Chromecast gets Plex, Vevo, RealPlayer, Viki and more with massive app update
A few months ago, a developer source told me that Google planned to release apps for its Chromecast streaming stick in waves. Well, guess what: The first wave is here, and it's a massive one …
Context & Ripple Effects
The update lands weeks after Google invited developers to a Chromecast hackathon and SDK show-and-tell in November, and days after Gigaom's report that a Plex app was imminent — so today's rollout confirms both threads at once. A developer source had told the outlet that apps would arrive in waves rather than all at once, and this first wave is unusually broad.
The pickup was wide even by launch standards: Plex announced it alongside TechCrunch, Android Central, TechHive and others, with Vevo, RealPlayer and Viki filling out the batch — evidence Google is pushing hard to widen the stick's app catalog ahead of the holiday buying season.
First-order effects
- Plex, Vevo, RealPlayer and Viki users gain native Chromecast casting immediately, giving each service living-room reach without shipping new hardware or negotiating set-top box deals.
- Google converts months of developer outreach — the November hackathon, the staged SDK preview — into visible catalog growth, addressing the stick's biggest criticism since its July launch: too few supported apps.
Second-order effects
- Every media app developer who saw the hackathon materials now has a working template for adding cast support cheaply, which pressures competing TV platforms to match the pace of third-party app additions.
- For niche services like Viki and long-tail media tools like Plex and RealPlayer, casting becomes a low-cost distribution channel — the value shifts toward whoever controls the TV-side runtime Google owns.
Third-order effects
- If the wave model holds and opens into a full SDK, Chromecast stops being a fixed-function dongle and becomes a platform whose competitive strength is software breadth — a shift that would force rival streaming devices to compete on developer access and price rather than bundled services.
- Content owners gain an alternative to per-platform licensing negotiations: one cast-enabled app reaches every Chromecast unit, gradually weakening the gatekeeping position of closed TV ecosystems.
The trend: Streaming hardware is shifting from bundled-app walled gardens toward open, SDK-driven platforms where catalog breadth — not the device itself — decides the winner.