Report: Apple working on TV guide for Apple TV


Recode:

Industry sources say Apple's plans are an outgrowth of the TV service it wanted to launch last year. The difference is that in 2015, Apple wanted to sell TV programming directly to consumers and provide them with a new interface that would make it easy to find the stuff they paid for.

Now Apple is just working on the interface. It is letting programmers, distributors and customers work out the money part among themselves.

Siri kind of does some of this as a search for programs within supported apps. This could be a continuation of this effort, maybe deeper data, or perhaps looking to cover live streaming.

TiVo does some of this similarly with their Swivel Search. Basically you can search for cable shows, plus a number of supported streaming services from the TiVo menu, rather than going into individual apps to find something.

It's interesting if Apple is in fact pivoting here from getting a monthly fee from subscribers for cable services to taking its standard cut from iTunes/App Store. Apple has announced changes in its subscription payment model to programmers/developers and also a new single sign on feature aims to make dealing with multiple app authentication easier. So, it looks like Apple may be moving in this direction. The plans are less grand, but if Apple can successfully create a streaming marketplace, the end result could be similar.