Developers Flex Their Apple TV Muscle, But Is It Enough to Win Over Consumers?

The Apple TV launched in late October on the backs of two major features: Siri voice control and an App Store. At launch, Siri offered a glimpse of what it would be like to control your TV without a traditional remote control (beyond pushing a button to actually activate Siri), while the App Store finally gave developers the chance to work their magic on the biggest screen in the house.

That work is now beginning to show, even if the Apple TV's App Store still has some catching up to do to match the iOS App Store's breadth of content.

Since its launch, several new and updated apps have hit the Apple TV App Store, including Plex, which lets users watch on their TV videos that are stored on their Mac or PC (think ripped DVDs and the like); Tastemade, a kind of Food Network-meets-the Travel Channel streaming video service; HomeAway, which is similar to Airbnb but focused less on urban hotspots like New York and San Francisco and more on far flung vacation destinations; SongPop Party, a multiplayer music trivia game where players crowd around their TV to correctly identify songs; and Daily Burn, an interactive fitness streaming video service whose founders believe the best way to encourage people to get and stay in shape is to make exercising as convenient as possible.

"For us it's not about being jacked and ripped, but about real people making real changes that directly impact their lives," Daily Burn co-founder and CEO Andy Smith told Motherboard. "We have iPhone apps and iPad apps that allow you to take your workouts with you on-the-go, but it's best to do your workout at home in front of the TV."

An example of that is Daily Burn 365, a daily workout session streamed live from studios in New York City. A beta version of the service will become available on an updated version of the Daily Burn Apple TV app within the next few weeks, something host J.D. Roberto believes will help users encourage each other to keep at it.

"The ability to get [Daily Burn 365] on the TV and in the living room" makes it easier for users to work out together, said Roberto. "It's going to reinvent the concept of the workout video."

If Daily Burn is attempting to use the Apple TV to bring fitness out of the confines of the gym and into the living room, then Tastemade wants to use the device to expose people to high quality food and travel programming that's hosted by people other than Guy Fieri.

"I love cable television, but there's an awful lot of the same people who've been there for many, many years," said Tastemade co-founder Steven Kydd, whose updated Apple TV app is expected to go live today. The company believes graduating shows like "Raw. Vegan. Not Gross" and "The Grill Iron" (which explores tailgating and food culture in sports) from the smartphone to the TV will give viewers a real alternative to episode after episode of "Guy's Grocery Games," which, nearest I can tell, is shown approximately 700 times per day on Food Network.

Despite these recent high-profile additions, it's hard to shake the feeling that Apple TV developers still need more time to figure out how to best to make use of the largest screen in the house, which in turn leads to questions as to which set-top box offers the best value for money.

As mentioned in Motherboard's original review of the Apple TV, people merely looking to watch services like Netflix, Hulu, or HBO Now on their TV certainly don't need to spend $150 (the Apple TV's starting price) to do so: comparable set-top boxes from Roku and Amazon can be found for less than $100, to say nothing of popular "stick" devices like the Chromecast, Roku TV, and Fire TV Stick that can be found for less than $40. You may even be able to binge watch House of Cards or old Seinfeld reruns using the apps that are already built into your TV, no external streaming device required.

Where does that leave the Apple TV, one month after its release? In a strange place, I'd say: while the likes of Daily Burn and Tastemade undoubtedly function better on a TV than they do on your iPhone, is that enough to convince consumers to whip out their credit card? I'm still not sure.

As it stands, the promise of the Apple TV App Store is still just that: a promise. While developers are moving in the right direction, it's going to take more than a handful of well-executed apps before we can call the Apple TV the next great computing platform.