• Business Insider et al, Tuesday, December 21, 2010 12:38 PM

After a few false starts, could Apple finally have a winning TV strategy on its hands? It certainly thinks so on the proverbial eve of selling a million Apple TVs less than four months after debuting the cheaper version.

"The new Apple TV offers the simplest way to watch your favorite HD movies and TV shows, stream content from Netflix, YouTube, Flickr and MobileMe, all on your HD TV for the breakthrough price of just $99," the tech giant boasts.

Critics, however, seems less impressed with Apple TV sales.

"It seems that Apple's foray into your living room has gotten further than Google's, given the latter's disappointing reviews and pre-CES pullback," writes MediaMemo. "But I'm not sure it's a runaway success, either. Some context: Apple sold nine million iPods during the third quarter of this year."

"By that measure, it's been a slow take off for the latest incarnation of Apple's play for the living room," The Next Web seconds. "With its $99 pricepoint it appears it hasn't quite been the runaway success it was perhaps meant to be."

Business Insider thinks Apple rushed to make its sales announcement in light of Google TV's latest setback. "It probably wants to rub Apple TVs success in Google's face."

According to Fortune, meanwhile, Apple's "slightly premature" sales announcement is likely a gimmick to "goose some last-minute Christmas purchases."

Agendas aside, there's no arguing with Apple TVs strong sales figures.

We'd heard reports that new Apple TVs were selling like hotcakes, thanks to a lower price point and a host of new features," TechCrunch writes.

Also this week, Apple announced that iTunes users are now renting and purchasing over 400,000 TV episodes and over 150,000 movies per day.

"Bear in mind that those are being watched on all of Apple's devices, not just Apple TV," MediaMemo notes. "But if you're a studio with product to push, that shouldn't matter -- a sale is a sale."

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