Sunday, 16 October 2011

The conundrum of Social Media and Time-shifting

Two things people like:
  • TV time-shifting a la Tivo, BBC iPlayer or Sky+. It's brilliant, pause/rewind live TV, record a show whilst watching another, you know how it works, we wouldn't be without it.
  • Social Networking during TV shows, twittering about X-Factor, facebooking on how bad they're dancing on Strictly, whatever, it really does add to the experience. Again, increasingly people wouldn't be without it.
Now, here's the kicker: These two things people love are fundamentally incompatible. If you're watching a time-shifted show then the web2.0 experience is impossible. Even a few minutes pause for a quick toilet trip means social networking moves from being a great part of the experience to becoming a source of irritating spoilers.

Is there any way the two can come together again once the viewer has done any kind of time-shift? I can see the idea of time-shifting web2.0 experiences alongside the time-shifted show, but that's going to be a one-way street - certainly it can no longer be an interactive opportunity.

Acknowledging that read-only is possible, can the web2.0 experience be linked to the time-shifted show itself? When you start to think about it, the scope of the problem gets very big, very quickly because of the variety of ways in which time-shifting now happens and the sources from which people get their time-shifting.

So, the question is: Will people go back to watching programmed TV rather than time-shifted TV so they can take part in social media associated with the programme? Maybe, if its worth it. If I was a TV channel exec I'd be driving hard at getting the social media element of the programme because it's the best way to retain an audience in these fragmented viewing times. What do you think?

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