PBS won't activate -- anyone else having this problem?

Using an iPad, I was able to follow instructions on screen and enter the code. It worked perfectly.

I had difficulty getting the PBS site to recognize my TV device via Apple TV until I downloaded the PBS app to my iPad. It then accepted the activation code, and connected to both the iPad and the TV.

Braizyn you are right !!!

it just work with Ipad I tried with differents web-browers, tablets, and my iphone did not work

I would recommend to use IPAD to active your apple tv it the only way so far.

I was having issues activating the account using Firefox. I switched to Google Chrome (as another user previously mentioned) and had no issues.

Not working for me either. I'm getting stuck at the point where you are supposed to select your local PBS station in the web browser. I selected my local station, and it just brings me back to the same page over and over again. Same thing if I select a station from a nearby city. Tried this on iPad and a laptop PC using both Chrome and Internet Explorer browsers. All get stuck on the "select your local station" page. It's broken.

The first AppleTV we bought, this worked just fine. However, when I tried to Activate the 2nd AppleTV we just got, PBS.org/activate says it's activated, but the App on AppleTV says it's not.

BTW, now BOTH AppleTVs are DEACTIVATED! FRUSTRATING!

HELP!!!

I'm having the same problem, except that I was previously activated. In the middle of a program, it stopped playing, told me to activate, and then has not let me do so, either in Safari or Chrome on OS X, and not on Safari on iOS.

I think we need to be more precise about what works and what does not. Specifically, after reading through this thread, I tried the activation process using my wife's iPad and was successful, where previously using my Mac did not work. So here is the specific configurations:

Macbook Pro mid-2012 model, 2.4GHz i5 core duo processor running OS X 10.9.1 and Safari 7.0.1-unsuccessful

iPad 3rd generation running iOS 7.0.2 and Safari (I'm not really an iPad user and can't seem to find the version number but suspect it also is 7.0.1. If someone will tell me where to access the information I'll supply it)

Apple TV 2nd generation (MD199LL/A ) with software version 6.0.2.

The posts have not included this type of information and therefore it is not possible to isolate the problem. Clearly it is not Safari related as some of us are successful using that browser. While Chrome seems to work, again there are no specifics of version numbers or even what platform the browser is on.

So all that appears to be true is that the activation does NOT work using Safari 7 on a Macbook Pro running OS X 10.1

I think that this is more of a PBS.org issue than anything Apple makes. Why? Because, after unsuccessfully getting my Two Apple TVs to Active for PBS.org, I gave up, and walked away.

Two hours later BOTH were ACTIVE.

See what I mean??

The process is supposed to be interactive, in other words, when PBS.org says "Your device is Activated, please press the Menu button to proceed," or something the like, the PBS.org app is supposed bring up the main window with all the content. And it didn't for a period of time too long to sit in front of and continuing to stare.

Interesting, Gerry

Perhaps there are multiple factors involved...may be related to timing issues anyplace in the path from the initiating device all the way to the PBS server and back to the Apple TV. And perhaps exacerbated by the particular initiating device, Apple TV device, and/or various software components and versions. But your experience certainly does seem like the PBS server/process is suspect, though that does not seem to explain the success rate for an iPad.

I guess for those with an iPad I would say use it for the activation. For the rest of us I guess the only thing to try is either using Chrome if you have it or contacting PBS (though be ready for them to possibly pass the buck to Apple). If anyone contacts either Apple or PBS it would be nice to get their response posted here. These posts did enable me to get activated, thanks to those of you who successfullly used an iPad.

Robert

Did you ever get activated? You seem to be the ony one in the thread who was unsuccessful using an iPad. Would you mind sharing details about that device (model, software version, browser and version) or letting us know if you did get this done later and with what device/browser?

Tessmar,

I too am having this problem. Had iTV for 5 months and PBS has always worked. Activation screen showed up on the morning of the 19th. Tried my iPhone 5s, iPad Air and Macbook for activation. I tried Safari, Google and PBS online and nothing has worked. Reset Apple TV 4 or 5 times too. I also tried the PBS iPad App aproach to no avail. Now all I have on my screen is 'unable to connect to PBS, try again later".

Very frusterated with Apple TV - it is by far their weakest product.

I do not know how software processes for included apps within the Apple TV get incorporated...but your comments imply that this activation step may be something new that PBS has added to their app (for want of a better term) on the Apple TV platform. This in turn leads back to Gerry Simmons comments and supports the hypothesis that it is this software or how it interacts with the PBS web processes that is the culprit...in which case, at least as relates to this specific topic, your comment about the Apple TV product is misplaced (and is off topic anyway).

Neither I nor anyone else here has ironclad answers, only suppositions and evidence of what does, or does not work, for them. Nor am I hearing that anyone contacted either Apple or PBS, though I suspect there is no effective way to do the former and am even less confident that the latter will produce positive results. Cetainly my own attempts to communicate with Apple on other "quirks" of the Apple TV, even registering as an Apple Developer in order to file bug reports, has been totally useless. So from a practical view about all that can be said is there seems to be some partially successful workarounds. But it would be helpful to know more about hardware and software versions, etc. to see if there is some commonality there, particularly when some folks report success and some do not with what appears (in the absence of such information) to be identical configurations.

I didn't go through all the steps I tried, but one thing I will share that I DID DO is this. When you go to www.pbs.org/activate, and enter the code that the AppleTV displays, PBS asks that you login with external credentials like Google+, Facebook, or something else (I can't remember.) Since I have had Android devices in the past, I have a couple of Google accounts, and I know something about managing them.

Anyhow, when I started having difficulties, I logged into my Google account, and went to Security Settings tab and found "Control which apps and websites have access to your account information." Clicking on this link showed the PBS.org permissions record. There was a button there to revoke access, which results in forcing PBS.org go back through the authentication process. (It specifically asks you to grant permission to the PBS.org app to access private information that Google has.)

I don't know exactly how this works for Facebook, or any other "credentials" service, but I'm sure they have similar user mechanisms to revoke application access to private information. And again, this will force PBS.org to go back through the whole process.

Hope this helps!!

In my case, the activation actually did work... but the page on the pbs.org website never told me so. I just kept getting taken back to the "select your local station" page. But when I went back to the PBS channel on my Apple TV I was able to find and watch PBS shows.