Originally published at: Amazon Officially Kills Sideloading on Future Fire TV Sticks
Amazon has officially confirmed what many of us suspected for months. Every future Fire TV Stick will ship with the company’s new Vega OS instead of the Android-based Fire OS that powered the lineup for years. The confirmation was quietly tucked into Amazon’s Fire TV developer documentation. The page flatly states ‘Starting with Fire TV…
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We knew it was coming. The question remains on what will happen with existing Firesticks and Firecubes. Is it still worthwhile to buy the 3rd generation Firecubes?
I have 4 Firesticks. If I need another one in the future and I can’t sideload with it I’ll be switching to Buzztv.
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Its a pitty that amazon has taken this position.
My question is, how will google react in future? They already remove sideloaded aps from my Nvidea shield home page, or poster page. What can be done to stop google from removing apps from .y home page?
I don’t know all the specifics about Vega OS, but I’m sure developers are already working on a way to bypass the sideloading restrictions on the new sticks. Who knows if they will be able to (or when), but I’m interested to watch any progress made. I know we have expanded our box/stick arsenals so we have many options now and don’t need Firesticks, but the cat-mouse game between Amazon and cord-cutters/developers will continue to make good drama lol.
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That’s the end of firesticks
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Nah I doubt it. We here at the Insider that sideload apps like KODI, Stremio, and other APK’s are a very small percentage of the overall Firestick users who get Firesticks to use for legit apps
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Probably right older sticks are fine but then there are so many other devices that work well as @Miki would say stream on
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You don’t think somebody, somewhere is working on a way to circumvent the Vega OS restrictions?
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Absolutely someone is. Was just saying what we do here with our devices is a very small percentage of what most people do with their devices.
Yes very well said. I talked about this in the Final Thoughts section of this article but it seems that Amazon is seeing Roku’s financial success and trying to copy their streaming playbook - Why Roku's Success Shows Everything Wrong With Streaming
Great for their shareholders and bottom line, but horrible for us streaming consumers…
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