With the rapid advance of technology, many platforms have struggled to keep up with demand. Few have been more visible than the state broadcaster’s digital streaming platform, RTÉ Player. Finally, the player is getting a long overdue overhaul and here are just three reasons this is fantastic news.
RTÉ Player on Chromecast for Android
With Android being my weapon of choice I only found out today that RTÉ Player has supported on iOS for quite some time. A barmy scenario when RTÉ opted not to support Google’s own platform but still this was the scenario.
The good news is that with RTÉ’s relaunch of RTÉ Player, no more will Android users be left out in the cold. You’ll be able to sling your stream from any mobile device to a Chromecast.
This is such a game changer because who really wants to tie up their laptop or smartphone while watching a livestream? Have the fun is in Tweeting along to the craic.
Ad Experience Will Be Improved
Nothing makes you more annoyed to be paying a TV license that a crappy ad experience. Actually, if you’re paying for TV at all, it’s infuriating that ads have to be a part of it. Anyway, look they are. The real problem was poetically summed up on Twitter earlier today:
Will it have 13 ads before you can watch a second of content?
— Rob Magee (@robmagee86) December 2, 2018
It did indeed feel like watching a thirty minute show required an hour of ads. Even worse, was seeing the ads streaming perfectly and then getting lag for the show you wanted to watch. While I’ve yet to see what RTÉ considers to be an improved ad experience, it would be hard to make it worse, right?
Slightly related side note. If you are involved in advertising, give some real thought to whether or not you want your brand to be what people see for a minute before they get to the show they really want to watch.
Love/Hate on Tap
It looks like RTÉ will be massively expanding their back catalog of content for us all to stream to our hearts’ content. That will include some classics like Love/Hate (if the video promo is anything to go by) and also a barrage of RTÉ Player Originals that don’t feature on TV. This approach is growing popular as older TV institutions struggle to keep up with chord cutting culture.
Digital Box Sets has proven massively popular on Sky and shoule RTÉ pull this one off, RTÉ Player could genuinely get the state broadcaster back in the game.
It Might Actually Work
While ads are annoying as hell, nothing is worse than actually sitting through the ads, loading your stream and then five minutes into it, it craps out.
This was unfortunately common with RTÉ Player.
With the RTÉ Player relaunch, I have to hope that they’re actually improving the infrastructure too that’ll help the player cope with massive demand. If the teaser is anything to go by, the Player will have more content than ever before and as such, you can expect more users than ever too. If they only improved the looks and not the infrastructure, this whole thing could be a disaster.
I’m Quietly Confident
I’m quietly confident that RTÉ’s reimagined RTÉ Player will deliver what everyone has been waiting for. An I should emphasise the word waiting there. Boards.ie has been lighting up with people wanting this update for years. RTÉ themselves announced this back in April 2017, yet it’s only launching now!
In the famous words of George Hamilton, a nation holds its’ breath. Here’s hoping this RTÉ Player relaunch was worth the wait.
All this is coming your way tomorrow! 🙌 pic.twitter.com/YSYFZejbGB
— RTÉ Player (@RTEplayer) December 2, 2018
PS. Hey, RTÉ! Any chance we could get that Downfall mockumentary about Sellafield uploaded? I missed it years ago and have been looking for it ever since. Sound!
