Back in the saddle

Apologies for the dearth of recent posts. As you may have heard, we have been pretty busy recently. We will be working on that. To recap recent Roku happenings:

  • We ended 2011 with more than 400 channels published in the Channel Store. This is up from 135 at the beginning of 2011.
  • We announced the forthcoming Streaming Stick just prior to CES. This product, due in the second half of this year, takes all the functionality of the Roku2 and places it in a package the size of a pack of chewing gum. The Streaming Stick will be compatible with all TV’s that implement the new MHL port, which is being added to a number of TV models this year . Our first announced partner is Best Buy’s Insignia brand. The Streaming Stick will automatically turn an MHL-enabled TV into a “Smart TV’”, and the in the future a user can upgrade their TV again just by buying a new Streaming Stick. From a developer standpoint, there should not be anything specific you will need to do to make your channel Streaming Stick compatible; if it runs on Roku2, it should run on the Streaming Stick. For more information, please see our press release.
  • We announced, and are now shipping in  the UK and Ireland. More on that in the next post.
We expect 2012 to be a busy year and look forward to seeing what developers continue to submit to the channel store.
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  • Nas Banov

    1. Correction – the very few TVs with MHL-port in existence are already “smart” (have network connection and apps on them), so you mean it will be turning them in “Roku-smart TV” only. Do you know of any non-smart (a.k.a. cheap) TV with MHL port? If not, it would be delusional thinking this dongle will be a hit.

    2. You guys should include (mini USB?) port for optional power so that this dongle can work with any “old” HDMI

    3. Inclusion of CEC (remoting over HDMI) is great and should make it to the other Roku2 models if possible

    ps. btw i expect the next generation of AppleTV (much rumored “iTV”) will come in the form of dongle as well and not as TV set.