The days of the family gathering together in the living room each evening at a certain time to catch their favorite shows are long behind us. We all lead busy lives, and it’s now easier than ever to be away from your home without missing a beat. Mobile phones allowed us to be away and not miss that important phone call, and today’s options of watching television allow our favorite shows to be viewed whenever and wherever we choose.
A New Way To Watch Television
Whether it’s breaking news, sports or your guilty little pleasure of keeping up with the housewives, you’re able to easily view these shows on your smart phone, tablet or computer. Perhaps I’m going to show my age here, but the overall quality is not comparable to the old portable televisions with the two-foot antennae sticking out in hopes there would be less static while trying to enjoy your show; today we have instant access to HD programming on the many devices we all have at our fingertips.
Without a doubt, it was the phenomenon of YouTube that sparked the fascination and love for watching videos online, followed up by Vimeo and others providing an outlet to showcase your personal videos, but also for the networks to feature their own programming in an easy to view format. Then came Hulu, which was seen as the future of television with a lot of content, including the favorites from FOX, ABC and NBC. Then, Crackle, Netflix and the many online streaming sources joined this revolution alongside of Hulu. So how do we organize all these options coming at us from every direction and create an easier way to watch all of these programs?
The Future: Browser Extension
This is the exact question that Television Fanatic has been asking themselves for the several years that they’ve been further developing their brand. In today’s world, Television Fanatic has become the face of the future for viewing anything and everything online with this browser extension – taking the viewing experience from one of excess online browsing on many sources, to one of having all your content in one centralized location. Not only do you have instant access to your favorite shows all in one place from the many network and online streaming services, but is also one of the leading sources for television news, reviews, spoilers, photos and information. Essentially making Television Fanatic a destination for hours of entertainment from multiple sources, all at no cost to the consumer. “In today’s society, convenience plays a large part in which types of entertainment people choose. By having a plethora of entertainment options available in one browser extension, our viewers have what they need at their disposal,” said a Television Fanatic employee.
Of course, now that we have finally become accustomed to words such as “streaming” and “mobile media,” we are now also hearing a lot of chatter about “browser extensions.” So, what is a browser extension? I do not try to claim to be a tech-savvy developer, but I also am accustomed to working with a number of software and platforms for various website and media clients over the years. Like you, I am now educating myself on what is said to be the future of watching your favorite shows online – the browser extension. In the case of Television Fanatic , it’s this browser extension that allows for this very easy-to-navigate and clean user interface that allows for legal viewing of your favorite network programming, while also being able to integrate with your Hulu and Netflix accounts for an even more dynamic experience. This type of browser extension makes this level of online viewing possible, while providing an added value to the consumer.
The Numbers Tell The Story
In recent years there have been events that bring awareness to the desire and consumer demand for this content to be available on their favorite mobile device. Major events like the London Olympics provided the entire world an entirely new way to experience each event in ways unimaginable just two years before. With the excitement of Sochi 2014, brands such as Television Fanatic are bracing themselves for another record-breaking event.
During the London Olympics 2012, it’s reported that more than 57 million people in the U.S. alone were actively streaming the games. Overall, 153.4 million videos and 20.4 million hours of video were streamed across computers and smartphones during these few weeks, doubling the amount of streaming video during the Beijing Olympics. More than 64 million of those videos were live streams, a 353 percent increase over 2008. During the closing ceremonies, 9.9 million mobile devices had been verified by NBC. For better or worse, Preparing for even bigger number in Sochi, NBC has promised 100% live availability of each and every event, and reportedly abandoned YouTube, and using Azure to stream media to the Adobe Flash Player, available at NBCSports.com.
This year, another great step has been taken to further measure these numbers with TV and online ratings giant Nielsen has announcing a pilot program called Nielsen Digital Program Ratings that will measure audience statistics for TV content viewed on the Internet. “It’s [Nielsen Digital Program rating] an important step toward reaching the ‘holy grail’ of true cross-platform measurement,” said Alan Wurtzel, president of Research and Media Development, NBCUniversal. As this program evolves, Nielsen will also be developing ways to meter the mobile devices and tablets. Hulu, Netflix and others are obviously here to stay for many years, and now with the added benefits of being able to legally have all your favorite shows in an easy to use floating platform and toolbar via a browser extension such as Television Fanatic for free, it seems the future of streaming our favorite television programming online is here today.