Why Apple TV fails in the UK....

[scaramoosh]

There is no Freeview.... Everyone in the UK uses Freeview and Sky and Virgin have their own versions. People are just used to plugging in an aerial and watching TV with the whole app stuff on the back end. So many times I tried to get people and family members into these boxes, it never works because they have to switch source, no one can ever seem to work it out. It's like how most people I know cannot work out 101 is HD and 01 is SD, but they're so used to watching channel 1 - 4 that they will never watch HD, they do not care it looks bad.

Apple TV needs to have a built in decoder for Freeview or it'll never be big in the UK.

 

[-Gonzo-]

Well Im certainty not classed as everyone.
I haven’t used Freeview for many years, don’t have an aerial for a start and got rid of SkyQ a few years ago.
We do have a satellite feed going into the TV but very rarely use it.
AppleTV 4K with TV Launcher, iPlayer, ITVX, Ch4, Five cover most of the live TV channels we watch.
The likes of U, PlutoTV, Plex, Tubi, Watch Free UK, Freevee & RakutenTV covers other free to view tv viewing.
Other than that it’s atv+, NOW, Netflix, Disney+, Paramount+ & YouTube that covers the rest.
The AppleTV remote is the only remote we use in our house, in both the main lounge and bedroom.

 

[JulianL]

Well Im certainty not classed as everyone.
I haven’t used Freeview for many years, don’t have an aerial for a start and got rid of SkyQ a few years ago.
We do have a satellite feed going into the TV but very rarely use it.
AppleTV 4K with TV Launcher, iPlayer, ITVX, Ch4, Five cover most of the live TV channels we watch.
The likes of U, PlutoTV, Plex, Tubi, Watch Free UK, Freevee & RakutenTV covers other free to view tv viewing.
Other than that it’s atv+, NOW, Netflix, Disney+, Paramount+ & YouTube that covers the rest.
The AppleTV remote is the only remote we use in our house, in both the main lounge and bedroom.

Yeah. TV Launcher is a life saver for those people like me who want a EPG for live broadcast channels as well as streaming from Netflix, ATV(no plus any more!), Amazon Prime etc.

It's maybe worth pointing out that as well as the free stuff (BBC, ITV, C4 etc) Now TV is also integrated into TV Launcher to add some of the Sky channels for people moving away from Sky Q or Sky Stream but that does incur a Now TV subscription charge.

I hope that one day Freely might be available as an app but right now, unless something changed in the last few months without me noticing, it's not even available as a stand-alone box/puck and you have to buy a new Freely-enabled TV if you want to get it so I suspect it might be a while (if ever) before there's an app for it. I suppose it's probably a money issue, Freely presumably gets some licensing fee from TV manufacturers which makes a stand-alone app tricky to monetise.

Personally I would pay a modest subscription fee if a Freely app offered a more seamless experience by hiding the fact that it's going in and out of iPlayer, ITVx etc to watch the various channels but that's just me. For now TV Launcher at least gives me a pretty nice unified EPG interface to the live broadcast channels.

 

[StumpyBloke]

Couldn’t agree less with the OP.

Linear TV is dying and we know this as an absolute fact. TV on demand is increasing and we know this as a fact. That’s all that needs to be said IMO.

 

[BMox81]

I do get what the OP is saying-my wife’s side of the family still use Virgin Media/a TV guide so when they come over to ours (for babysitting) the concept of the ATV (or any streaming device) is absolutely alien to them and they ask if they can use the regular LG remote and they will just watch freeview.

And when you have the latest TV manufacturers of this world baking in Fire/Google TV into the their TV’s and people just being happy making do, I can’t ever see the ATV gaining traction here in the UK even though we know it’s a great device.