ExperienceLab

Top ten apps for TV

It’s a fascinating and fast-moving time for the TV. Not only is 3D in the living room becoming a reality, but the advent of internet connections to the TV is inevitably leading to new ‘on demand’ services straight to the TV as well as internet widgets/applications (apps). Apps have had a dramatic effect on mobile phones, with the popularity of the iPhone and iPad underlining how useful these are perceived to be. But will they be so popular on the TV and if so which apps will thrive on the TV screen?

 There are various dilemmas for the TV which mean different apps will be popular here compared to mobile devices:

• Entering text is much harder than on a computer – even with a keyboard the distance between the keyboard and screen leads to a lot of looking up and down.
• The screen is often monopolised for watching programmes and splitting it can disrupt viewing too much.
•  The TV is a social entertainment system with many viewers at once.

So, my prediction is that the following apps will be most popular:

• Apps that require minimal text input (are you really going to write emails or long text messages into your TV?)
• Apps that are TV centric – providing video content, augmenting programmes, helping with discovering and choosing what to watch
• Apps that avoid disrupting TV viewing – apps that sit neatly to the side or beneath the viewing area or are designed to fill short periods of time (between programmes, in advert breaks, if your fellow viewer needs a bathroom break!)
• Apps that are designed for multiple viewers – whether that’s games, shared calendars, music, photos or potentially new ‘family/household’ social networking applications.

Seesaw - some nice touches but still room for improvement

Seesaw is a new online TV service that provides catchup content from the BBC, Channel 4 and Five, as well as some additional on demand content from other sources.

Having played around with the new service both in beta and post launch, I have to say I quite like it. Generally it's reasonably easy to use, visual and nicely laid out. It's handy to be able to go to one place to access content from various different sources (channels or otherwise) - although I admit I still go to BBC iPlayer to access BBC content - and the 'turn lights down' feature is a particularly nice touch. The easy links to other episodes in the same or previous series is well implemented too. 

What will TV be like in 2020?

The rapid changes in consumers’ viewing habits brought about over the last decade by such services as Sky+ and Freeview show what can change in a short period in the TV domain. VOD and IPTV services through a set-top box have also emerged over the last decade but have been slower to make real changes to viewing habits. However, their impact is set to accelerate over the next decade. User interest in VOD is definitely present (as high usage of BBC iPlayer suggests) but ‘discovering’ content in broad VOD libraries, particularly on a TV screen, (or even thinking to consider VOD content instead of on broadcast channels) requires a substantial change in user behaviour. This change will only be brought about by UIs that really take account of user needs and so facilitate this change.

National digital retune causes problems

September 30^th was National Freeview Retune Day. This was a reshuffle of channels proceeding the introduction of High Definition on Freeview. Despite it being widely trailed beforehand, the confused of the nation still caused the website explaining the changes to crash and were calling the Freeview helpline at a rate of 200 calls per minute seeking advice.