There is a big difference between consumer interest and consumer adoption. People expressed interest in VoIP for years, but it never reached any kind of mass adoption until operators threw it into their triple-play bundles. Same with TiVo. Lots of people talked about how great it was, but DVRs got no real traction until the cable companies rolled out DVR set-tops. Lack of adoption doesn’t diminish great technology or great execution of an idea, but it does put a kink in business plans.
Michael Gartenberg, who I respect greatly and who has access to gobs of primary research over at Jupiter, has a detailed post on Apple’s opportunity to deliver on consumers’ desire to get content from the PC to the TV. He believes Apple can make the leap from consumer interest to consumer adoption with the Apple TV. He may be right. But I can think of a few reasons he may also be wrong. (more…)
