Google Play: Less Lessness?

Hot on the heels of Apple’s latest iPad (and lukewarm on the heels of Amazon’s new Kindle Fires), Google announced new Nexus tablets in unsurprising sizes and price points.

As I’ve said before, hardware is largely irrelevant to the tablet market. Greater resolution or processing speed doesn’t help you get more content to download.

To that end, Google announced new licensing deals to bring more content to Play — and I have a chart to prove it.

Below you’ll find an updated version of the chart I put together for my iTunes vs Amazon Instant Video vs Google Play vs Sony Unlimited vs Samsung Media Hub article, where you can read all about the methodology in depth.

Note, I didn’t check the other services for this round, only Google Play. If other services announce new licenses, I’ll update them as well.

Changes from the original chart appear in blue:

Notes: The highest number season listed (e.g. Doctor Who S7) is the most recent season. Dead Like Me was available before, but now only the movie is. Farscape’s movies were available before, but are no longer. This is also true of LotR:RotK.

Bottom Line

Despite losing a few titles that were once available, this is a net increase in content for Play, and certainly a step in the right direction for Google. However, it’s still a far cry from what’s available on Apple and Amazon. Until such a time as Play offers roughly the same content, I’ll still consider the Nexus tablets also-rans. 

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