San Jose Mercury News

"The more customers, the higher price the NFL can command," said Brett Sappington, director of research at Parks Associates. "For Facebook, the NFL would drive huge volumes of consumption to get advertising and data. Facebook has to remain relevant. With other social media platforms emerging, Facebook has to push the envelope."

From the article "Facebook Reportedly In Talks To Stream NFL's 'Thursday Night Football' Games" by David Pierson.

Apple's effort to upend the television market isn't a sure thing, analysts said. Many of the features that it is expected to include on Apple TV -- an app store, voice search, a more powerful processor and a motion-sensing remote -- are already available on other devices, they noted. Meanwhile, Roku, which has some 2,000 channels available for its boxes, is likely to maintain its lead on Apple for the time being, Erickson said.

The bigger problem facing the new Apple TV coul ...read more

Sometimes the company is a pioneer, such as when it added a headphone jack to its remote so users could listen to shows or music without disturbing others in their home. Other times, as with voice search, which previously was available on Amazon's Fire TV box, and with Roku's Chromecast-like streaming stick, it's been a quick follower.

"Roku is one of the few players in the space that this is all they do," said Barbara Kraus, an analyst who covers the streaming media player ...read more

Google is investing in new tools that provide online songs, movies and television shows as users increasingly access various screens for consuming media, a competitive area that has also attracted rivals including Apple and Amazon.

Chromecast, unveiled in 2013, has emerged as the No. 2 media-streaming device, with 20 percent of sales to U.S. homes with broadband access during the first three quarters of 2014, according to Parks Associates.

The Mountain View company is pu ...read more

The booming market for streaming video has created another venue for Google and Apple to battle, and Google appears to have ridden lower prices to yet another market-share victory over its Cupertino rival.

Parks Associates reported Wednesday that Google's Chromecast streaming-media device jumped ahead of Apple TV in 2014, challenging Saratoga-based Roku for the title of most popular dongle. The Mountain View search giant failed to crack the top five after debuting the Chrome ...read more

That ubiquity means consumers can control Bluetooth-based smart home devices directly with their phones or tablets, rather than having to go through a so-called bridge. In order to interact with non-Bluetooth home automation devices, users typically need a gadget that can translate between them. That bridge, or hub, makes ZigBee and Z-Wave devices more expensive and complicated than Bluetooth products, analysts say.

Thanks in part to such issues, only about 16 percent of U.S ...read more

Parks Associates' Wang said smartwatches will eventually compete against luxury watch makers such as Rolex, not other tech companies.

Entering into the already established watch market would have companies making fewer sales but higher profit margins, he said. Wang's forecast for the sale of 120 million devices assumes that wearables would act more as a luxury watch, rather than a smartphone or tablet.

Wang cited several factors that could boost the smartwatch market, in ...read more

With the wireless phone industry moving away from subsidized smartphones, the cost of the phone psychologically is going to feel more expensive, said Harry Wang, director of mobile research at Parks Associates.

"When people pay upfront for their smartphone or see the cost of paying it over 12 months, consumers will have a clear understanding of the price of their phone," Wang said.

The "Fix It Here!" program also complements how Magnacca is trying to reposition RadioShac ...read more