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Amazon Launches Fire TV, Offering Voice Search For Movies

This article is more than 9 years old.

Amazon, in an ambitious bid for control over your TV viewing, launches Fire TV, taking on  Apple , Roku, and  Google in the race to become your portal for on-demand movies and television shows.

Full disclosure: As a former employee of an Amazon subsidiary, I own shares in Amazon.

At a press event in New York City, Amazon unveiled Fire TV, a streaming video set-top box that lets you watch on-demand movies and TV shows, delivered over the Internet, on your television. You can choose from a vast library of content from popular services like  Netflix , Hulu Plus, ESPN , and of course, Amazon's own Instant Video library. The Fire TV goes on sale immediately for $99.

Peter Larsen, head of Amazon's Kindle division debuted the device in a mock living room replete with floor-standing speakers and a massive flat screen that highlighted the array of titles available in Amazon's Prime Instant Video library. "We're selling millions of streaming devices on Amazon. So we know what's working and what isn't for customers," he proclaimed. Taking a swipe at Apple's iTunes approach, Larsen touted Fire TV's more open ecosystem. Like Amazon's Kindle tablets, Fire TV runs a forked version of Android.

The Amazon Fire TV does exactly what you'd expect from a streaming set-top player. You get 1080p video and can choose content from a variety of sources. Amazon is hoping to differentiate its product with a new approach to search. The search interface is voice activated, allowing you to speak the name of an actor, movie or genre to see relevant titles. Amazon's voice search works via the remote's built-in microphone. The set-top box leverages a fast processor and healthy dose of RAM to allow videos to start immediately with no buffering. An Amazon feature, dubbed ASAP, uses predictive technology to cue up shows you may be interested in watching.

Amazon's X-Ray feature is, as you'd expect, integrated with Fire TV. As you watch a movie on your TV, you can use a Kindle Fire tablet (support for iOS devices is in the works) to get information about the cast. In about a month, you'll be able to access your music collection bought on Amazon. FreeTime, a service aimed at the 3 to 8-year old crowd, provides a kid-safe viewing interface. Parents can whitelist content appropriate for children and set daily time limits. You can use Amazon's Cloud Drive to view photos and videos taken shot with your smartphone on your TV. There's a slideshow option for photos that can also be used as a custom screensaver.

As rumored, Amazon has brought the gaming experience to Fire TV. The device sports a quad core processor, dedicated GPU, and 2GB RAM. Working with game makers like EA and Ubisoft, Amazon offers what it says will be a growing library of gaming content. A new $40 game controller will be available. You can also play games using the standard Fire TV remote.

The introduction of this long-rumored Amazon set-top box is the latest step in an increasingly aggressive video strategy for the Seattle-based retail giant. The company began offering on-demand video in 2006 and made a bigger push for prominence five years later, when it made a portion of its Instant Video library available for free to Amazon Prime subscribers. The company's Kindle Fire tablets all feature built-in access to the entire video library. Last year, following the lead of rival Netflix, Amazon produced its first television series, "Alpha House" written by Garry Trudeau and starring John Goodman. Amazon Studios has recently greenlighted six new original series, set to begin airing this year.

The big push in video may, on first glance, seem a potential distraction for a company whose core consumer business is online retail. The market for set-top players is currently a small one, limited mostly to young, tech-savvy users. And Apple and Roku own this market by a wide margin. The allure for Amazon lies partially in the potential for streaming video to become a more mainstream pursuit. "You want to enter a growth market early," notes Deana Myers, an analyst at SNL Kagan. "This is an opportunity for Amazon to be competitive with a company like Apple in a market that could potentially be much bigger," she says. The move also gives Amazon a potential leg up on Netflix, which years ago opted not sell its own hardware.

Others, however, see this move for control of the living room as a crucial step in Amazon’s quest to create what Forrester Research analyst James McQuivey calls a television commerce. “Video is a means to an end for Amazon,” he says. “Unlike a specialty retailer, Amazon can sell you just about anything you would want to buy. What they need is a way to participate in your TV viewing hours that lets you make direct purchases based on the ad you’re watching. But to do this they need the hardware to control the viewing experience. The Fire TV gives them that control.”

In the long run, Amazon may not be trying to simply one-up Apple or Netflix, but instead carve out a potentially very lucrative sales platform that would offer an unprecedented connection between viewers and the products they buy. One that it could charge advertisers a premium to access. It's worth noting that Amazon, normally prone to a blanket, "no comment", on future offerings, last week felt compelled to issue a direct denial of a Wall Street Journal report that the company is considering a free, ad-supported streaming television and music-video service.

We'll know soon enough whether that deal or a similar one becomes reality, but today's launch of the Fire TV puts a major piece of the puzzle in place. At the very least, it leaves no doubt that Amazon is ready to claim a prominent role in your living room.

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