2nd Screen Sunday @ NAB 2013

With NAB Show just about to wrap up, we thought this would be a great time to recap Sunday's second screen event in Las Vegas.

Registration kicked off a little early on Sunday as were expecting "a few walk-ups"--we ended up with an incredibly long line that would not abate and actually had to start the program late to get the most of people into the room for Hardie Tankersly's keynote, which kicked off the event to standing room only of 350-400 people.

Hardie delivered a great keynote in a fireside chat format (lead by Seth Shapiro), helping the audience to understand why getting the metadata that powers the rich second screen applications syndicated to key partners is so important.  Those key partners joined Hardie on stage after the keynote to talk through the challenges and take audience Q&A.

We tested the waters with a "2nd Screen 101" session where we expected 15-30 attendees to join in a parallel program track--and were surprised when 100-115 joined the 45-minute session.  The industry is clearly now mature enough that we need to facilitate great thought leadership to at least two segments of participants: 1) experts who live and breathe this stuff every day, and 2) new entrants who are just starting to figure out what all the fuss is about.  Expect to see more of this type of content from us at our 2nd Screen Summit in NYC in late June.

iPowow, one of our newest members, delivered an incredibly engaging live second screen experiment during a technology spotlight, engaging the audience in 3 live voting scenarios and show the results live on stage and then showing the parallel scenario that was recently aired on a live broadcast with the same live voting technology.

Kit Digital launched their "2Si" social discovery platform at the event, with industry thought leader Alan Wolk on stage guiding the audience through the features and consumer use cases it was designed for.

We had an incredibly engaging session on the direction of the second screen app market moderated by Marty Shindler, with industry veterans such as Alex Terpstra from Civolution and Tom Engdahl from Magic Ruby trading views with Tracey Garvin from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

Joe Inzerillo from the MLB dazzled the audience for 30 minutes, taking all of us through an incredibly detailed case study of their MLB At Bat product and how complex it is to have the level of success they have captured as the industry's #1 monetized app in the iTunes Appstore.

That was followed by Andy Batkin moderating a very engaging sports panel with Tyler Slocum from the NFL and Joe Inzerillo from the MLB discussing their brand engagement needs with industry startups TOK.tv, Kwarter and iPowow.

Jason Kint from CBS Interactive Sports had the closing keynote, taking the audience through a Super Bowl 47 case study and reminding everyone just how far reaching second screen can be for major events and the brands that sponsor them.

The conversation over cocktails buzzed along for quite awhile before a smaller group broke off  to engage further in second screen dinner that was sponsored by Kit Digital and Civolution.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, about 30 of us gathered in a conference room on Monday to conduct a 2nd Screen Society Advisory Board meeting, discussing and progressing key industry initiatives around the DIAL protocol for device access and ad agency measurements.

Add all of the focused action to the incredible buzz of the NAB Show floor (which seemed to scream 2nd Screen and 4k) and it was an 2nd Screen packed week in Las Vegas.

You can check out the Twitter engagement during the show (#S3NAB) and, for conference attendees, we will be posting the audio and presentations under a password protected link shortly (with an email notification).

Look out for our webinar series on "Successful 2nd Screen Strategies" and join us in NYC during CE week June 24-28 to continue the discussion at our 2nd Screen Summit NYC, jointly presented with Broadcasting and Cable.

@ChuckParkerTech
@S32Day

First Quarter, 2013: Are we on track? An update to the definitive research "The 2nd Screen: Transforming video consumption"

The first 3 months of 2013 has been explosive for 2^nd Screen.  Apps have improved, new apps have continued to launch, clear evidence of growth in the revenue associated with the market can be seen, and the convergence of 2^nd Screen companion experiences and 2^nd Screen viewing experiences has continued.

In this brief summary, I am going to make references to our published research (“2^nd Screen: Transforming Video Consumption”, a 252-page report published during our 2^nd Screen Summit @ CES on January 7^th), as well as to blogs and conferences we have hosted and attended during the last 3 months.  However, the information should be relatively coherent if you have been paying attention to the space even a little bit.  If you are attending today’s 2^nd Screen Sunday @ NAB, you will have the opportunity to buy discounted copies of the Executive Summary, Market Starter Pack, or the Full Report as required.  

1. Market Trends.  Perhaps the best way to gauge where the market is headed to look back at the predictions we made in the report (page 77 and in our blog on New Year’s Eve) and to see if we are on track:
1. The "digital land grab" continues, marked by consolidation,
   
   failure, and improved user experiences.  Well Viggle didn’t successfully complete the acquisition of GetGlue, but the market itself has continued to consolidate.  Dijit did acquire Miso, giving the consumer branded NextGuide app which excels in the “To Discover” segment a strong head start on developing its features “To Enhance” the consumers’ viewing experience after they have found a show.  Additionally, zeebox continues to develop its consumer feature set out as have other app notables (Yap.TV launched v.4.0, Turner launched a new March Madness app that was even better than last year, and the Super Bowl, the Grammys and the Academy awards all got their own bespoke app experiences for second screen).
2. Social feeds will be a feature, not the experience.  There has been a decent amount of debate in the blogosphere and at conferences, led by industry thought leaders Alan Wolk and Jesse Redniss.  Twitter is perhaps the best and most used tool for Social TV, but Social is only one component of the second screen experience, being aptly rounded out by the features making up the “To Control”, “To Discover” and “To Enhance” segments.  I am sure this debate will continue as Social TV continues to enjoy continued growth and press.
3. "Discovery" will become a household word.  Well, we’re making progress, but we’re not there yet.  Expect DirecTV, Dish, and Time Warner Cable all to make announcements around their platform discovery in the coming months and for start-ups like BuddyTV, Dijit (NextGuide), Yap.TV and Matcha to continue their progress as well.  While Digitalsmiths continues to make progress in the Pay TV and CE space, larger industry service providers have been making their push (Kit Digital, Gracenote) as well.
4. Tablet and smartphone usage reports will become about activities related to the TV.  Nielsen launched a social measurement service (after buying SocialGuide) and Twitter bought BlueFin.  More and more the statistics are pointing to behaviors while watching TV (shopping, looking for a show to watch, voting, etc).  Expect this trend to continue.  It is no longer a question of whether or not people use a second screen but rather what they are doing with them.
5. Studios and networks save money, apps grow in 2 directions.  We saw announcements around CES where CBS Connect and Fox Now are consolidating multiple shows into their consumer facing app.  More importantly, we predicted that these branded content apps would create alliances with 3^rd party apps like NextGuide and ConnecTV to expand their reach by syndicating their official metadata and content to promote a quality branded experience—and today Hardie Tankersly from Fox will be on stage to discuss exactly that.  
6. Gamification will begin to lose favor with the press and consumers, only to begin to add value again towards the end of 2013.  Perhaps it is a bit too early to weigh in on this trend.
7. Amazon and eBay will engage in a battle for the Second Screener's M-Commerce.  While Amazon is making progress with its “X-ray” feature for Kindle, there has not yet been a push from them on commerce and “Watch with eBay” is still massively under marketed.
8. Cloud-based digital lockers will finally be taken seriously by consumers and the rest of the ecosystem.  There has not yet been evidence of discovery platforms scanning or presenting results from the UltraViolet locker service, but there are now 11m accounts on record and Saffron Digital announced an end-to-end service in partnership with Akami for UltraViolet retailers.  Progress.
9. Device makers will jump into second screen with both feet.  Samsung certainly is “all in” on the concept, launching several second screen efforts to drive real connectivity amongst their smart phones, tablets and Smart TVs.  Expect Nokia, HTC, and Motorola to come to the party soon.
10. ACR and the battle of the digital video ecosystems.  Prior to CES, there had already been market rumors of Netflix working their streaming ecosystem towards a second screen platform.  Now that DIAL (owned by Netflix) is out in the open and supported by  Google, there is a real possibility that an open API system will decrease the cost and complexity for 3^rd party apps to connect to devices in the living room including Smart TVs and set top boxes.  Additionally, companies like Flingo are creating white label ACR ecosystems for smart TVs and other digital video devices, allowing the ecosystem owners to go to market quickly with a synchronized content capability.  Watch this space closely.
2. Market sizing.  We took a bold stance in our research report (page 55) on revenue in the 2^nd Screen space, claiming that 2012 had already seen $490m of attributable revenue from this market segment and the we expected the market to reach $5.9B by 2017.  When I stood on stage at CES to discuss this, I saw a lot of disbelief in the crowd.  We walked the room through the breakdown of mobile and online video advertising  ($6B growing to $17B) and m-commerce ($76B growing to $158B) and out logic for the incredibly small sliver of those markets that will be captured by 2^nd Screen experiences in the living room (forgetting the opportunities in the convergence place between companion and viewing experience).  Right out of the gate, Super Bowl 47 had press for CBS Interactive claiming to have sold $10-12m in advertising for the 2^nd Screen along.  Then the stats for living room shopping while watching TV started to pour in from various analytic agencies (very high percentages of smartphone and tablet owners are shopping while watching TV).  Throw in the content syndication model for apps sponsored by the NBA and MLB, and you quickly get a sense that this market is on a strong upward trend.
   
3. Consumer app experience.  To round out the Q1 view, we should look at what applications have significantly improved their feature set.  This is important because no matter what the revenue or business model is for a particular app experience or ecosystem, if the consumer isn’t engaged and using the app on a regular basis, there is no opportunity to attract revenue.

1. Events.  The Super Bowl (Keynoted today by Jason Kint), the Grammys and the Academy Awards all got their own bespoke app from their network sponsors.  March Madness upgraded their amazing 2012 experience to deliver an even more eye-popping 2013 app.  I would expect the Masters to double down on their strong 2012 showing and deliver an event better experience next week.
2. 3^rd Party Apps.  zeebox has continued to develop new feature sets for its app. 
   
   Yap.tv launched its 4.0 version and a Microsoft’s Xbox SmartGlass continued to expand its presence by launching an exclusive experience for The Hobbit.
3. Network apps.  Fox Now, CBS Connect, USA Anywhere and Bravo Now continue to improve their app experiences, with Fox and NBC distributing their metadata to 3^rd party apps to improve their branded content consumer experience across multiple apps.  HBO Go continues to invest in its converged 2^nd Screen companion and viewing experience app as Game of Thrones hits its 3^rd season.
4. Sports apps.  The NBA continues its great 2^nd Screen season, cleaning up on the Social side of the experience set and the MLB is just underway with a new set of features for MLB At Bat (presented on stage today by Joe Inzerillo).
5. Finally, converged experiences are continuing to
   
   be a trend, helping consumers manage the transition from the living room scenario where a companion experience is desirable and a mobile scenario where a viewing experience is what is required.  March Madness and HBO Go leverage the authenticated Pay TV network for their video experience and I am expecting the Masters to do the same next week.  MLB and the NBA give you the opportunity to have a “lite” stats-only experience for free and a paid subscription for viewing out of market games.  With significant advertising and subscription revenue at stake here (and the converged experience being highly desirable by consumers), expect this significant industry trend to continue despite its increased development costs.  Expect sports apps and premium branded subscription TV to lead the way forward here.

So a relatively short but very action-packed summary for nearly 100 days of market activity.

We are looking forward to continuing the conversation today at 2^nd Screen Sunday @ NAB, through a few webinars over the coming weeks, at our 2^nd Screen Summits in NYC on June and IBC in September, and, of course, through our blog and Twitter activity (@ChuckParkerTech, @S32Day).

Look out for the next major update on this comprehensive report on June 27^th in NYC.

Second Screen by the Numbers - infographic

How did the first quarter stack up vs. our projected growth of the industry?

Come join us in Las Vegas for 2nd Screen Sunday @ NAB this weekend to discuss from 1-6pm (cocktails follow).

We have a content-packed program being kicked off by Hardie Tankersly from Fox and being closed by Jason Kint from CBS Interactive Sports with a lot of great panels and presentations in between.

www.2ndScreenSummit.com

(if you have trouble with registration, please follow the instructions here)

• zeebox reportedly had over 3.7m
downloads and Viggle is approaching
2m active users
• 2/3 of Americans under 44 years old who
own tablets and smartphones are
shopping on them while watching TV
• NBA games have been garnering 1-3m
social impressions, making the games
consistently the highest socially active
events each week
• The Academy Awards, Grammy’s
and Super Bowl 47 each were given their
own “network developed” special
purpose app, helping to drive incredible
increases in engagement year on
year:
– 13m+ social impressions for the
Academy Awards
– 19m+ social impressions for the
Grammys
– 52m+ social impressions for the Super
Bowl

NCAA's March Madness Second Screen App--a great 2012 app made even better for 2013

If you haven't been paying attention to March Madness, then you may still appreciate this for the second screen value alone.  Last year, this app demonstrated one of the best UIs and second screen feature sets in the industry (see last year's review here).  Developed by Turner Sports, the app continues to lead the way in terms of a Stimulating or Enhanced experience and is leading the market in Converged Experiences (where the app behaves both as a Companion experience and a Viewing experience).

Examining Second Screen through the eyes of "TV Experts"

Last week, Noel Murray wrote a well-thought out piece on his recent second screen experiences called "The 'Second Screen': Is This App Really Necessary?"  He did a good job at describing what many consumers experience when they encounter new technologies or new experiences driven by technology.  Noel did a decent job of trying different apps during different major events (Super Bowl, Oscars, Grammys) and during every day television, but I think his logic erred slightly when he made his conclusion.  Let's briefly examine.

First, he describes himself as someone who does not understand the seemingly popular desire to participate in social media (whether Twitter or badge driven experiences like GetGlue).  But as Noel himself states, "But the second-screen phenomenon has become increasingly difficult to ignore."  That fact that this is a phenomena means by definition that it is a change in consumer behavior--perhaps fueled by social media or perhaps by the uber-availability of smartphones and tablets, but it is a set of activities that many people are participating in despite the fact that most experiences are poorly designed.  Now that is powerful--imagine what might happen if the consumer was consistently presented with a strong UI/UX--it might be like the change in smartphone usage when Apple entered the market place and created the first experience for the "everyman" vs. the techie.

Second, Noel does a good job at working through what feature sets he would like to see as a consumer himself (though he is self-admittedly a niche demographic).  He starts to describe "Stimulating" features to Enhance his viewing experience.  When we look at most consumers, we find that they tend to pick up a device in the living room for 1 of 4 major reasons: 1) To Control the first screen (think of your classic remote), 2) to Discover something to watch (either an archaic EPG or a sophisticated Discovery app), 3) to Enhance their viewing experience (the companion experiences Noel desires), and 4) to Share their experience (yes, the Social TV aspect of second screen).  While I agree that not all of the apps Noel tried are great at Stimulating features (to Enhance the viewing experience), the apps he did try do have some strengths.

Finally, Noel comes to a conclusion that the apps he tried didn't seem to solve the use cases he was after and seemed to be trying to solve problems he didn't have, and that the networks are just trying to slap a logo on top of Twitter and Wikipedia functionality to call it their own--which presumably leads us back to his title that the app isn't really necessary.  And this is where I think the error in logic exists.  What we know is that a very large percentage of consumers who own smartphones or tablets are engaging in second screen behavior.  We know that the majority of "developed" experiences need improvements, but that a majority of consumers tend to find an app better than a self-developed collage of Wikipedia and Twitter experiences (otherwise apps on Smartphone would never have taken off and we'd still be using a web browser on our small devices instead).  And as to the intention of the publishers of the apps (very often the TV networks or 3rd party start-ups), we can rest easy in knowing that regardless of the business model intent, no app can succeed that does not first create utility or entertainment enough for the consumer that they come back to it on a continuous basis.  So, rest easy Noel.  This nascent market will find its way forward and app user interfaces and user experiences will improve, and you will eventually be able to point to your own use cases desires and say "There is a second screen app for that."  

And for the industry, this is a great reminder that the user experience is paramount to any particular apps success.

If you are interested in more discussion about this topic, join us at NAB on April 7th for 2nd Screen Sunday at the Encore Hotel in Las Vegas 1-6pm (cocktails follow).  If you would prefer to read about it, I would encourage you to check out our 252-page research report on the subject at www.2ndScreenSociety.com/research/

@ChuckParketTech
@S32Day

Robert Tercek: Inventing the Future of Second Screen

Last Tuesday, a little over 250 industry professionals gathered for a 2nd Screen Summit in Beverly Hills.  No one in the audience had any idea that they were about to see the most thought provoking keynote presentation on the future of TV and Second Screen.

Robert Tercek has been "Inventing the Future" of media and entertainment throughout his 25-year career.  He is passionate about inspiring audiences to seize their own destiny by thinking creatively and taking decisive action. His business strategies are informed by his personal experience as a pioneering executive for MTV, Sony and OWN, and as an entrepreneur in disruptive startup ventures.

Special Purpose vs. Multi-screen: the second screen debate continues

We've spent time in blogs (including this one) and on conference panels debating the subject: as the industry evolves, will there be one app "to rule them all" or will the market evolve into a collection of specialty apps for major events or niche interests?