For the last two years, the social TV startup Fans.tv has been powering social chats for networks like the CW. But today, it’s rolling out its own consumer-facing site so fans can connect around their favorite shows. “Fans.tv moves social television beyond the check-in,” said Andrew Cuccurullo, founder and CEO. We took the new site for a spin, and we asked Cuccurullo a few questions about the new product.
To start, you authenticate via Facebook or Twitter, fill out your zip code and pick your TV provider. Fans.tv will then ask you to pick some of your favorite shows to begin, and you can add more as you go. On the home page, you’ll find an activity feed of things you and your friends are favoriting, watching and recommending.
“Favoriting” a show moves it into your playlist, which ties to a programming schedule so you can see when it will air next. You can then share this playlist with your friends, so you’re not just sharing what you’re watching right now, but what you’re planning to watch. “A user can share or recommend a single episode for a program right through to sharing their whole playlist to their Twitter or Facebook networks to get new show recommendations,” Cuccurullo tells us. Here’s part of my playlist:
Fans.tv is currently in public beta, and the company says it will launch an HTML5 app as well as iPhone, Android and iPad apps in the 2nd quarter of 2012 along with an API for developers. Here’s our interview with Andrew, who has a long startup history, including Softgame, B33hive, HollerTV and iTweeVee:
Lost Remote: What is fans.tv and why did you create it?
Andrew Cuccurullo: Fans is an evolution of our involvement with TV networks to develop social interaction around their shows. We developed FANS because we wanted to take TV applications beyond a check-in and saw gaps not being addressed by the Social TV platforms currently in the market place.
LR: How is it making TV more social?
Cuccurullo: We believe you can’t really make TV social until users are able to personalize their TV interests first. Everyone’s taste in TV is different so we wanted to address that and allow a user to set up their own TV playlist so they could easily access what they liked. Doing this also made programming information for users simple to find and use. By providing the ability to build a personalized TV playlist meant users could then share these playlists with their friends in way that allowed for discovery of common tastes, finding new programs that a friend likes and to be able to make valuable recommendations to your friends based on their tastes. From the core personalization features we could then make the experience social.
Providing functionality of sharing each others playlists and what you intend to watch enables friends to plan social TV events in advance. We also handle just in time TV with a alert system and Facebook and Twitter sharing capabilities.
LR: How are you working with the CW and other networks?
Cuccurullo: Each network has different challenges, different agendas and want different outcomes so we work within those ideals. Flexibility is the key where we will use existing functionality, adapt it or innovate and develop new functionality to help them get to an outcome. The FANS system is flexible where it can work for just one show or every show on their network and provides a established functions set for the networks to use. We are also big believers in the networks being able to have the Social TV functionality live on their own sites so the traffic ends up with them.
LR: What unique features does the platform have?
Cuccurullo: Our sharable playlist is unique and the way we share with friends on the site and outside to their Facebook and Twitter networks is unique e.g. a user can share or recommend a single episode for a program right through to sharing their whole playlist to their Twitter or Facebook networks to get new show recommendations. There are features like being able to become a secret FAN of a show so it allows you to add your guilty pleasures to your playlist keeping your friends guessing what those shows are. Other features where you can add a favorite actor or sports team to your playlist and the system will track when they will next be on TV. The will watch function provides a automated tune in alert and tells your friends your going to watch a show. We have integrated Twitter for each show but we allow the user to personalize what hashtag they want to follow for that show because hashtags are constantly changing. Oh the FANMAN of course he’s going to feature prominently in the fun things we do.
LR: How is social TV in Australia different from US?
Cuccurullo: Australia has been slower in adopting Social TV or second screen applications but there are signs that users and the networks are ready to give these services a try.