"The experience authorizing channels on media boxes?" Sun Dec-21-14 10:59 PM by handle
I just got At&T U-verse installed at my mother's house with the "EVERY POSSIBLE THING* (except the Filipino channels) package."
At my house I have an Apple TV - so I figured I'd "authorize" my device and get a bunch of those channels - HBO2Go, Showtime Anywhere, Fox, ABC/ etc. (I do pay the bill, so it's not cheating.)
Man, what a fucking hassle that was.
For *each* app I had to do this: 1)Launch the app 2)Go to settings a click authorize 3)Take a picture of that code 4)Leave the AppleTV in that state 5)Go to my computer and go to a different website for each app 6)Choose my provider form the list 7)Enter the activation code 8)Create an account on that website (for about 50% of them) 9)Log into my AT&T u-verse account 10)Wait a few seconds (up to a minute) for the Apple TV to be authorized.
And repeat. It took about 30 minutes to do the 10 or so I get.
Is it this bad on the Roku, or other devices?
Why doesn't the device store my U-verse credentials and authorize itself??
Can this problem be fixed with better agreements between device makers and content providers?
1. "you don't have a laptop? or a tablet? or a phone?" In response to Reply # 0 Mon Dec-22-14 12:02 AM by Rjcc
edit - ah, I thought reading it the first time that you said you needed to leave the room, but I realize you didn't specify.
on some devices and for some channels, they can actually automatically login based on your internet connection. comcast has this on some, some other providers do too. I don't know if the Apple TV works this way.
the "TV Everywhere" setup suuuuucks, there's very little in the way of consistency, the only real benefit is that you should only have to do it once.
I probably wouldn't recommend trying to do all the apps/channels at once?
also, Apple imo, is deserving of some blame here, they've done precious little to improve the Apple TV experience for years now.
that said, it's pretty much like that on other boxes. of course, if you have the channels, you presumably have TV service where you are.
6. "I did leave the room" In response to Reply # 1
I mean I could have done it on my phone, but since the URLs were often stupid, and may of the sites asked me to register an account I used a computer for the superior keyboard input.
This is clearly an issue because the vendors (ABC, FOX, HBO, etc) are unwilling to standardize the process and accepted a "half-way" solution.
It certainly could be worse, but it would definitely be better.
4. "yup, same BS on Roku -- I gotta remember my Comcast email login" In response to Reply # 0
wherein Comcast has misspelled my name and lord knows what the fuck it is because I never use it, so last time I tried it I ended up talking to a phone bank in god knows where on top of all of what you did. It's dumb.
5. "we're gonna look back on all this shit and laugh" In response to Reply # 0
passwords and logging into shit are the bane of my online existence.
i get that security is important and all, but there's still a special circle of hell reserved especially for IT admins who force you to change your email password every 2 months.
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