I'm rather sad to see the Ouya posts and comments like this on HN.
There is no science to the knockdown - it's just naysaying.
It's not like they're raising to build something really crazy like a space vehicle that docks with ISS.
Many developers/startup community have to deal with naysayers all week - and come here to get away from it - to talk/think/discuss about possibilities and innovation.
There are many cases of visionaries being told by everyone that they will fail, but still going ahead and making it happen. People who say this needs to compete with Xbox360 or PS3, or worse - PS4 and Xbox720 - are really missing the point and don't know how disruptive innovations work.
That being said, I still think Google turning Google TV into a "console platform" and actually pushing it as such, would be even more disruptive, and with a higher chance of success than any single $99 device running Android as a console platform. It would be very similar to how Android won the market share game through an aggregate of devices, instead of trying to get any single device to sell more than the iPhone.
The author does not talk about needing to compete with XBox360 or PS3 or anything like that. The author's objection is basically that the people on the project appear to have underestimated the practical aspects of actually producing the device in quantity.
Can't they eliminate the manufacturing risk by outsourcing the hardware 100% to a company like ASUS that already has a working supply chain and significant experience with Tegra 3 and Android?
Yep. At the scale they are starting at, they can micromanage the control a bit, and team up with a company like ASUS to build the hardware.
Without having to embed a display on the device, I really don't find the price point of $100 outrageous -- aggressive, absolutely... but I am thinking they can probably make the lowest of the double digit margins on it.
There is no science to the knockdown - it's just naysaying.
It's not like they're raising to build something really crazy like a space vehicle that docks with ISS.
Many developers/startup community have to deal with naysayers all week - and come here to get away from it - to talk/think/discuss about possibilities and innovation.
This is first article I've ever flagged.