NBC Universal will be introducing social networking tools on its Web site later this year along with streaming episodes of “Late Night With Conan O’Brien,” NBC Digital Entertainment said Monday.
Beginning in September, NBC.com will showcase such networking capabilities as profiles containing user-generated content, online communities in which users can interact with network personalities, Widgets (interface items like dialog boxes and pop-up windows) will also be part of the site, as well as user blogs and photo and video galleries.
“You’ll see us place multiple bets on a lot of different technologies,” said Beth Comstock, president of integrated media at NBC Universal, at the company’s presentation Monday at the Television Critics Assn. at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills.
On August 27, NBC will begin streaming episodes of “Conan” on the site. Daily episodes will be available the next day at 5 a.m. PDT.
Also in late August, NBC will unveil a corporate site for Dunder-Mifflin, the fictitious paper company at the center of “The Office.” Users will be able to log on to this site, join branches and complete challenges relating to the show.
The network will ratchet up the online presence of “Heroes” this summer, as well, presenting sites dedicated to specific characters. NBC also will introduce Season 2 characters from the drama on the portal.
The site for “The Biggest Loser” also will have a new look in the fall, when the show begins its fourth season. New host Alison Sweeney will write a blog, and NBC will offer online exclusive video segments on contestants and scenes that weren’t on the broadcast.
“Coastal Dreams,” a Web-only soap opera geared toward a younger audience, is set to debut in October on NBC.com. This project previously was announced in May, during the upfronts, the networks’ annual programming presentations to advertisers.
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While Apple designed its Apple TV device to make media downloaded through a computer viewable on television, Amazon and TiVo have taken the PC out of the picture.
TiVo, a maker of digital video recorders, said Tuesday that its subscribers “can now browse, purchase, and rent movies and television shows from Amazon Unbox on TiVo without leaving [the] couch and without using a PC.”
While the health benefits of this approach leave something to be desired, the price and the instant gratification factor will likely make NetFlix customers, at least those armed with TiVo’s hardware, think twice about continuing to receive NetFlix DVDs through the mail. Note that with a 5 Mbps broadband connection, instant gratification for a two-hour movie takes about one hour.
TiVo Series2 and Series3 subscribers with broadband connections can take advantage of Amazon’s Unbox service, which offers movies, for rent ($1.99 to $3.99) or purchase ($9.99 to $14.99), and television shows, for purchase only ($1.99 per episode).
“We are excited to make Amazon Unbox on TiVo even easier to use by making it possible to purchase and rent movies and TV shows not only on the Web but also with your remote control,” said Roy Price, director of Amazon Unbox, in a statement.
No doubt Amazon is also excited to be finally bringing an innovative service to bear against Apple’s dominance of the digital download market. In the first quarter of the year, Amazon lost its place as the third largest music retailer in the U.S. to Apple’s iTunes Store, according to the NPD Group, a shift that reflects the growing importance of downloaded music.
Amazon’s Unbox offers a selection of over 10,000 movies, TV shows, and other digital content. Apple’s iTunes Store features over five million songs, 350 television shows and 400 movies.
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Two video games developed with director Steven Spielberg are to be shown off at the E3 conference in Los Angeles.
The filmmaker has collaborated with Electronic Arts, the world’s largest games publisher, on three titles.
The first, codenamed LMNO, is a contemporary action adventure, said Neil Young, general manager of EA’s Los Angeles studio.
The second, with the codename PQRS, is a puzzle game designed for Nintendo’s Wii console.
In an interview with Newsweek magazine, Spielberg said the puzzle game “seemed like a great thing for the entire family to play together over Christmas; although you don’t need the excuse of a holiday to enjoy it.”
The game has been described as a mix of Saturday-morning cartoon and Jenga.
‘Chemical reaction’
Mr Young said: “Of course just playing with blocks does not a game make.
“Now imagine there are up to 50 different properties that can be associated with them. They can explode or form a chemical reaction.”
In LMNO, being designed for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, the player partners with a female character who evolves over time depending on how she interacts with other characters in the game.
Newsweek described the title as “North by Northwest meets ET”.
Spielberg told Newsweek: “The challenge is, can the game have an emotional impact on players while they are actively manipulating the world?”
In a separate statement about his involvement with EA, he said: “I am truly enjoying the creative collaboration and we hope that gamers will be as excited as we are about what we can bring to the medium through our shared vision.”
No details about the third game Spielberg is working on were released.
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