Kjetil Horneland,
CEO, Sixty
The days of us all watching the same programs at the same time, and talking about them around the water cooler, are long gone.
Technology has given us the ability to pause, rewind, fast forward, record and watch “catch up” TV. It has also brought us a huge increase in available content, not just from ‘traditional’ broadcasters but from multiple alternative – online – sources. Watching TV is now rarely a communal experience: more often, it is an individual experience, dictated not by what the broadcaster wants to broadcast, but what the consumer wants to consume.
As that has happened, so too another phenomenon has surfaced – the phenomenon of universal interactivity. It’s true that the ability to control what we watch and when we watch it represents some degree of interactivity – but it’s as nothing when we compare it with the rich opportunities to interact that we now take for granted on our PCs, our laptops, our cellphones and our tablets.
In fact, a generation is growing up – witness the famous “A Magazine Is an iPad That Does Not Work” movie on YouTube – who cannot imagine that content can be anything other than interactive. That is one of the biggest challenges facing broadcasters and content owners today. Increasingly, what we want to do is to create experiences that are unique to us, that represent our individual desires and preferences.
Beyond the ability to time shift, consumers have been given some limited ability to interact with and control what’s on screen – in programming such as live sports, for example. And yet…
The most important challenge
There is no doubt that engaging, retaining and monetizing viewers via interactivity is perhaps the most important challenge and the most important opportunity facing the broadcast industry today. 2016 needs to be the year when we begin to address that challenge and seize that opportunity.
The fact is that, today, for the most part, there is a significant gap between what consumers have shown they want and what the industry is providing them. Television still, to a large extent, expects consumers to sit back and just watch.
And if they want to know more or different about what they’re watching? If they want to engage rather than passively consume? Well, they can always turn to the ubiquitous second screen. What was the other movie that actor was in? What was the result the last time these two teams played each other? What are other people saying about this news item? It’s all there – but not on the TV screen.
At Sixty, our business is built around understanding and redefining the TV experience – so we’ve done a considerable amount of work to create the best possible multi-screen experiences for our customers. We are now convinced that multi-screen is – or was – a great “stop gap” solution. It’s not, however, where we or the industry should be going.
Why do I say that? The
Is the second
screen dead?
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