The Easiest Way to Get a Channel on the Roku

December 17th, 2010

Lifechurch.tv did it. Northland Church did it. Now your church can do it too, for only $34/month.

We are, of course, referring to launching a channel on the Roku device, the Internet TV box that Mashable.com named one of the top 10 gadgets of 2010 (which is saying a lot considering competitors such as the Xbox 360 Kinect, Apple’s iPad and iPhone 4, and a slew of new digital cameras, smart phones, and flatscreen televisions.)

With a channel on the Roku, your church could reach over 1 million current Roku owners, plus the hordes of new owners that will be unwrapping theirs this December 25th.

To most small to medium churches, a channel on an Internet TV box may seem more dream than reality due to the time and price involved, but a new product by the Christian development company UpperRoom Technologies may make that reality a little more reasonable.

UpperRoom, in partnership with online video host Vimeo.com, released a channel for their sermon console Media Fusion. For the easy to swallow price of $29/month, plus an equally low $5/month subscription to Vimeo Plus, any church can put their church videos on their website with Media Fusion.

What’s the kicker? Each and every Media Fusion subscriber hosted through Vimeo is also included in the Media Fusion channel on the Roku device, essentially giving a Roku channel to any church that wants one for $34/month.

UpperRoom first decided to pursue a Roku channel for Media Fusion after Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Texas approached them about a custom channel for their archived lessons. Senior Pastor Randy Frazee and Teaching Pastor Max Lucado saw the advantages of using internet TV over the traditional DVD delivery system for neighborhood groups and multi-site campuses.

Media Fusion is available at startthefusion.com. You can find out more about UpperRoom Technologies at uroomtech.com.