Apple Burns Apple TV Early Adopters

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Apple is no stranger to completely pushing ahead with new hardware and leaving early adapters in the dust. Case in point, those who bought the early Apple TV will not be getting the features of the newer smaller black one that was unveiled this week at Apple’s music themed press event.

Here’s the statement from Apple, as reported by Macrumors.com:

Additionally, there will be no software update to bring the new features to older Apple TVs. Older Apple TVs will continue to work as they have been working up to this point, and they will continue to be able to purchase movies and TV shows even though the new Apple TV is rental-only.

The new Netflix streaming is easily the most desirable feature of the new small Apple TVs, and it’s a bit disappointing that the old boxes won’t be able to do that. Other software features that won’t be included to the old Apple TV include the AirPlay features, apparently. While it’s known that I’m not a fan of Apple – I don’t think Apple’s (in)famous backwards compatibility is because of any  conspiracy theory involving getting you to buy new products. I imagine that Apple is a forward thinking company that doesn’t want to waste resources on dealing with legacy hardware.

As that snipet from Apple says – they will allow the older Apple TVs to keep buying content, even though the new ones can’t. As many of our readers likely know, the new Apple TVs are sans any physical storage and have a new focus on streaming. The ability to keep buying content should be a consultation for any upset Apple TV fans.

What do you think about Apple not updating the older Apple TVs?