Social TV Applications
Get flash to fully experience Pearltrees
Time Out prepares to launch online social TV guide
Time Out prepares to launch online social TV guide The Time Out TV guide currently in development aims to seamlessly integrate social media with traditional TV listings to provide a new and richer TV experience. Media Week understands the lifestyle and entertainment company is a planning to launch the new guide within the first quarter of 2012 after partnering with Red Bee Media. When launched, the Time Out TV Guide will provide an EPG that will enable users to ‘like’ programmes and see what their friends ‘like’, share, recommend and ‘favourite’ content and see what programmes are trending on Twitter. The thinking behind Time Out’s social TV guide is based on the simple premise that viewers are more likely to watch linear TV programmes and share their experiences if they know there friends and family are tuned in at the same time.Zeebox trial questions value of viewing companion
Zeebox may be attracting a lot of attention as a viewing companion, not least from Sky, having invested a reported £10 million for a 10% stake in the company, which employs 30 staff. However, the results of the first trial of the second screen application with another broadcast partner seem to suggest that just fifty users posted an average of two messages each over the two month run. Broadcast magazine reports that despite close collaboration with Channel 4 for a trial with the eight-episode series Desperate Scousewives only 100 of the 80,000 associated Twitter updates were through Zeebox.
Sky apps to go social with Zeebox integration
Netflix? What Netflix ? Says Sky as it announces a partnership with Zeebox that it hopes will see Sky customers getting social as they watch TV using the Sky mobile apps. Sky is set to be the only TV platform in the UK to offer Zeebox integration in its bespoke mobile apps (including Sky+ and Sky Go ), with the new 'augmented' features set to hit Sky's apps during the first half of this year. You may recall Zeebox from its launch last year – it's a social app that allows you to see what your friends are watching, find out more about TV shows that are on, chat as you watch the gogglebox and even buy products featured in programmes and adverts.