Google’s super-cheap media streaming dongle, the Chromecast, has been incredibly popular in the United States, but it has yet to be officially sold anywhere else. In the UK, retailer Curry’s has announced that they’ll be selling the Chromecast as of March 1, and even though you can get it in Australia, it’s a bit of a hassle.
Business Spectator are reporting that Telstra – who are no stranger to new technologies, and who actually have a multimedia ecosystem of their own – are in talks with Google to bring Chromecast to Australia. The Chromecast sells for $35 in the US and Telstra are expected to sell it for a similar price here (although with an additional 10% GST).
It’s worth noting that Telstra’s Bigpond Movies and Music don’t currently have applications available on Google Play, but I would expect this to change if their negotiations with Google pan out.
This should be of great concern to readers. Anyone who has followed or been part of Telstras Tbox debarkles will know that the last company in the world they would want to see this device released through would be Telstra. What are we going to end up with, the usual inflated Telstra price, chromecast LOCKED to the Telstra network somehow? No Telstra should be kept as far away from this as possible, if just for customer sanity if nothing else.
As far as I can see, wouldn’t it be a better match for Netflix, if they wanted to launch in Australia?
They could basically give them away with subscriptions – which would give them a way to very large market share, very fast. Foxtel would need something akin to Sky’s NowTV to compete.
And wouldn’t it compete directly with their T-Box?
This makes no sense, what are they going to do put a little Telstra logo on it at sell them with bigpond subscriptions
Certainly I don’t see how they could lock it to telstra networks/services. Which would be the only reason to distribute it.
They could do a deal where Telstra get exposure on Play Store – featured apps, etc. and special packaging with Telstra propaganda. I think they’re best off selling them in JB/HN and through Play.