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Apple Podcasts app spotted for new Apple TV on demo units at retail stores

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The Apple TV is an advancement in many ways over the third-generation model (faster processor, App Store, Siri) but there are also a couple of regressions, features that existed before that are missing and/or removed. One such example is Podcasts. The third-gen Apple TV featured a pre-installed Apple Podcasts app, which would sync with your iTunes subscriptions on the desktop and iOS devices. However, it is nowhere to be seen on the new fourth-generation Apple TV yet …

The screenshot above comes from the video loop Apple plays in retail stores to demo the new product. It clearly shows Apple’s latest Podcasts app icon, suggesting the app is on the way for the new fourth-generation box. Like the Remote app which only works from iOS and Apple Watch on Apple TV 2/3, it seems Apple did not manage to get it ready for the initial launch of the device.

There is a chance that the Podcasts app was included in the marketing video due to human error, but this is unlikely given that the icon has been fully designed for the new Apple TV. It also just makes sense that the feature disparity between the 3rd-gen and 4th-gen will be rectified in forthcoming software updates … like the annoying lack of iOS Remote app or Bluetooth keyboard pairing for text entry. Apple has not officially commented on any of these matters.

Thanks Alireza!

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Comments

  1. lkrupp215 - 8 years ago

    IF true this is yet another indicator that the new ATV4 was rushed out to some arbitrary marketing schedule. It wasn’t ready. The Remote app and the Podcast app are probably the two biggest bones of contention on discussions forums. The lack of these two apps is causing the biggest backlash and negative comments. Well those two apps AND the lack of Bluetooth keyboard support. If these three things show up relatively shortly in an update or App Store we’ll know the product was pushed out the door before it was ready to go.

    • Jonny - 8 years ago

      Lets not conflate the discussion forms with the average user.

    • Looks like it was “pushed out” for the holiday quarter.

    • Ikrupp215

      Simple solution. Dont buy the ATV till those features that you can’t live without are included.

      I don’t use Remote/Keyboard/Podcast so I bought on first day.

      Can believe people keep making mountains about dung hills. Sounds like little brats who can’t wait 5 seconds to get their ice cream cone.

      • Jonny - 8 years ago

        Off those three, the Remote app is probably the only one that even has a chance at impacting a large amount of Apple TV users… maybe. I can’t imagine the typical user is hooking up a bluetooth keyboard to any set-top box nor are they so used to listening to podcasts on their television that they would be affected by not having the podcast app.

      • Robert Cain (@cain2003) - 8 years ago

        Yeah people are making a bunch of noise over nothing but using BT Keyboards is super useful for searching in netflix and other apps. As well as typing in complex passwords. I didn’t buy one but I do have an extra from a previous Mac that I use and its a major stress saver. So it is a bit of a disappointment that Apple overlooked such a simple feature thats been on the AppleTV box for so long now. Also Siri is half baked at this point so having at least one tool that works for search would have been nice.

      • Nice description of ikrupp215 lol I can imagine him now

    • rogifan - 8 years ago

      I have to agree. But that makes me wonder if this stuff will be coming any time soon. Otherwise Apple could have waited another week or two before putting it on sale. Perhaps they wanted this out the door so iPad Pro would get media attention all to itself.

      • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

        There is no media for this. They didn’t even make an ad. It’s still very much a hobby for them until they actually finish it and introduce the streaming service. It’s actually a disaster of a product. If I were Tim Cook I’d be firing so many people on the Apple TV team.

      • What a surprise. oOsmoothiesOo grumbling about another Apple product.

        Living life with such a bitter outlook makes ones soul rotten.

      • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

        @Fanboy What problems do you think there are with current Apple products? Or do you think there are no problems?

        If your answer is the latter…..oh dear.

    • tonywmd23 - 8 years ago

      Yet another dumb comment on the new ATV software. It’s a right thing to do to put a product on the market with minor improvements to be made later with updates. This is what EVERYBODY does, including the apotheosized Steve Jobs. In no way should the remote/podcast/keyboard issues be viewed as major problems that impede rolling the product out, so they rolled the product out and would bring those not-so-important features back with a software update. If this qualifies as “not ready” and every product has to be perfect in every way when they come out, nobody can push any products to the market anymore. I’m just baffled.

    • lamberw - 8 years ago

      Are you actually serious? Product development should always be about getting the product out to market and then modifying the small things later. The vast majority of people are not going to worry about receiving the Podcasts app, a working Remote app, and a Bluetooth keyboard on day 1. They are all nice to have but they should never delay the product coming to market. However Apple choose to label their TVoS version, it is essentially a 1.0 version and subsequent firmware updates will be rolled out along with updates from individual apps that will improve functionality and compatibility.

  2. Looks like there’s a tvOS update coming soon.

  3. mmaaxxo - 8 years ago

    Okay since when has the remotes app on the Apple Watch worked, I have a ATV3 and ATV2 and spent 2 hour on the phone with apple support trying to get it to the app to work and nothing on both of them. It showed as paired on the ATV but the watch never showed as paired. Tried restarting, and factory resetting, and then the ATV3 got stuck in the setup process the I had to connect to iTunes and do a fresh install of the software for the ATV3 and then it quit working totally. Had to take it to an Apple Store and get a replacement. And the new one doesn’t work with the app either. The remotes app has never worked for me. My ATV4 gets here tomorrow, but I guess I won’t miss what I never had. The remote app on my iPhone and iPad have always worked.

    • thisisasticup - 8 years ago

      Mine worked perfectly on apple watch with ATV 3.

    • Pedro Marques - 8 years ago

      I’ll save you more hours of frustration: make sure the AppleTV and your Apple Watch are on the same wireless network.

      I have multiple WiFi points in the house and even though they’re all hooked up to the same network, the remote app only works if the AppleTV and iPhone/AppleWatch are on the same WiFi point.

  4. o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

    Here are some reasons (plenty of others I’m unaware of) that the Apple TV team should be fired (at least the team leaders).

    • They’ve had years to work on it.
    • No Remote app at launch (should have hit the iOS App Store on 10/29/15)
    • The TV Show organization was done by people with low intellect. Instead of listing TV Seasons and Episodes in a vertical plane (like is done correctly by Netflix), they listed all Seasons and Episodes in one horizontal plane, which you have to swipe clear across to find what you’re looking for. Whoever allowed that to happen…words can’t describe how stupid they are. I told them the stupidity is palpable when I sent feedback to the Apple TV team.
    • No Bluetooth Keyboard support
    • No Siri for Apple Music
    • No Siri for searching App Store
    • No Siri for useful information like you can ask on your phone. I’m not saying it should ask you to search the web, (it could handoff for that), but it should be a fully capable Siri, there’s no reason why someone shouldn’t be able to ask ‘Show me popular funny videos’ and it links to different apps on your device, like YouTube.
    • No HomeKit
    • No dictate
    • No Handoff
    • No Widgets or Glances (I guess it didn’t occur to the idiotic Apple TV team that glancable formation on a TV is great, like it is on a watch). Swipe up from bottom of trackpad on Home Screen = Sports Scores, Sports Highlights, Weather, (Stocks if you’re into that), Calendar Events, Recently Viewed/Continue Playing, etc.

    • This list makes you sound like a spoiled child. While this may be called Apple TV 4, it is such a massive departure from the ATV 3 that I’m considering it a version 1 product. There are things that need to be fixed, but over all it is a strong foundation product. If you can’t stand to have things missing from version 1 products, don’t buy them, and certainly don’t buy them on day 1.

    • rogifan - 8 years ago

      Here’s something simple and easy. Don’t buy it.

      • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

        I didn’t buy it. I love Apple. They make the best products. I’d just make every product better, if I had a direct communication with their teams.

    • Inaba-kun (@Inaba_kun) - 8 years ago

      I agree on all those points. Also telling that this wasn’t ready is disoverability disaster that is the App Store, siri’s lack of a voice, the near total lack of UK apps – even Now TV, advertised as a launch app on the Apple web site is nowhere to be seen, and the mind blowing,y ugly (and clearly placeholder) UIs in apps like YouTube and Crunchyroll.

      There isn’t even a game centre app, despite game centre being a part of ATV games.

    • Tim Cook did say ATV4 is the “foundation for the future of TV.” Now, on to the job of building on top of the foundation. Think how far Apple has come with iPhone 1 to iPhone 6S / Plus.

    • OoSmoothiesO

      You have a sad sad life if those things really bother you. LOL.

      I got my AppleTV on Friday and I’M LOVING IT. And its only going to get better each year.

      Instead bitching about all its so called shortcomings, I instead choose to enjoy all the great things it does. Its is BY FAR the best set top box available and its not even close.

      • Inaba-kun (@Inaba_kun) - 8 years ago

        Not sure how anyone could consider the new ATV as being better than the Fire TV at the moment. That may change in time, but the Fire TV now has so many more apps, including Prime Video, and BBC iPlayer. Plus it does 4K, which is a nice bit of future proofing.

      • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

        Oh it does plenty of things supremely great. It does certain things better than any product like this, but I focus on the missing features that should be there at launch, the features that are inexcusably absent.

        Just to throw out one amazing thing it does perfectly so you don’t cry over my views: it does scrubbing through video better than anything ever has, it is insanely precise and easy to stop right where you want, as opposed to the iPhone scrubbing bar for example.

    • taoprophet420 - 8 years ago

      For the hardware being pretty much settled on 2 years ago there is no excuse it not having most the features you meant.

      Remote app and all the Siri features should been ready to go day one. Software unreliability is why the new Apple TV wasn’t own at WWDC. My guess it was probably Siri reliability on movi and tv searching. It should been easy for Apple to add Apple Music and other Siri features.
      The remote app should be there for easy typing or Bluetooth keyboards support for searching.

      No HomeKit is the biggest disappointment to me. It would made the Apple TV a hub for your home, especially if the Apple TV had built in Airport wifi.

    • lamberw - 8 years ago

      None of those things are things that cannot be sorted with subsequent firmware updates. Why not just launch the product now and get better later? You can tell that your focus is purely on the technology without any eye for entrepreneurship because you understand the sequence of product preparation as ready, aim, fire; rather than ready, fire, aim. Firmware updates will come regularly with the Apple TV and a lot of the standalone apps, including those made by Apple, will follow soon thus increasing its value proposition.

      The Apple TV 4 is much better than the predecessor already and it is only going to get rapidly better. Anyone can be an ideas person and think of the improvements to the products and anyone can mandate that they should be ready for the launch date, however what the world has less of is those that make it happen. These things are all probably on Apple’s internal product development roadmap and will come in due course. Unfortunately, in the real world, there are many legal considerations, software development issues, sales/marketing, engineering, and mass production issues to consider to bring these ‘ideas’ to market.

      Your opinions would be better received if they were positioned as opportunities for improvements rather than obstructive problem statements.

  5. If you have the new Apple TV, like me, and want iOS remote app and bluetooth keyboards to work, PLEASE go to http://www.apple.com/feedback and let Apple know.

  6. Fire tv lol

  7. Tiago Pedrosa - 8 years ago

    Who needs to wait? I just use Podcasts by myTuner. It’s great!

  8. Ruba Nemeh - 8 years ago

    myTuner Podcasts – that´s it. lol

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Avatar for Benjamin Mayo Benjamin Mayo

Benjamin develops iOS apps professionally and covers Apple news and rumors for 9to5Mac. Listen to Benjamin, every week, on the Happy Hour podcast. Check out his personal blog. Message Benjamin over email or Twitter.