Social TV and Film

Apple TV is reportedly developing ad-skipping technology so owners of a set-top box can watch shows commercial-free. The propsed deal with cable companies would reimburse programmers for skipped ads.

Google is really just hoping to beat Apple to the punch, despite the fact that the company already has its Apple TV streaming product on the market, according to The New York Times "Apple’s thinking… is that any next-generation television service must be set up in partnership with existing distributors, in part for quality assurance reasons. A future Apple service could include a user-friendly interface layered on top of Time Warner Cable or Cablevision’s channel lineup."

Adoption from the major networks is "very unlikely to support any service with their linear feed that allows for commercial messages to be skipped even if they get some form of compensation," Rino Scanzoni, chief investment officer for WPP's GroupM, told AdAge. "This is not a viable economic model and subscribers to the system would not pay an adequate premium to compensate for it." 

Chromecast lets your stream online content to your TV and control it via your new Nexus 7 (also introduced today, along with Android 4.3) or any Android device running version 2.3 or later

Unlike Apple's AirPlay, which can stream content directly from mobile devices to Apple TV, Chromecast pulls content from the cloud. The benefit: If the person initiating the Chromecast leaves the house, someone else can continue controlling the viewing experience with a different Cast-enabled device. It also won't drain the battery of your device.

Like most Google TV devices, it comes with a separate and overly complex remote control. The remote control for Chromecast will be your favorite mobile device (yes, it even beats your iPhone). It's very un-remote like: No special interface or buttons. Since Chromecast revolves around apps, the app remains the interface. If you know Netflix, you know how to work Chromecast.

Facebook has given Trendrr preliminary access to previously unanalyzed Facebook user engagement data on chatter relating to television content.

Our analysis reveals that there is a large amount of TV-related social activity on Facebook — in numbers approximately 5 times as large as that of all other social networks combined as measured by Trendrr.

Trendrr’s analysis of second-screen Facebook activity during one week in May** found that the volume of Facebook user engagement relating to television programming was 5 times as large as all other social networks combined. Activity related to broadcast television was 7 times as large, while activity linked to cable-television programming was 4.5 times as large as all other social networks combined. Second-screen activity levels on Facebook were particularly high among viewers of dramas and comedies.

With an Intel-designed set-top box, people won't have to own DVRs or even plan to record programs.

Negotiations with media companies for content rights could delay new services and limit some features, though Intel vows to enter some markets by the end of the year.

"I've never seen as much innovation in television as there is right now," says Ulf Ewaldsson, chief technology officer at Swedish telecom-equipment giant Ericsson, which plans to step up its own TV efforts

But negative comments about the feature continued. A more recent factor was the highly publicized revelations about surveillance activities by the National Security Agency. “What pushed me over the hump was the whole NSA sort of thing,” Huggers says. “I don’t want to go there.”

Not that Intel doesn’t plan to offer plenty of ways to personalize the TV-watching experience. For example, the company cites a Personal Profiles feature that helps switch between individuals using the device, so they have access to relevant content and recommendations. Another option lets users add favorites so they have access to recently watched shows, with the ability to instantly pick up in the program where they left off.

Still another feature, called Spotlight, integrates recommendations based on what’s trending in social media as well as curating content based on a user’s age, interest and time of watching, the company says.

Today, the dynamic between low-budget producer and content-hungry distributor has flipped. Netflix doesn’t just stream films—it wills them into existence. The composition of contemporary B movies is dictated by middlemen like Netflix and Redbox, international direct-to-DVD distributors, and cable networks like Syfy, all of which pad their offerings with Asylum originals tailored to their needs.

The nimble creative process is “cashing in on this shifting moment in film consumption between the demise of the video store and the rise of streaming,” says Davis.

Filtering in low-budget films with the high-budget versions “fuels this perception that there’s a wealth of new content.”

The vast majority of Americans – 95 percent – still watch television using traditional cable or satellite options, according to Nielsen. But the number of households that choose to opt out of cable or satellite TV is on the rise, from 2 million in 2007 to 5 million in 2013, Nielsen’s data show.

“This scares the bejesus out of the cable and satellite people,” said Jim Barry, a spokesman for the Consumer Electronics Association in Arlington, Va. “I think it’s going to change the business model.”

A main driver behind the high cost of cable and satellite in recent years is the expensive license fees networks pay sports leagues to broadcast their games. The cost gets passed on to consumers to pay for the “bundles” of channels they get with their cable satellite subscriptions, whether they plan to watch sports or not.

ccording to Nielsen’s SocialGuide service, the heaviest Twitter activity appears to be happening during real-time programming minutes and not commercial breaks. After analyzing data culled from 59 broadcast and cable programs, SocialGuide concluded that nearly three-quarters (70 percent) of all airtime tweets were sent during the actual content.

when the spot load is light, the share of tweets issued during the breaks is also light. By the same token, when the programming is weighed down by multiple spots, the volume of tweets sent in commercial time rises proportionately.   

in some of the more compelling programs there are spikes in Twitter activity that coincide with significant plot moments

Google will now include listings of television episodes and on-air dates in its search results.

This new data will be displayed alongside the existing information in Google’s database that already details a show’s network, cast, theme song and main characters.

change also extends to TV shows no longer in production.

To its 200 million-plus active users, Twitter is many things: a social network, a short-form messaging service, a news wire, a tool for self-expression — even, some believe, a force for global political change. But the company itself seems far more keen to position itself among its users — and even better, potential users – as a TV companion, an indispensable tool to keep up with, discuss and even influence the outcomes of shows and live events like sporting contests and political debates.

The average price of an ad has been plummeting, down 46% in the most recent quarter.

Americans now comprise just one-fourth of Twitter’s participants.

The app turns your smartphone or tablet into a universal remote, content recommender, and reminder platform. While the phone-as-universal remote concept is not new, based on Peel’s numbers, its users are both savvy and avid tv watchers, which is certain to intrigue advertisers.