Apple’s latest ad is aimed at promoting its TV set-top box and the apps that have become the company’s primary focus as a way to reach consumers’ living rooms.
The new ad, titled “The Future of TV is Apps”, highlights some of the popular apps that are available on the Apple TV, since the debut of tvOS. Netflix, Showtime, ESPN, HBO Now, Crossy Road and others are being featured as examples of what the Apple TV can do and how it supposedly changes the way people watch TV.
This isn’t the first time that the Cupertino-based company has focused on apps as part of the messaging around TV. In fact this has become quite a recurring theme in recent months for the company, and with the recent marketing push for its new hardware and software, Apple seems to finally be ready to take the next step and no longer treat the TV business as “just a hobby”.
That being said, the company’s real plans for this segment seem to have been hampered by friction between it and the rest of the industry. Numerous reports point to Apple suffering major pushback from TV networks with regards to the company’s plans to essentially do for TV what it did for the music industry fifteen years ago with iTunes. As a result Apple’s TV subscription service, which had been rumored as keystone for the company’s strategy, is reportedly on hold for now.
Despite all of that Apple seems to be trudging forward with plan B - focus on apps and hope that developers will once again turn the tide and transform a fledgling Apple venture into a revolution for the entire industry.
Whether that works out as the company hopes, remains to be seen in the years ahead, but for now you can just sit back, relax and tell Siri what you want to watch.