The Confusion Over Apple TV
Right now, you can sit down on your couch, fire up your Apple TV, open the Apple TV app, scroll through Apple TV Channels, and end up watching something from Apple TV+. Confused yet? You’re not alone—Dustin Curtis has published a blog post mocking Apple’s confounding branding around its television offerings. But as Jason Snell points out at Six Colors, it would likely be just as confusing if each Apple TV-related product had a unique name. Regardless, the simple truth is that watching TV has become far more complex than it was in the “good old days” of deciding between ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS.
And still there is no original (free to air) TV but I suppose “Apple Pay-to-view Video Watching” app is a little negative!
My main beef with Apple TV+ on an Apple TV is that it is tied to the selected Apple TV Apple ID account for the device and not the Apple TV app. In my family we have several Apple accounts - the kids are at University so have their own accounts for their phones and stuff, and my wife also has her own account and then there is mine. The main issue is that I have the Apple TV+ subscription as it was automatically added to my Apple Music sub for free and so I need to have my Apple ID on the living room Apple TV setup for purchases. However, when we are watching Movies on the living room Apple TV, I want my wife to pay for movies that the wife and kids choose, so we have the Apple ID set to hers for purchases. However, if we want to watch Apple TV+ we have to go to settings and select my Apple ID before being able to watch Apple TV+ content as this can’t be done in the Apple TV app. This is a real annoyance as we don’t have that problem with Prime Video or Netflix as these have accounts associated with the individual apps so you can get those regardless of who is logged into the Apple TV. My Apple Music account doesn’t have this problem because we access that through Amazon Echo so anyone can listen to music in the house on my account.
Apple my say use family sharing, but that means paying extra and there is only a single bill payer, whereas I want bills for individual movie purchases and rentals to go to the individual and bills for services like Apple TV+, Prime and Netflix to go to me. Using Prime and Netflix on Apple TV is fine for this as the account information is separate, but it all gets messy when you can only use a single account at any one time for Apple Movie rentals and Apple TV+ on the same Apple TV unless you want that account to pay for both Movies and TV+ (which we don’t).
I think the Apple TV app on the Apple TV device should have a login Apple ID just for Apple TV+, allowing the Apple TV to have its Apple ID for purchases such as Movies and individual TV Shows.
Also, there are so many things called Apple TV - app, device, service - and then there is TV Shows on Apple TV device - that it all become very confusing.
I signed in on my Roku smart TV on the first day and had no problems. I also have a Apple TV, but it was not turned on.
Lynda
Me, too! So happy to have the Apple TV app on my Roku smart TV.