Agora Media Group Innovation Blog » T-Commerce

Will new generation of remote controls be the catalyst for connectedTV and socialTV?

Paul Johnson — Thu, 13 May 2010 15:39:25 +0000

First Published on Appmarket.tv

It has been possible for a while now to download an iPhone app and using it as remote control for your TV. Examples include Apple TV themselves and Boxee.

These remotes are however slightly different to the remote control we know and love (or hate when it has slipped down the side of the sofa, or the kids have taken the batteries…because they needed them for one of their toys!). The Boxee iPhone app provides a ‘pointer’ mechanism, in that you can track your finger across the iPhone screen and it will direct the movement of a spot cursor on your TV. A nice gimmick you say and perhaps you are right, however one of the main reasons why these companies developed and launched these remote control apps is because it provided an easier way to input text into the search function or sign up function on the TV….have you every tried to type in a long phrase, or your email address using just the remote control…?!

Today, Comcast Labs announced their prototype for a new generation of remote control…the Xfinity remote. It works on the iPad and any other IP enabled devices.

If you want to read the whole article, you can thanks to those great guys over at Interactive TV Today.

So why is this an exciting new development? I believe this could set the scene for a number of new developments in the connected home that will become the catalyst we have needed, to understand what the future holds for our 3 favorite buzz words right now – ConnectedTV, SocialTV and the 2 Screen experience…

This is the video from Comcast Labs which demos the Xfinity remote. Read below the video for first thoughts on what opportunities this could have on the digital home of the future…

Heres why:

1. A remote control that is an app on my iPad / netbook / laptop / iPhone gives context between the content I am watching on the big screen, and other IP enabled services.

2. You will be able to use this app to browse and search through an EPG to find broadcast (linear) and video on demand content.

3. You can choose what content to watch on your big screen directly from the app…a simple touch of the finger will change the channel on your TV.

4. The app could use the content you have chosen to watch on the big screen as context for other related content on your ipad that you might like to snack on. It could become the ultimate tv companion e.g. see other content that relates to what you are watching, or help answer any questions you have relating to what you are watching (think tellylinks.com), join conversations about the content, add comments about the content and share with others, rate and recommend the content to others, buy the suit that the actor is wearing…all directly on your ipad app.

5. You can integrate social networks directly into the interface of the app so you can share and interact with others, whilst also getting recommendations from your friends, or choose to listen to a different commentary on a live broadcast event from one of your favorite social tv presenters.

6. Participative TV shows could have a new kind of format, with a new kind of audience.

7. Advertisers and Sponsors would have a new highly targeted and more personalised format that puts them directly in front of your eyeballs for the duration of the programme / film you are watching…and we wont mind so much because it will have context with what I am watching, but without the intrusion.

8. tCommerce could have a platform for enabling the easiest way for you to complete transactions.

9. You could see and choose which match to watch at Wimbledon ie. tapping into the red button services that broadcasters such as the BBC offer at big events.

Have you come across any other IP based remote control applications?

What other uses and consumer behaviours could these applications drive in the home, on the fingertips of your average coach potato?

MTV to make iPad into Interactive Social TV

Richard Kastelein — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 08:27:06 +0000

Wow! That came out of left field - unsuspected but… really – something that really makes sense when we consider TV Everywhere as a concept (at least for me!). If the iPad does get the traction that many are predicting (Apple Inc.’s iPad tablet computer hits US shelves on Saturday, April 3, 2010), and they do flog 10-20 million in 2010, the converging media landscape will really have a new player in terms of co-viewed TV and Social TV.

Personally, I have always had issues with watching video on mobile devices – not that I am blind, I can actually see well. But I just don’t enjoy the experience. Interactive TV on an iPad (24.3 cm × 19.0 cm × 1.3 cm) will certainly be more enjoyable and feasible for most consumers.

Will this be a one screen or two screen play? Or both?

“Part of the idea is that mobile devices are easier and more appealing to play with while watching TV than laptop or desktop computers — but the tablet will hit the sweet spot in between.” reports Ad Age, so let’s wait and see.

MTV Developing ‘Co-Viewing’ Apps for the iPad

Magazines and newspapers aren’t the only media eying big benefits upon the iPad’s arrival: TV is poised to use the device in new ways, including creating interactive, social apps designed to be used while watching live programming.

MTV Networks, for example, is developing a “co-browsing app meant to be used while watching live TV,” said one executive familiar with MTV’s iPad plans. “This means the iPad could be the appendage that makes interactive TV a reality.”

Kristin Frank, general manager of MTV and VH1 Digital, said MTV is focusing on two approaches to its apps, whether for mobile or the iPad: co-viewing apps that capture the social-media chatter around TV and awards shows and apps for video on the go. IPad apps for “Beavis and Butt-Head,” “MTV News” and “VH1 To Go” are all due in April, she said.

“Fifty-nine percent of people are multitasking when watching TV — that’s something we’ve always known,” said Ms. Frank, referring to recent Nielsen data quantifying a longstanding observation. “This is the next evolution.”

Mobile phone apps to run on the iPhone and Android devices remain MTV’s priority for 2010, Ms. Frank noted, but the iPad apps under construction are a reminder that TV is not about to sit the tablet out.

MARUG Congress 2010 – Future of Marketing on TV – Social TV, TV 2.0I

Richard Kastelein — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 12:47:14 +0000

Recently, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to do a lecture / presentation at the Annual MARUG (Marketing Associatie Rijksuniversiteit Groningen) Conference, the largest Dutch marketing event organised by students here in Groningen. There were over 400 students and business participants this year and the marketing theme for 2010 was Experience Marketing (I actually prefer the term Experiential Marketing). Some of my more recent writings and research have been around emerging television platforms and convergent media so I thought it might be interesting to blend it into the presentation and make it relevant for future marketeers. Because this space could very much play a part in their futures.

Also presenting was Andrei Westerink, the Chief Operations Officer and Rick Nijhuis, the Chief Marketing Officer of Worldticketshop – and they both brought some great, fundamental, and very practical situations and technologies from the ‘real’ world of online experiential marketing and high level management strategy.

MARUG Conference 2010 – Presentation – Richard Kastelein – Future of Marketing on TV – Social TV, TV 2.0

View more presentations from Richard Kastelein.

Google Aims at the TV market – Will they Succeed? Yes, and Here’s Why

Richard Kastelein — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 12:25:24 +0000

by Richard Kastelein

This article first appeared at Atlantic Free Press.

Ever since the New York Times launched word that Google TV will likely become a reality last week, the concept of convergent media has suddenly become a mass meme rather than a tech meme… and probably done more good for IPTV and the blossoming worlds of Social TV, tCommerce, TV Widgets, TV recommendation engines, TV Everywhere, TV 2.0, and opt-in TV advertising than any single event in this emerging landscape.

The TV deal between Google, Sony, Logitech and Intel which flooded the media zeitgeist last week was a perfect riposte to the other news that Facebook topped Google for the week ending March 13th with 7.07 per cent of all Internet traffic for that week, while Google.com got 7.03 per cent.

Sony looks set to rollout new Intel ‘chipped’ TV sets, while Google will make available set-top-boxes (STB)’s – and both will be powered by tiny keyboards built by Logitech. Makes perfect sense.

And what punter would not want an affordable Google Set Top Box (STB) with new cool Logitech remote that does stuff, so he can search his TV and do other cool things? Or just buy a new Sony LCD wall screen that does the same thing – sans the STB?

Interesting to see how it all plays against the Yahoo Connected TV – which already has its feed firmly entrenched in the space and has some cross over with their partners, including Sony and Intel. Most people still don’t even know about Yahoo TV, nor ever heard about. Including most developers I meet at the many events I attend each year in Europe. You can bet, with all the coverage last week, they know about the Google TV foray.

Probably the most exciting news for me is the fact that the New TV platform will be based on Android, and will remain Open Source. That means all code will be transparent, available and open to change and suggestions and managed by a core team… unlike the iPhone, Facebook and Yahoo Connected TV developer communities which offer a slice of code to allow developers to develop applications via Application Programming Interface (API)’s or Software Development Kit (SDK)’s. Bear in mind, any external or 3rd party development has to meet stringent standards for the TV market.

There are some rumours that the platform may have Chrome browser capabilities and even rumblings of a deal with Hulu in the future.

And the major global TV networks and media centers of power? Look for their already crumbling influence to be even more diminished. TV, which has been the mainstream media’s core tool to for swaying us to one or another of their movies, music stars, books, politicians, brands and whatever they get paid to make us like, will be in decline. And, to perhaps the chagrin of a few parties, the TV will continue to democratize and will follow the web with many to many rather than one to many. Publically owned broadcasters listed on the NYSE are in, what seems to be, a never-ending spiral of contraction, which is disastrous for shareholders.

Google is obviously more known for its search technology than their weaker portfolio of social media products (Wave, Orkut, and more recently Buzz in Gmail), and undoubtedly, most consumers that are now mulling over the idea of Google on their TV are enticed by the idea that perhaps it will become much easier to wade through the ever-increasing number of channels available … perhaps Google will offer a search engine like they do online? Or maybe even a better organizational structure – a directory of sorts?

Searchable TV is why Google is currently testing its technology with Dish Networks… and probably why they will be the future of the Electronic Program Guide (EPG).

Some analysts are skeptical about Google’s latest plan to expand; noting their previous attempts to enter the TV, radio, and print advertising markets were all dismal failures.

However, I disagree. And here’s why.

Try out another scenario… one which no one else could do in this space. No one.

Google is currently allowing advertisers to use their innovative and very fresh Google TV advertising platform to launch TV ad spots in US cable markets.

Google TV Ads is an online marketplace that makes it easy for anyone to buy and measure national cable television advertising. Using the familiar Adwords interface, you can launch a television campaign in minutes

This means, in Google’s new ubiquitous, massive TV realm, I could simply buy time slots or even permanent space on for programs or channels in the future of Google TV.

Why two? Time slots for more linear TV experiences such as a classic 30 second spot, using an ‘old school’ non- elective, interruptive, advertising model.

Or.

I could buy elective (opt in and opt out) landscape around particular program for TV Widgets for shows or even entire channels. It might be a custom widget built in Android or could even be some kind of Chrome extension. It could be Contextual Advertising based on the show’s content, it could be Behavioral Targeting based on the viewer’s preferences and habits, it could be Location Based Advertising (LBA), based on the viewer’s lat and long via IP, or it could be Experience Marketing (full fledged TV experiences).

I think this is what Google has in mind. And I for one… think it’s going to work.

Richard Kastelein is the Winner of 2010 Deloitte Technology, Media & Telecommunications (TMT) Predictions for Entrepreneurs in the Netherlands for his futurist views on Social TV and Media Convergence (Tech Visionary) and is a Guest Lecturer at Hanze University in Groningen, Netherlands. He’s a Canadian C-level strategist with start-ups on a number of continents and has strong skills in Social Media and Social TV Architecture and Analysis – Community building using Open Source technology. New Media publishing and on-demand technologies. Open Source Evangelist. Innovator. Creative. See more on Linkedin.

Two Minute Pitch that Helped Push Social TV to the Forefront

Richard Kastelein — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 12:31:58 +0000

Thought I would share my winning pitch for The Netherlands Deloitte’s Technology, Media & Telecommunications (TMT) Predictions 2010 Tech Visionary for futurist views on Social TV and Media Convergence.

I wrote it on the train on the way down… I actually forgot half of it and kind of made it all up again once I got up there. I had two minutes to pitch… in front of about 200 of Holland’s tech community who voted by SMS.

My name is Richard Kastelein, I am a Canadian of Dutch heritage and am currently working a Chief Strategy officer for a startup in Groningen called Worldticketshop as well as building a creative and innovation agency called Agora Media Group in London.

How many of you have young children out there?

In five years, your children and mine will laugh at the old days when certain programs were available only at certain times. We will too.

On demand TV is just part of the great change we are going to see in the future… where media will be ubiquitous, and will no longer be the passive experience we now see today.

It’s called TV Everywhere.

I am going to go through four quick points.

1.       Production. The rise of User Generated Content has already and greatly shifted the Internet landscape and will do the same for TV. Merged media will be everywhere, video, audio, photography, 3D and more.

2.       Delivery – Entertainment will be available in the cloud – everywhere, on demand and available to anyone, anywhere.

3.       Consumption – This will be profoundly changed due to the future convergence of the Web and TV, where web widgets become part of the TV experience and viewing culture will be radically changed due to the inclusion of recommendation engines which will offer true reflection of consumer needs and wants.

4.       And lastly, Monetization. Last year, it was noted by MTV here that content companies are now driven by control of Intellectual Property. And that has too and will change. Business models will change. I call it tCommerce and it will also be a paradigm shift for the TV industry. Last year MTV also mentioned that new business models will need to come into place. We feel that affiliation models will rise – profit sharing rather than profit hoarding. The ability to shop on TV will be seamless and simple allowing for revenue sharing between the broadcasters and advertisers.

Already new players in the social tv space are building API’s and SDK’s to allow developers to make the shift from iPhone and Facebook to new models on TV. Yahoo Connected has an Open API, Europe ‘s HBBTV will likely be Open Source software as it’s based largely on Open IPTV and even BBC’s Canvas in the UK is pushing towards open standards.

I will wrap this up by saying that it’s my feeling that this could be the next ‘bubble’ in the market as TV is going be decentralized and it will, in the future, be owned by the audience in many ways. Unlike TV today…. Such as in the USA, where the networks are publically owned and contracting – with no sign of growth in the future.

Thanks for your time and feel free to contact me at the borrel if you are interested in chatting further. We are working on building products for this new space.

T-Commerce – where are the conversations?

Gianluigi Cuccureddu SMP — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 13:08:57 +0000

T-Commerce is a new -rising- market which has great potential, much is written from the developers/business point of view, products are being developed and so on.

As far as I can see, there’s a discrepancy though between demand and supply? I’ve scanned the social sphere but from the users’ point of view, I’m not seeing many conversations, hype, interest and so on.

Am I wrong? If not, due to what is it being caused?

Discuss as well via Google Wave