I love phones, computers, cameras and every other gadget I can get my hands on. But after a recent trip to Curry’s I felt out of touch and confused by the latest offerings on the television market – and this scares me being only 23 and a bit of a tech enthusiast.
Gone are the days of small chunky television sets with a few large buttons on the front – and a built-in video recorder if you were really lucky! Now they’re available with HD and Blu-Ray capabilities, some are 3D, some even require you to wear 3D glasses, some are the size of your palm and others the size of a small cinema screen. The choice is endless.
So, do we really need to invest time and money into Google’s latest foray, GoogleTV?
It doesn’t surprise me that the Internet giant has ventured into the television market, what with mail, maps and phones, it almost seems like the next logical step. It’s not an actual TV that Google has decided to make, but a kind of service with a set top box – similar to Freeview here in the UK.
On a Google TV you can watch normal channels like you always could, but you can also search through the entire Internet and a range of applications as well, flicking between all the different functions seamlessly. The official GoogleTV website calls it “an adventure where TV meets web apps, search and the world’s creativity.” Google claims:
“Not only are TVs the centre of our living rooms, but five billion of us use them. That’s more than the number of people who use mobile phones or computers.”
By integrating TV viewing with the Internet, those that normally wouldn’t venture online may feel less daunted. I also like the fact that it may make the Internet more social – now I know this sounds ridiculous but my family and close friends often find ourselves all sitting round our own laptops when we’re together. We email things to others and one another but maybe if we could share things together on the same screen it would be an interesting and much more social dynamic?
Then again, there’s certainly a chance it won’t really change anything and users will soon decide there’s a reason both the TV and computer have worked so well on separate screens.
However, if you’re based in the US and want to try it out you currently have three options:
- A Sony Internet TV with the capabilities built-in.
- A Sony Internet TV Blu-Ray Player which just acts as a set top box on top of your current TV.
- A Logitech Revue set top box which is a set top box as well.
Unfortunately, those of us in the UK won’t be able to get Google TV until next year. This should give us enough time to read reviews and work out for ourselves whether it’s really worth the investment, or just another piece of technology which will be deemed redundant in a few months.