The fourth guy (TvTak) didn't seem very interested in Paul's idea, which I thought was magnitudes better than his original idea. The idea of being able to signify that you're watching a show could actually be disruptive.
How does this technology work? I'd think it would have to have a huge cache of video to make this work.
Update: I checked IntoNow and this is what they say:
"IntoNow, which is based our patented platform SoundPrint, analyzes the ambient audio being generated from your television in three-second increments. The audio is then converted into a “fingerprint”—basically, the show’s unique signature for ID—that is matched on the back-end to our reference set (which covers 130 channels of live broadcasting and has more than five years history). Once we make a match, we return all the metadata associated with that show and episode—things like title, description, cast, and associate links. This all happens in seconds."
So it actually uses the audio, which is much better, although I watch a lot of TV with CC in bed.
I still don't know how they analyze shows airing for the first time. They could recognize voices, but what if an actor opens in two different TV shows?
Presumably if they're on the East Coast they get the shows first (at least for the major networks and national cable). And then if you're watching it at the same time, they're encoding in real time.
Couldn't you just have the TV show or commercial flash a QR code on the screen, or on the corner of the screen? I've already seen subway ads using QR codes, though I'm not sure how effective they are. The business model sounds solid though - advertisers flash QR codes on screen, users scan it with their app and are entered into contest/sweepstakes. Once contest is over they get a message on the app stating if they've won or not, and informing them of new/upcoming giveaways.
The only hard part would be convincing shows and companies to participate. They have incentive but I imagine they'd want to see numbers in regards to cost vs viewer acquisition, or perhaps loyalty. Pretty interesting stuff..
Isn't this getglue? It's how my friends are using getglue at least.
Getglue has appeared in my feeds with increasing frequency over the past month. Admittedly, most of my friends are entertainment industry types and so predisposed, but it's been coming up much more often.
...so who wants to do it? I'm down.