This past week Yahoo purchase IntoNow. What is IntoNow. IntoNow is a way to share what you are watching on TV with other people. It was launched in January 2011 into a ever growing field including Glue and Miso. The way intoNow works is you hold up your iphone, iPod Touch or iPad and hit a button on the IntoNow application and within a couple of seconds the applications picks up what you are watching on TV. It also determines whether the show is currently on or if it is a recorded show. IntoNow has a database of over 5 years of American TV content or 2.6 airings. It uses this data base plus the SoundPrint technology, The SoundPrint technology reads the audio from TV shows like a fingerprint and identifies the program within a couple of second. This is what makes intoNow different from its competitors you don’t have to enter what you are watching, the system picks it up automatically. Once what you are watching is determine you can then share it on Twitter or Facebook. You can also start and participate in discussions and recommend shows. It is clear by the Yahoo press release that they plan to use the information for target advertising. “IntoNow has built a platform and companion TV application based on real-time indexing of television that deepens the connections between audiences, television content and advertisers.”
I did see a couple of problems with IntoNow, First because the number of users are fairly small I only found one show that had any kind of discussion at all and even that only involved two people making unconnected comments. Second it is limited to US TV shows only, so if you want to share a movie you are watching on Netflix or maybe Amazon On Demand then you will have to use some other application. In addition if you are outside the U.S. or watch non U.S.-based shows you are out of luck. intoNow does not work well in a noise environment and let’s face it, if you are watching TV with some friends a quiet environment is not happening. Plus history tells me that in the end the purchase of IntoNow by Yahoo has a good chance to turn out bad for IntoNow the product. Although the creators will have done quite fine, money wise. If you ask me which of these TV check-in products I like best I would say Glue which has a large and active community. Glue also allows you to share more media types, including movies, music, and web videos. I not sure I will use IntoNow, it will depend on if the community that uses grows and becomes more active.