Roku announced on December 19 that it’s US Roku Channel Store has surpassed 2000 channels for online video and music. The popular set-top box, which has expanded its reach into a streaming stick and a new smart TV line, now offers the most online channels.

New additions to the set-top box’s content include NatGeo, FXNOW, CBSN, Cosmobody, CinemaNow, Smithsonian and Google Play Movies and TV. Comcast Xfinity subscribers are now also offered HBO Go and Showtime Anytime. A Roku Recommends channel has also been recently added.

A much-awaited search feature among the top fifteen streaming channels is a recent addition. The universal search lets you search for a TV show or movie among the top 15 channels which include FOX NOW, CinemaNow, FXNOW, Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon Instant Video, HBO GO, Crackle, Vudu, M-GO, Time Warner Cable, Popcornflix, Blockbuster On Demand, Snagfilms and Acorn TV.

The new content has come at a good time as people will be home for the holidays. Roku says that it now streams over 200,000 movies and TV episodes. Media content is available in a variety of interests from music, news and weather, sports, kids and family, fitness, international movies, and more.

In the numbers game, Roku is quite ahead of its competition. Chromecast has less than a thousand apps, Apple TV has about fifty, and Amazon Fire TV has about one hundred entertainment channels (and 340 games).

Apple’s set-top box, the Apple TV, has got its latest update which includes several new apps: The Scene, Fusion, Dailymotion, and UFC.TV. Google has also updated its YouTube app within the software update.

The design of YouTube’s updated app for Apple TV is now consistent with that of the Xbox, Playstation and Roku. Alongside the new layout it now has personalized recommendations, a subscribe option, and predictive search which helps speed up the search process. Advertisements are now played before watching certain videos.

The new channels should automatically be installed on Apple TV’s if it is set to automatic updates. Otherwise it can be added manually. Country restrictions on the apps may be liable.

The new apps are described as follows:

Latest TV searches:

Apple TV has not been updated in over two years now. Which may be the reason why its competitors has gained some ground.

Parks Associates reports that Chromecast is now more popular than the Apple TV. In the first three quarters of the year, streaming media players are at its popularity peak. Almost ten percent of US households bought at least one streaming device this year.

According to rumours Apple TV does have an update ready for release but is pending the resolution of negotiation problems with content providers.

Google, Amazon and other competitors have taken advantage of the update gap and offer more diverse content at cheaper prices.

Google may be the biggest benefactor in the set-top box purchases becoming the second most popular device in households with a broadband connection this year. Last year it was only a minor player in the industry.

Roku still ranks at the top but market share has dropped to almost half in the last year from 46% to 29% in 2014.

Amazon Fire TV was only announced in April 2014, but is already a serious contender having captured 10% the market.

Apple has released an announcement that has it developed 8.1.1 to iPads and iPhones, and has treated Mac clients to their first Yosemite upgrade.
But, iOS 8.1.1 is not liable to produce much joy for Apple users, or maybe just in case they are still using an iPhone 4s or iPad 2.

Apple claims that the upgrade can speed up processes on both devices, after previous users complains on weakly characteristics of execution performances.
This upgrade likewise incorporates various fixes, yet it has not given a rundown of particular bugs that iOS 8.1.1 corrects.

The upgrade can be found in two ways: downloaded over-the-air or through iTunes.

Apple likewise discharged the first significant update for the Yosemite working system, Mac OS X 10.10.1, which guarantees to correct the WiFi issues that raised such a variety of complaints.

Countless number of clients using iMac and MacBook has reported issues to connect to specific Wifi networks, while others have endured unstable connections and wasted time on long loading times.

Apple says that these issues has been removed in OS X 10.10.1, claiming that the upgrade contains “Wifi improvements that improve stability”.

The update is accessible to download now at the App Store, and brings better Microsoft Exchange ties, improves Mail when sending messages from particular providers, and various bug fixes identifying with Time Machine, turning on from sleep etc.

As though that wasn’t sufficient, the firm additionally released an Apple TV upgrade, bringing various bug fixes to the set-top box.

With the return of the NFL through its 4-week August pre-season schedule (one of the first games of which saw the Denver Broncos defeat the Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks around 6 months too late), the well-known american football league has set out to further expand their media presence, with one of the biggest commercial entity in sport attempting to do so by teaming up with one of the most commercial technological entities in the world, Apple.

An unsettling development for anyone who fears corporate powerhouses combining, though for the parties involved it will appear on paper as a mutually beneficial deal, as NFL add their NFL Now app to iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV.

The app, which had been announced for a summer release on Xbox One (amongst other platforms) prior to the Apple announcement, is to guarantee 105 hours of original content per week, alongside an already-present 400 hours’ worth of archived footage. That archive is to include ‘historical highlights’ from each of the league’s 32 franchises, as well as of every Super Bowl from 1967-2009.

Also featured will be access to the league’s ‘NFL Films’ selection, segments and features from the NFL Network, as well as live streaming of press conferences and NFL Network shows.

A headlining ability of the new service, though, appears to be the introduction of a personalization option, offering viewers the chance to have recommended videos based on their favorite players & teams, and synchronisation to their official NFL fantasy team roster in a similar manner, if they have one. The features are noted as creating a ‘customized video stream’ that evolves throughout the season, with the NFL explaining that this will occur: “…to the point where no two registered fans will have the same experience on NFL Now.”

Whilst the download and basic features of the app are free, the NFL are naturally pushing their more ‘premium’ packages, which include ‘NFL Now Plus’ for $1.99/month (or $4.99/month for non-American subscribers), bringing users instant in-game highlights, whilst select foreign viewers along with Americans will gain the added benefits of NFL Network live streaming and Sunday access to the NFL Red Zone. Whether those customers will consider it value for money remains to be seen, so will Apple become the ideal partner for the NFL to get to where they want in the streaming market?

A trailer for the NFL Now service, ahead of the 2014 season, can be seen below: