The forthcoming, platform-agnostic smart home standard Matter could do more than unite our smart home ecosystems. It could also introduce a universal standard for TV control.
A report from The Verge looks at a lesser-discussed part of the Matter specification that could eventually replace the likes of AirPlay from Apple and the Cast tech Google offers on Android devices.
Matter gadgets could enable the casting of content to a television, regardless of whether it’s an iPhone, Android or Windows laptop hosting the video or audio. According to the report, Matter partner Amazon is the key driver behind the initiative. That’s likely because Amazon currently doesn’t have a proprietary casting tech within the Fire TV ecosystem.
The report says that while the Matter standard – which is a collaboration between Apple, Samsung, Amazon, Google, and the Zigbee Alliance – will make it possible to control every day functions like channel, volume and inputs.
“But importantly, you can also do casting,” said Chris DeCenzo, Principal Software Development Engineer at Amazon Lab126. DeCenzo says Matter will initially reply on apps communicating with each other “until the TVs and streaming video players become Matter enabled.”
“This is an area with at least five proprietary protocols today,” he said. “The result is a complete opportunity loss for everyone.”
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So, in the short term, that means the Matter-enabled Netflix app on your phone could talk to the Matter-enabled Netflix app on your TV in order to send the content to the display. Considering most of them already have access to Apple AirPlay and Google Cast tech it probably isn’t going to be that much of a game-changer. However, buying a TV without considering whether it supports Cast or AirPlay would be nice.
Matter is expected to begin the rollout in 2022 and is designed to ensure devices from the major smart home manufacturers benefit from interoperability.
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Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
