Google TV is coming to 10,000 lucky developers

Google TV is now available in Best Buy and Sony Style stores across the nation, as well as online through Amazon.com. We’re excited that consumers are finally taking these out of the box and have been hearing a lot of positive early feedback. And while people may think that Google TV is great now, we can’t wait for them to see what’s coming.



First and foremost, as with Android for mobile, we’ll continually push new system updates with new features and bug fixes as they become available. But just as important, we are focusing our efforts on empowering the developers of the world to make Google TV an even better experience, through websites that have been built with the TV screen in mind.



For users, better-looking and more interesting websites means that the overall Google TV experience is even better. We want to encourage a new generation of TV developers to come forward to make this vision a reality. Which is why, over the next few weeks, we’re planning to give away 10,000 Google TV devices to help developers start building for TV.



This morning, we gave away more than 3,000 Google TV devices to attendees of the Adobe MAX conference. Additionally, we’ll be reaching out to thousands of web developers in the Google Code community to offer them a free device. Finally, if you are a professional web developer who wants to help make the Google TV experience even better and you don’t happen to fall into one of those two groups, please submit an entry to our Google TV Web Developer Promotion and include a short summary about the type of interesting website your company would like to create or optimize for Google TV. We’re planning to select 2,500 winners from those entries to receive a free Google TV device.



We can’t wait to see the new sites people will build. Until then, check out some of the latest Spotlight sites that have just launched on Google TV. A few of our favorites include Net-A-Porter, which lets you watch runway videos and shop for high fashion; Meegenius, a place where you can read and customize children’s books; TuneIn, a personal radio for your TV; and The Onion which always gives us a good laugh.



As we’ve always said, the coolest thing about Google TV is that we don’t even know what the coolest thing about it will be. The experience is in the hands of its users and developers, and everyone is invited. Come play.


Update: To clarify, this giveaway is only for U.S based developers. We hope to make Google TV available in other markets soon.


Posted by Amanda Surya, Google TV Developer Relations Team