How to stream Super Bowl LIII

How to stream Super Bowl LIII – and other big stories of the week

By James StablesFebruary 2, 20194 Mins Read

Everything you need to know from the week that was

Welcome to the Week in smart home – another visit to the font of smart home knowledge, where we impart some of the happenings of the week. In this post CES lull, this week we saw a Casper smart light and a new iRobot lawnmower.

Here’s what else you need to know.

How to stream the Super Bowl LIII - and other big stories of the week

Compared to other sporting events the Super Bowl is very easy to watch for free – although no service has stepped up and offered the coverage in 4K, which is highly disappointing.

If you’re in the US looking to watch Super Bowl LIII, you’ll need to head to CBS – it’s showing the game for free, and you won’t even need to sign in. CBS also available on pretty much every streaming stick going, including Fire TV, Roku and Apple TV via the All Access app.

In the UK, you’re also spoiled for choice with BBC One showing the game, which you’ll be able to pick up on streaming services – but remember your TV license. US coverage is also being shown on Sky – with a subscription – for those who don’t need every moment explained.

And finally, if you’re outside those countries – and your local channels aren’t playing ball – you can download a VPN and access the above services. Also, you can get a stream legally at Hulu, PlayStation Vue, YouTube TV and FuboTV.

Nest services go down…again

It’s getting to be an all too often occurrence, but Nest had another outage to its service this week. Users couldn’t access key services on alarms, cameras, thermostats and doorbells all Tuesday.

It’s not a big story in the scheme of things, but as Engadget reports, it’s the fourth time in two months that users have been left unable to use Nest gear. There’s something about the lack of control that sends users completely bonkers when smart home tech goes down, and as Nest and Google battle to take back control from Alexa, these kinds of outages simply erode trust.

Lowe’s backs out of smart home

Lowe’s has toasted its smart home line up of devices, killing support and asking users not to return items to the store. The company is offering refunds in the form of a pre-paid Visa card – according to TechCrunch.

It shows that buying into smart home tech is probably best left to the big brands, as even after you’ve bought, support can be pulled when services are taken offline. Take a look at our guide to the best cheap smart home tech to find that balance between price and trust.

Alexa helps Amazon to killer Q4

Somewhat unsurprisingly, Alexa was behind a very successful set of financial results for Amazon, which raked in $3bn of profit in Q4 2018, reports The Guardian.

“Alexa was very busy during her holiday season. Echo Dot was the best-selling item across all products on Amazon globally, and customers purchased millions more devices from the Echo family compared to last year,” Jeff Bezos said.

It’s no surprise that the Echo Dot was a big seller – the third-generation product was heavily discounted like most of the Echo range – with availability delayed until mid-January. Check out our complete guide to Alexa and our round up of the best Alexa compatible devices.