Social TV apps typically tie with Twitter for real-time conversations, but the new Yap.TV app is adding deep Facebook integration as well. Beyond likes and shares, it integrates with Facebook chat, enabling users who have logged in via Facebook to discuss the shows they’re watching with their friends.
The updated app, which is now available in the App Store for iPhone and iPad, is the only app to bring real-time Facebook discussions to a social TV experience, Yap.TV founder Shawn Patrick tells Lost Remote. It also ties into Facebook’s presence detection feature, letting you know which of your friends are online on Facebook and Yap.TV (above).
The app is also ingesting Facebook posts about the TV shows you’ve liked, bringing them together in a personalized news feed. You can also navigate to show pages, click “feed” and see Facebook items posted by the show’s account. And in a nice touch, Yap.TV integrates reminders in show feeds, so you can touch to receive a push notification immediately prior to a show airing on TV.
Patrick tells us the Facebook integration isn’t a departure from Twitter, but a new addition to lure Facebook users to the experience. “Yap.TV has been deeply integrated with Twitter since our launch in 2010, and over the past 6 months have auto-curated and routed more than 1/2 billion tweets to over 6 thousand TV shows, and our fans love to see the celebrity star and fan tweets with our integrated Twitter features,” he said. “In this release we have gone deep into Facebook to give Facebook users an enriching companion TV experience.”
Social TV apps often struggle with bringing enough people to the table. By tying into Facebook along with Twitter, Yap.TV increases the odds that you’ll find a friend watching the same show, sparking more meaningful conversations around TV.