Technology

There are so many cheaper better options that Google can't really compete in that space. Onn set top box is half the cost and so is the fire stick. It's one of those things where people aren't gonna go with the cheap Google product when they can get a better cheap product elsewhere there's dozens of random Chinese companies also making the little streaming sticks and as more streaming companies upgrade their services these smaller offerings are gonna be less likely to sell because they don't do 4K well, don't do 8K and don't offer the functionality of larger boxes. I'm thinking really hard about swapping out my shield TV for one of these.

There're so many other products that come with Chromecast built in too. Receivers for home entertainment systems, tvs, sound bars. Even if the smaller streaming sticks weren't ubiquitous it's hard to tell someone to buy one that's gonna take up a dedicated HDMI port when they can buy a TV with it already built in. And for the rest of us there's stuff like this.

I'm not saying that the Chromecast doesn't have its place. I'm saying I didn't think we'd even get this kind of refresh of the product this go round. People only upgrade when what they have stops working and I feel like a lot of the market already has a tiny streaming stick.