Comment by ssl-3

You raise an interesting point. Performing the act of browsing the web on the TV from the sofa in the living room has been mostly[1] a non-starter for as long as we've had a web to browse, since the user experience sucks.

Dedicated remote-oriented apps usually do improve upon that user experience.

But does it have to be an app that runs within Apple TV's walled garden?

With a $20 Android streamer box (like the one sold under Wal-Mart's in-house ONN brand), a person can install SmartTube and watch ad-free YouTube with a configurable glitz-free remote-oriented interface and SponsorBlock. (If it dies or something better comes along, it was only $20. $20 doesn't buy very many cheeseburgers these days.)

[1]: There have been attempts to improve the WWW's sofa experience, perhaps with WebTV being the largest effort. And I've sat down with a trackpad-equipped wireless keyboard and run Firefox on some manner of television-connected computing device at various times. It's always pretty severely lacking compared to browsing the web with a laptop, desktop, or pocket supercomputer. Even though it's ostensibly almost exactly the same thing, it just never really flows well at all: It's worse than using a computer and also worse than using a TV remote in ways that compound with eachother.