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I seriously doubt Roku is going to put back the channel numbers. Most of the other streamers like Pluto and Plex do not have channel numbers on their live channels, but Local Now and Stirr do have channel numbers so I guess there's a sliver of hope though I wouldn't hold my breath. However, the others without channel numbers also have much cleaner and solid interfaces compared to Roku which makes the lack of channel numbers easier to deal with. I especially like Plex's UI with its category tabs horizontally arranged across the top of the channel grid. Very easy to navigate.
No matter how good the UI is, not being able to go directly to a channel, numbered or not, puts a premium on channel categories and using favorites unless you want to scroll your life away in the channel grid because favorites allow you to go directly to a channel. For example, say you hear me talking up !mpossible, the great UK game show hosted by Rick Edwards. You would go into Game Shows and scroll through just those channels looking for !mpossible to first check it out, and then, after agreeing that I was so right to talk it up the way I did, you make it a favorite and thereafter you can go directly to it from your favorites. As well, you can use a favorite as an anchor where you say by using this particular channel as a favorite, I can not only go directly to it, but from there I can also easily get to the channels around it.
The problem is that Roku's UI is not consistent because the channel organization you see in the Games Shows category is not what you see in All Channels when you look at !impossible's schedule and the channels around it in the grid. So while I think I'm going to !mpossible and from there will be able to navigate one up to Game Show Network and two down to Family Feud as is shown in the Games Shows category...
...what actually happens is that !mpossible gets put on the top of the stack of channels I recently watched---despite there being a Recents category---and my easy navigation elsewhere plan is shot. Not to mention, All Channels is anything but All Channels and instead is a mishmash of randomness.
We didn't have these issues when we had channel numbers because they kept the developers and their short-sighted managers honest. Once they removed the channel numbers and corporate thinking took hold, we have the mess before us. It can be overcome, but not by the crew responsible. They should have seen this long before we did and fixed it while still removing the channel numbers. But oh no, some dip**bleep** manager put down the imperial edict to remove them and paced behind a developer's chair until they were gone and didn't care about anything else.
So instead, we're doing the QA. Unlike Dr. Frasier Crane, they're not listening.
