Socialization TV

A month ago, i.TV acquired the popular GetGlue television check-in service. Somewhat earlier, Twitter became the owner of two analytical companies specializing in social TV - Bluefin Labs and Trendrr. Apple bought Topsy, a tweet analytics firm (and many experts believe that this is somehow related to social TV).

If you believe this report of Business Insider (and not to trust a resource with such a name, especially if its owner was tried for financial crimes - not!), Then the market for TV applications is experiencing a real boom and is going to consolidate.


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Here are some details:

- 46% of smartphones and 40% of tablets in the US are used by TV viewers right during the viewing and it matters because ...

- ... 53% of users (using these devices while watching TV programs) are engaged in activities one way or another connected with what is happening on the screen. As an example, I can cite the series "The Cop" ( Copper ), where in some episodes hashtags surfaced, following which the audience could learn more about the plot of the series. Well, or as a couple of years ago, at the end of the Simpsons series, Homer and Marge announced voting on the site (the question of whether Edna Krabapple and Ned Flanders should meet) was on the agenda.

- some users of smartphones (13%) and tablets (20%) tend to buy on these devices what they saw while watching TV

- 20% of American consumers have already connected their TV with a tablet, smartphone or PC

- companies that develop applications related to TV content and are designed to synchronize with the viewing received a certain increase in the audience

- Techno-business giants will start buying the corresponding applications after they realize all the prospects of social TV (for example, what you already saw at the beginning of the article)

Of course, not everything is so smooth. Applications do not yet give too much audience growth. The ambitious Twitter strategy for entering the TV market has not yet produced any significant results, moreover, it turned out that the top programs from the widely advertised Twitter ratings are not at all those on TV itself. But "reality is developing in the right direction."

In this blog, I have already said many times that television should be more controlled by the audience and take into account their wishes. Frank Underwood Kevin Spacey adheres to the same point of view. A couple of months ago, at an event in Edinburgh, the two-time Oscar winner, using the example of the Cards House series, proved that paying attention to users pays for itself: after analyzing the situation with Game of Thrones (this series leads in the number of downloads from torrents) and conducting a number of polls among viewers (trying to figure out the main reasons for the active use of trackers) Netflix tried to lay out all 13 episodes at the same time. And it worked - viewers who were freed from the imposed need to turn on the television set at a certain time on a certain day appreciated the idea and the series gained great popularity (and did not lose anything from pirated downloads because there was no need for them). “Today, people want to watch TV shows where it will be convenient for them and then, when it will be convenient for them, we have given it to them. Let's already compete not with prime time, but with content, ”said Spacey.