More Bad News for Google TV

It was pretty much established that Google TV wasn't ready for prime time when it launched last fall, and now comes more proof.

Logitech has reported that the company's Revue with Google TV set-top box and the accompanying gear generated only about $5 million in sales during the last quarter. That's only about 72 percent less than the $18 million Logitech had expected. Not only did Google launch a Web TV strategy that required users to shell out money for hardware, such as the Revue or a TV from Sony, but at the same time, competitors such as Netflix offered a much simpler and less-expensive option--they enabled users to watch Web TV with little more than a browser. Google TV's content strategy also stumbled badly out of the gate. Why launch and enable users to access the Web content from the major networks without cutting deals first? Google set itself up for a headline-grabbing smackdown, and that's what it got when the networks all blocked Google TV access.