A look at multiple motivations behind Amazon's move to stop selling Apple TV, Nexus Player, and Chromecast devices
What's behind Amazon's baffling decision to ban Apple TV and Chromecast? — Amazon's decision to ban sales of Apple TV and Google's Chromecast and Nexus Player from its retail store …
Context & Ripple Effects
The ban traces to a stated rule: as Bloomberg reported when the October 29 deadline was set, Amazon framed the delisting around Prime Video — Apple TV, Chromecast, and Nexus Player couldn't stream it, while Roku, Xbox, and PlayStation could and kept their listings. The Verge's piece reads the move as multi-motivated, sitting alongside an earlier content-control decision to ban the Kodi/XBMC app over piracy concerns.
Amazon then followed through completely at month-end, when all Apple TV and Chromecast listings were pulled even from third-party resellers. The arc only closes two years later, when Amazon reversed course and started selling both devices again — evidence the leverage play cut both ways.
First-order effects
- Apple TV and Chromecast immediately lost the largest US online retail channel, with third-party resellers swept out too, leaving those devices harder to discover for mainstream buyers.
- Roku, Xbox, and PlayStation gain a de facto merchandising advantage on Amazon, since supporting Prime Video is now the price of shelf space.
Second-order effects
- Google and Apple face pressure to open their TV platforms to the Prime Video app if they want access back to Amazon's storefront — compatibility becomes negotiable currency between platform owners.
- Device makers learn their sales funnel is hostage to a rival's content strategy: any hardware partner dependent on Amazon retail now weighs its own Prime Video integration against platform loyalty.
Third-order effects
- If retail gatekeeping works as leverage, expect more content-owning platforms to demand app compatibility as a condition of distribution — but the eventual 2017 reversal shows the tactic has limits when the excluded parties are strong enough to hold out.
The trend: Streaming platforms are using distribution control rather than pricing alone to force cross-platform app compatibility, a tug-of-war that reshuffles who controls the living-room gateway.