A little over a week after ABC rolled out its Grey’s Anatomy sync-to-TV iPad app, Fox has launched one of its own for the TV show Bones (iTunes). While ABC’s app listens to the audio to sync with a show, Fox’s app works off the clock, recognizing the time zone of the user’s device. Or if you like, you can hit the “sync” button the moment you begin to play the show on your DVR to start the flow of content updates.
The Bones app serves up companion content to help you solve cases, “decipher forensic speak,” check out cast profiles, and listen and buy songs featured in the show. When we played with the app, it debuted six content updates several minutes apart.
You can also comment with other fans, either by plotting a comment on a Google map or by connecting via Twitter or Facebook.
These new “second screen” apps are just the tip of the iceberg. While people have envisioned “interactive TV” for a decade now, interacting with content on an iPad has distinct advantages over fumbling with your TV remote for companion content. As Fox and ABC learn how people use these apps, the experiences will improve, and we’ll start seeing a lot more sync-to-TV apps in the iTunes store.