Apple TV update could be the missing "one more thing" from iPhone 5S launch
Lacking one of Steve Jobs’ trademark “one more thing” announcements at last night’s iPhone 5S reveal, Apple may still have one more goody tucked up its sleeve. AllThingsD is reporting that the Apple TV set-top box will be getting a software refresh next week, adding some useful extra functionality in the process.
Set to land on September 18 alongside the iOS 7 mobile update for iPhone 5 and iPhone 4S, AllThingsD’s Peter Kafka highlights new streaming features coming to the Apple TV.
“The one new feature I’m aware of is a tweak to Apple’s Airplay system,” writes Kafka.
“The new software will allow people who have purchased content from Apple’s iTunes store to play that stuff on other people’s TVs, via its Airplay system. The key part is that they will be able to tell an Apple TV box they don’t own to stream the media they do own, directly from the cloud.”
Free streaming of your iTunes content to a pal’s Apple TV? Sounds like a worthy update to us. The current method for beaming your iTunes movies to another person’s Apple TV box requires you first download the movie to an iPhone or iPad, and then beam it from the mobile device to the box. This new cloud-based method would save plenty of hassle, adding flexibility to a user’s iTunes catalogue, while still offering Apple some DRM protection through cloud-based streaming.
No official word on this from Apple yet, but we’ll keep you posted if it does eventually prove to be true.
