The move from cable to streaming for live TV changed a lot of things. Choice, for one. (We have more.) Price, for another. (You’re likely paying less.) But not all changes were great. If you’re of the channel-surfing variety — or love to flip back and forth between two channels — you’ve likely been missing that feature.
YouTube TV — the most popular streaming service in the U.S. with more than 8 million subscribers — has addressed the latter. After having been teased in some A/B testing for a while now (that is, some folks saw it, and most didn’t), it looks like the ability to hop back and forth between two channels is now rolling out more broadly.
This is hardly a new idea. Cable remotes long had a dedicated button for going to the previous channel. And the defunct streaming service PlayStation Vue also allowed for it in the same way that YouTube TV has implemented it. Hold down the OK or select button (it might vary slightly depending on the platform you’re using), and you’ll return to the last channel you watched. Hold it again, and you’ll go back to the first channel. A YouTube TV community manager on Reddit confirmed that it works on live content, recorded shows, and on-demand.
You don’t have to do anything to get the new feature, though you may want to ensure your YouTube TV app is updated on whatever you use it on. And it won’t cost you any extra, which is nice in an era in which streaming companies are nickeling and diming us to death.
YouTube TV is available on every major streaming platform, from Roku and Amazon Fire TV to Google TV and Apple TV and everything in between. It’s also available on phones and tablets, and in a web browser. (Though you won’t get the previous channel feature there.) YouTube TV costs $73 a month for the base service and has several optional add-ons, including the ability to watch some live and on-demand content in 4K resolution. It’s also where you’ll want to go to watch NFL Sunday Ticket.
Instagram is making its way to yet another screen, and this time, Apple TV is getting a taste of the Reels rabbit hole. The company has launched a dedicated Instagram app for Apple TV, bringing Reels, longer videos, and live shows to the big screen. So, if watching one quick clip on a phone somehow turns into an hour of scrolling, there's now a much larger screen for that.
Instagram brings Reels and more to Apple TV
Audio-Technica, a brand well known for making some of the best studio and professional headphones on the market, has just come out with the ATH-AWX7000, which the company itself claims to be its "finest headphones ever." The new flagship closed-back headphone has debuted at an eye-watering price of $3,799. It combines hand-finished Japanese woodwork with a newly developed 58mm driver.
The earcups are made from Kiso cypress, a prized wood historically used for Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Each housing is finished by hand with traditional Echizen lacquer, which brings out the grain and is expected to darken over time. The frame and sliders are finished in a deep navy kachi-iro shade traditionally associated with samurai.
This post is brought to you in paid partnership with Best Buy.
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