Google Yanks YouTube From Amazon Echo Show Citing ToS Violation

Amazon's screen-toting incarnation of Alexa has just gotten less useful. Well, depending on what you were using the Amazon Echo Show for. If you were mostly using it for watching YouTube videos, which, admittedly, is an odd case for a more or less stationary and limited tablet, then you are in for a rude awakening. Both companies have confirmed that, yes, YouTube has been pulled out of the Echo Show without prior warning to users. And, yes, both companies are blaming the other for it.

To be fair, the Echo Show isn't exactly a general purpose tablet that happened to just be permanently mounted to a stationary frame. It is, first and foremost, just a visual face for Alexa and a way for Amazon to display shopping images and, secondarily, video calls.

That you could watch cooking demos and instructables is almost like a side effect of having a screen that can access the Internet. Now that use case has just been cut down nearly at its roots, with Google removing YouTube from the device. It's reason? A violation of YouTube's terms of services.

According to Google, Amazon's implementation of YouTube on the Echo Show is broken. It doesn't offer the same level of features and control that YouTube officially offers on other platforms and devices. On the Echo Show, users can simply search and play videos and nothing else. That's as much as what Amazon wants you to be able to do on the Echo Show.

According to Amazon, Google pulled out YouTube without explanation and without prior notification. Google says it has been in negotiations with Amazon for a long time, trying to, and obviously failing, to reach an acceptable agreement. It's a he said, she said war that, unfortunately leaves users, not the companies, as the casualties.

VIA: The Verge