Your Guide To The Ways That Smart Tv's Get Clever

By Author: Barry Knightly
Total Articles: 57
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Just as smartphones have blown up the mobile market over recent years, a new storm is brewing – Smart TV's are set to do the same thing to the traditional telly.



My previous article on the subject - titled 'Easy Guide to Understanding Smart TV's' - explained what the terms means. In short, by integrating your TV set with the Internet, you'll be able to do a range of things that were previously limited to your PC and more recently your smartphone. This includes downloading useful apps, streaming online video and keeping up to date with your social networking.



Current figures show the uptake of Smart TV's has grown 124% this year compared to 2010, and they're expected to account for 54% of the total flat panel TV market sector by 2014.



The following guide will look at the ways that Smart TV's access content to help you understand why they're about to take the home entertainment industry to a whole new level.



TV Applications


Apart from functioning as a regular telly, one of the exciting features about ...
... emerging Smart TV's is that they’re app based – meaning in the same way as you do with your smartphone, you can download useful apps to make your life easier and access a range of fresh content sources.



The number of apps available is growing by the day, allowing you to stream content directly to your TV screen via the Internet. This type of online activity is managed through hubs similar to smartphone operating systems and app stores – you'll have a home screen where you can manage your apps, receive app and movie recommendations, as well as search through a variety of available material to download.



Just as with mobile apps, there is a range of different platforms for Smart TV apps to choose from through well known brands. And since not every Smart TV platform offers an inbuilt Web browser, this is easily rectified by using an app.



Early Smart TV models simply offered basic apps for sites like YouTube and Flickr - the app market had not yet been developed so there weren't many choices and varieties of apps on offer because third-party developers were for the most part shut out. What makes Smart TV's so interesting now is that platforms for independent developers to sell their apps are advancing and big brands are also racing to offer appealing widgets and the like.



The glitch in the TV app market however is that there is a rapidly growing amount of different platforms for Smart TV's, meaning companies will have to develop individual apps for each of them and you the consumer will have to bear with the limitations and quirks specific to the platform you own.



TV Optimised Websites


What TV optimised websites entail is instead of you downloading an app to access YouTube for example, companies are creating websites that can be integrated with your TV, allowing you to directly view their content as if it came from a traditional broadcaster.



While not every Smart TV platform gives their customers access to a web browser, that will likely change over the next year. If it turns out that this does not become the standard, technically a TV optimised site could be turned into a TV app without much fuss.



Also, given that HTML5 is fast gaining ground in popularity, currently accounting for around 54% of all Web video, it looks as this will become the norm for future TV optimised sites, which will streamline the process considerably. So far, TV optimised sites are only to be found from Web video sites. But as the capabilities of Smart TV browsers increase, and optimised sites begin to take advantage of even more HTML5 features, they have the potential to rival the capabilities of TV apps.



Conclusion


When it comes to accessing content with your Smart TV, both apps and optimised websites have their pros and cons. Unlike TV apps, a single TV optimised website has the major benefit of being able to serve multiple Smart TV platforms. TV apps however currently tend to have more capabilities than optimised websites. Regardless of their shortfalls, the main thing is that both methods are making Smart TV’s more useful and excitingly clever.



About the Author: Barry Knightly owns a Smart TV and electronics repair business.