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It appears that Google has done a refresh update on their TV and Movies app for Google TV, and it brings about some fairly significant changes. The app is now much more user friendly and searches for the TV shows and movies that you are looking for much faster and easier than before. You also now have more personalized choices across all of your content, better favorites management, a Trending This Week feature and a ratings system to help sort things. It even sorts content from your cable or satellite provider to make everything much more organized and user-friendly.

This is definitely worth taking the time to check out. For more detailed descriptions head over to the source link below from Google.

Source: Google TV Blog

A new report indicates that Google will be taking Google TV to Europe in September. Here's a quote from Engadget with some details:

Sony France's marketing director said that two devices, a set-top box, priced at €200 ($266) and a Blu-ray player, selling for €300 ($399), will launch in France this September. The paper reports that it could launch across the UK, Spain and Germany at the same time. Sony's Stephane Labrousse added that remotes for the new devices would also include a dedicated Android Market Google Play button to access the Android progenitor's apps and media content.

What do you guys think? How many of our friends across the pond are excited about this news?

Source: Engadget

Google filed a patent which showcases a new technology that would allow users with Google TV-Equipped devices to control

their device with their voice among many other things..

Source and more info:

Google Developing Siri-Like User Interface for Google TV - Patently Apple

The day has finally arrived that we can access root on our Sony Google TV's, thanks to GTV Hacker the Eagle = Blu-ray Player & Asura = Sony GoogleTV Panel are both exploitable and with a computer and 4 512mb USB sticks it's easily accomplished

We give to you our latest release, a root for all current Sony Google TV devices that we call “The GTVHacker Sony Recovery Downgrader & Rebooter”. This method will allow you root and run custom unsigned kernels on your Sony Google TV device.

The process in the guide above will walk you through downgrading the system to an exploitable version. Then using another exploit, we hijack the devices boot process and reload a new kernel. This completely bypasses the signatures normally used by the system, including those used in the bootloader, kernel, and init binary. The kernel reload process happens automatically each time the box is powered on, and the USB drives required for the install are not needed again. After loading our attached unsigned kernel you will notice a new splash screen (featuring the Sony and GTVHacker logo) as well as the following perks:

Between the speediness of the 3.2 upgrade and the unsigned kernels we finally have the box that we’ve always wanted from the Google TV. We recommend this update to everyone as it only requires 4 USB sticks and is a 100% softmod

With root you get

• Modified flash plugin with random per box flash string for Content Provider Bypass.
• Crippled update feature to prevent box from receiving automatic updates.
• Completely RW system, cache, and rootfs partitions
• Full ADB Root
• Removed signature checks on kernel / init scripts / init binary
• A few other surprises.
• BETA: Enable NTFS Support for Sony Google TV devices (see wiki for instructions on how to add: GTVHacker.com: Sony NTFS)

Personally I'll be knee deep with this today - hopefully we will see a Revue exploit in the near future

Visit the blog for instructions and be sure to follow @GtvHacker on twitter


Blog

Root Instructions

Google shared an interesting announcement today. They have a new YouTube app for GoogleTV. The new updated version has some slick new features:

• Faster, and smoother navigation
• New feature called Discover that lets you browse videos by category
• New channel pages, which make it easier to switch between related videos or find more videos from the same user

It's funny... earlier on the weekend they announced that they would be sharing a "big" announcement on Monday, but although this is pretty cool, it probably didn't deserve the over-hype.

Source: TheVerge

Sony is pressing forward with their Google TV initiatives, including a project to launch Google TV equipped Blu-Ray players in the UK later this summer. This seems like a great idea... bundle the product with another product that people want anyway, thereby potentially reaching a wider audience. Brilliant!

They didn't share if/when other regions will be getting the devices, but we must consider that they will most likely market it elsewhere at some point. According to Phandroid, the devices were impressive when they got to preview them at CES this year. We will let you guys know if we find out any more details.

Source: Phandroid