As if to
announce it’s back in the game after its engagement to Time Warner went south, Comcast this week announced it will begin producing its own 4K
set-top box, dubbed the “Xi4,” according to The
Verge. The device presumably will create another conundrum for would-be
cord cutters who don’t have the brain space to juggle between Netflix, Hulu
Plus, Amazon Prime and now, Periscope
and Meerkat, allowing users to produce “unlimited virtual 4K linear
channels by creating personalized playlists from the Xfinity in UHD library.” The
only question, as The Verge points out, is what consumers will watch on the
box. For now, content seems limited, so you won’t be able to ax your Netflix
account just yet. But the announcement does seem to raise the question of
whether Comcast can turn the tables on the streaming services cutting into its
subscriber base by trying to beat them at their own game.
