谷歌+亚马逊+苹果：三巨头为何火拼电视机顶盒

    继2010年推出谷歌电视、去年推出Chromecast电视棒之后，谷歌（Google）于上周三发布了Android电视。而亚马逊（Amazon）则于今年四月推出了Fire电视。苹果（Apple）还在继续摆弄苹果电视，现在已经出到第三代或者说是第四代产品，看你怎么算了。

    上述设备都不大可能成为摇钱树。苹果电视去年一年的销售收入为10亿美元，仅为iPhone每个季度营收的三十分之一。

    他们到底图什么？

    咨询公司Creative Strategies的本•巴佳林表示，答案就在本文所附的图表里。这张图表来自玛丽•米克尔的互联网趋势幻灯片。从图中可以看出，世界各地的消费者每天玩手机和看电视的时间要比用电脑的时间长。

    以美国人为例，他们平均每天花2小时31分钟玩手机，花2小时27分钟看电视。

    巴佳林上周二在 Rene Richie的Vector播客中说：“网络和台式机正在衰落。”填补空白的是智能手机以及传统的电视屏幕这最后一块没有被征服的领地。

    因此，苹果、亚马逊和谷歌正争相打造与电视机顶盒紧密融合的智能手机平台。

    巴佳林说：“移动设备将成为门户。我不打算同时拥有亚马逊Fire电视盒子和谷歌Android手机。我也不打算同时拥有苹果iPhone和谷歌Chrome电视盒子。”

    “大家拥有的手持设备将会胜出，成为最后的赢家。”（财富中文网）

    译者：项航

    Google GOOG 0.22% on Wednesday unveiled Android TV, the successor to last year’s Chromecast dongle and the 2010 Google TV. Amazon AMZN -0.34% in April launched Amazon Fire TV. Apple AAPL 1.19% is still noodling with its Apple TV, now in its third or fourth iteration, depending how you count.

    None of these devices are expected to be huge money makers. Apple TV generated $1 billion in revenue last year, about a thirtieth of what the iPhone generateseach quarter.

    So why are they doing it?

    The answer, says Creative Strategies’ Ben Bajarin, can be found in the attached chart, taken from Mary Meeker’s Internet trends slide show. It shows consumers around the world spending less time in front of their PCs and more time looking at their smartphones and televisions.

    Americans, for example, spend an average of 2 hours and 31 minutes a day staring at their smartphones and 2 hours and 27 minutes staring at their TVs.

    “The Web and the desktop are diminishing,” said Bajarin Tuesday on Rene Richie’s Vector podcast. What’s filling the gap is the smartphone and the old stand by — the last unconquered territory – the TV screen.

    That’s why Apple, Amazon and Google are racing to build smartphone platforms that are tightly integrated to a box that sits next the TV.

    “The mobile will become the gateway,” says Bajarin. “I’m not going to have an Amazon Fire TV box and an Android phone. I’m not going to have an Apple iPhone and a Chrome TV box.”

    “The handset you own is going to be the one that wins out.”

    Follow Philip Elmer-DeWitt on Twitter at @philiped. Read his Apple coverage at fortune.com/ped or subscribe via his RSS feed.