You may have noticed that when I talk about TV over the Internet, I haven’t been talking about Google TV or the like. Instead, I’ve been focusing on “media extenders” like the Apple TV, Roku, and the various Internet-equipped Blu-Ray DVD players. The main reason is the elephant in the room: “When will Apple announce an iTunes-empowered TV, aka a “real” Apple TV. We still don’t know when, of indeed if, Apple will make its move, but the possibilty, probablity, has everyone waiting to see what happens next in Internet TV.
Oh sure, the Leichtman Research Group claims that Americans report that 38% of homes already have an Internet connected television (PDF Link), but only 4% of them say that their Internet TVs are actually hooked up. Yeah, right.
I think most people still don’t have a clue about to get the Internet and their televisions in sync. Today, people who watch TV via the Internet are like me: Electronics fans and network savvy geeks. The current generation of Internet TVs is part of the reason why that’s so. None of them are all that user friendly.