frequently, to prevent you from streaming to it? Interesting question. From my own experiences trying to build an open source library to stream to it (and to receive streams): Very hard when the vendor is Google. The only way to stream to Chromecasts is with Google’s proprietary library, and Google will only license that to Amazon once Amazon kills their own App Store.
- dhoulb 9y ago
  Is the last part about licensing true (or sourced from somewhere)? Surely Amazon could just drop the Cast library into their iPhone and Android apps and they’d be all set? I can’t see Google stopping them (well maybe they would now it’s escalated, but they wouldn’t have last year.) I assumed not supporting Cast was just an excuse not to stock Chromecasts etc on Amazon. BTW I totally agree with the frustration of the Cast protocol not being more open, a tonne of cool standalone ‘browser on TV’ usecases like screensharing/dashboards/multiscreen aren’t possible on Chromecast (and it sucks). I assume they’re under a load of pressure from MPAA type groups to keep it locked down. (As though the TV is some holy box that must be protected.)
  - kuschku 9y ago
    > Surely Amazon could just drop the Cast library into their iPhone and Android apps and they’d be all set? The cast library doesn’t contain any of the code required to cast – all that code is in the Google Play Services in the system app, not in the library. And you can obviously understand how Amazon can’t just reuse that.