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Apple Wins an EMMY for Apple TV Siri Contextual Search

September 2, 2017 By swarma Leave a Comment

Search is a very important element in delivering streaming content. If you are accustomed to using Spectrum cable TV on the west coast with it’s painful letter by letter title search input and visit family or friends on the east coast where they have the luxury of Comcast voice search, you are acutely aware of the difference. Apple continues to make important strides in the voice activated arena moving forward with granular queries.

Apple TV Contextual Search Wins a Technical Engineering Emmy

Apple is among four companies to be honored with a 2017 Technical / Engineering Achievement Award for “Contextual Voice Navigation for Discovering and Interacting with TV Content,” with Comcast, Universal Electronics (UEI) and Nuance Dragon TV also receiving wins in the category.

Siri made its way to Apple TV in 2015 when Apple launched a fourth-generation set-top streaming device with a dedicated Siri Remote for interacting with the virtual assistant. Going beyond basic voice command functionality, Siri on Apple TV leverages artificial intelligence to drive user interactions. 

At launch, for example, Apple promoted “What did he just say,” an automatic rewind feature that plays back a portion of a movie with closed captioning switched on. 

Related to the Emmy win, Siri is able to parse through thousands of movie, TV and other streaming video titles via natural language interactions. With a vast catalog of iTunes content, and Universal Search hooks into third-party apps like Netflix, Hulu and more, Apple TV is capable of highly granular queries. For example, users can ask Siri to surface James Bond films starring Sean Connery, or action movies made in the 1990s starring Wesley Snipes. 

Apple is no stranger to the Emmys, having previously won awards for both commercial content and technical work related to mobile streaming technology. 
from Apple Insider

Filed Under: Select News Tagged With: Apple TV

Amazon Changes Listings on IMDb

September 1, 2017 By swarma Leave a Comment

Beware. IMDb has very recently changed the way they list “Watch Now on Amazon.”

For some time, if the title wasn’t available with your Amazon Prime subscription, that notation and link would include a price for the streaming pay per view.

Now there is only the distinction:

Watch Now with Prime Video
Watch Now on Amazon Video

In case you didn’t realize, Amazon.com has owned IMDb since 1998, when Jeff Bezos bought it for $55 million.

I am inquiring when it was (if you know please let me know publicly in the comments, @LindaSherman on Twitter or privately on my contact me form here) that IMDb began listing “watch now on Amazon” with their titles. It feels like it was this year.

Since I have been working on this site, I used those listings to add to titles “also available on Amazon Prime Video” if it didn’t have a price with it. Whoops. Just realized the latest change last night. So have to go back and check to make sure those titles are on Prime not pay per view.

Part of the motivation may be to build their HBO subscription service, an add-on to Amazon Prime for $15/month

Here is what to watch for:

Watch now with Amazon Prime Video on IMDb The NewsRoom

Watch now with (Amazon) Prime Video

Watch Now with Amazon means watch now with pay per view Silicon Valley

Watch Now with Amazon means watch this HBO title now with pay per view or add an HBO subscription to your Amazon Prime service

Watch Captain Fantastic with Amazon Prime Video listing on IMDb

Watch Now with (Amazon) Prime Video. This title is also included with Netflix streaming.

Filed Under: Amazon Prime, Select News

Sense8 Two Hour Finale in 2018!

June 30, 2017 By Linda Sherman 1 Comment

Thank you Netflix for listening to your fans and bringing us a two hour Sense8 Finale. We are sad not to have 10 seasons of the show since we LOVED the first two seasons. But we really appreciate the closure.

In her letter, Lana Wachowski confessed that she fell into a “fairly serious” depression after the series was canceled. Netflix handed down the news on June 1, not long after Sense8’s May 5 season-two release.

“The outpouring of love and grief that came in the wake of the news that Sense8 would not be continuing was so intense that I often found myself unable to open my own email,” she began in the letter. “I had never worked so hard, or put so much of myself into a project as I had with Sense8 and its cancellation hollowed me out.”

Calling out the “impossibilities” her crew achieved — the second season filmed in 16 cities and 11 countries to capture the stories of its global cast —  and the sadness from the actors, especially the eight stars who make up Sense8’s starring “cluster,” the showrunner said the passion from the fans, who created a petition to bring the series back, was most humbling.

“As the characters in our show discover that they are not alone, I too have learned that I am not just a me. I am also a we,” she wrote. “While it is often true that these decisions are irreversible, it is not always true.”
She continued in the note, which was directed to the fans: “Improbably, unforeseeably, your love has brought Sense8 back to life.”

Lana Wachowski said Netflix “loves” the show but admitted that the numbers have “always been challenging,” before signing off with a nod to the second season’s cliffhanger ending: “Now let’s go find out what happens to Wolfgang [Max Riemelt].”

The rare move, which was preceded by the end of Baz Luhrmann’s series The Get Down, prompted think pieces on what the abrupt canceling of two of Netflix’s most expensive series said about the streamer. Netflix also canceled another original series, the Britt Robertson-led Girlboss, last week.

“They did a beautiful show” and “the audience was very passionate, but not large enough to support the economics of something that big, even on our platform,” said Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos shortly after Sense8’s cancellation.

From: Hollywood Reporter update as of June 29th.

Death doesn't let you say goodbye. 2 hour finale episode in the works. Tell your cluster. pic.twitter.com/GHZgGuHwS0

— Sense8 (@sense8) June 29, 2017

Filed Under: Featured, Netflix Streaming, Sci-Fi, Select News Tagged With: Sense8

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