The Apple TV isn’t really about TV. It’s not even really about what it can do right now, or what it’ll be able to do when it launches in October (which is, to be honest, not that much). But Tim Cook nailed it: It’s about the future of TV.

There are two new things about the Apple TV, which together may come to represent something big. The first is the remote. The small, black rectangle is about the size of an iPod Nano, and is so light it feels like it’s missing its battery. (It’s almost too light, honestly—I’d lose this thing everywhere.) Instead of the up-down-left-right buttons we’ve been used to, this one uses a clickable touchpad, like a Magic Trackpad on a Mac. You swipe-swipe-swipe to what you want, and then click on the trackpad to select. It’s crazy sensitive—for a while I was gliding 12 icons when I meant to move one, and I was always going places I didn’t mean to—but it’s a sensible and one-handed way to move through even pretty long lists of stuff. And, of course, wherever you are, a tap on the button with a TV icon takes you home.

When you fire up a game, the remote becomes a simple controller. You’re mostly supposed to use it as a motion sensor, swinging a bat or steering a car, but developers can also program the play/pause button to do…something. (In Asphalt 8, it’s turbo.) It’s responsive and fast, and I managed to figure out how to use it pretty quickly.

The second big thing is Siri, which powers almost everything about Apple TV. There are a lot of things you can’t do any other way. The microphone’s built into the remote, not the box, though you don’t have to hold it up to your mouth to speak. It’ll work, say, sitting on your couch. Siri recognized everything I said, even though a lot of the time it couldn’t find much—so far, there’s not a lot going on inside Apple TV.