Many streaming services are quite shitty, don't allow you to link directly to a show, and don't allow streaming on PC (or don't allow it any higher than standard def), and most people want to watch their TV on TVs, which means your service needs to work with the various services available on the various common streaming hardware.
I swear Google Play Movies is the most convoluted difficult to use UI to play video I've ever seen. I bought a show in it once, but I bought the entire series, which shows up in the UI separately from every other season. (So it shows as seasons "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 1 through 6"). Every time I want to watch an episode, I need to open, go to my library, go to TV shows, pick the show, scroll to the "full series" season, then scroll from episode 1 to the episode I last watched to play it.
It's insane that it's that difficult! And knowing how difficult it is I absolutely will never order another show from that ecosystem again.
In all fairness, I get the feeling that a lot of Google services are there because Google has to have them. Apple have them. When people buy an Android they want somewhere they can go to get stuff. But for Google, that's it. There's very little extra effort expended to make it nice to use. They've just ticked a box. They offer films. That's it. It'll sit there and gather dust for a few years before Google sees that competitors have moved on, so they go and give their service a face lift. Then another 5 years of nothing.
Many streaming services are quite shitty, don't allow you to link directly to a show, and don't allow streaming on PC (or don't allow it any higher than standard def), and most people want to watch their TV on TVs, which means your service needs to work with the various services available on the various common streaming hardware.
I swear Google Play Movies is the most convoluted difficult to use UI to play video I've ever seen. I bought a show in it once, but I bought the entire series, which shows up in the UI separately from every other season. (So it shows as seasons "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 1 through 6"). Every time I want to watch an episode, I need to open, go to my library, go to TV shows, pick the show, scroll to the "full series" season, then scroll from episode 1 to the episode I last watched to play it.
It's insane that it's that difficult! And knowing how difficult it is I absolutely will never order another show from that ecosystem again.