CNET Google is adding a batch of new features to its Chromecast streaming media stick, in hopes that consumers will find uses for the device beyond watching videos. This includes viewing personal photos through Google Plus, the company’s social network, and the ability to cast anything from your mobile devices to the bigger screen. The …

Jason Cipriani/CNET With the arrival of an AOL video channel on the Apple TV set-top box Tuesday, Apple is now bringing a wide array of free, ad-supported video across the deep moat it has built around its $99 streaming-media device. The “AOL On” network will add more than 900,000 videos to Apple TV, predominantly short clips not only from AOL …

Sarah Tew/CNET Good news, bad news for Google: Chromecast is holding onto its slice of the streaming-video device market even as new rivals like Amazon’s Kindle Fire TV emerge, but Chromecast is being used less and less, according to new data. As demand for video online increases and accessibility to TV on the Internet expands, more device makers are jumping …

Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine Getty Images Read into it what you will: Apple is staying coy about its math behind the $3 billion acquisition of Beats, but Beats Music — the headphones company’s fledgling subscription-streaming music service — got the first shout-out in the computer maker’s release about the deal. A potential focus on Beats Music hints at how …

HBO’s “True Blood” HBO Amazon unveiled a significant licensing agreement with HBO on Wednesday that brings popular programs from the premier cable channel to its Prime Instant Video service and puts the HBO Go app on its Fire TV media-streaming box. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, so it’s unclear how much Amazon is coughing up for the privilege of …

Sarah Tew/CNET Amazon’s online store is sold out of its new streaming-media box Fire TV until next week, the company said Friday, attributing the problem to unexpected popularity and not supply chain problems. The difficulty with Amazon declarations of popularity is the company seldom provides hard figures to back them up, and this is no exception. An Amazon representative said …

Now playing: Watch this: Livestream from Google Glass in one click 3:30 Next time you come face-to-face with somebody wearing Google Glass, you may be the star of a Livestream broadcast without even knowing it. Livestream, one of the main companies providing tools both to average Internet users and to video professionals to stream live video of whatever they want …

Roku CEO Anthony Wood Joan Solsman/CNET The day a while back that Apple TV’s $99 box launched, Roku founder and Chief Executive Anthony Wood says that Roku sales doubled. But as Amazon enters the market today with its own $99 streaming-video device called Fire TV, Wood says he’s now looking beyond boxes. By some measures, Roku is the dominant streaming-video …

Sarah Tew/CNET Amazon’s main mission in developing its Fire TV was flawless performance, Vice President of Kindle Peter Larsen said Wednesday, since best-in-class specs mean that everything else fades to the background except what you want to watch. Other boxes are “self-important” for assuming customers will settle for anything less, Larsen told CNET on the sidelines of his presentation of …

Roku CEO and founder Anthony Wood Joan Solsman/CNET SANTA MONICA, Calif. — Roku founder and Chief Executive Anthony Wood isn’t worried about streaming-box competition like Apple TV, even if he thinks Apple maybe should be. “Apple TV is essentially an accessory for the iPad. They lose money, which is unusual for Apple,” he said Thursday, speaking at the Recode conference …