Interactive or distracting? The RBS 6 Nations Live Challenge Social TV App

I'm more than just a fan of rugby. I've played and coached the game for nearly 30 years. I have a folder on my iPhone home screen dedicated to it. So I was particularly pleased when I learned that the RBS 6 Nations app would be accompanied by a Live Challenge app, challenging the viewers' knowledge of the sport and getting their predictions on the outcomes of every conversion and penalty kick.

We're in 'social TV' territory again.

The app seeks the engagement of the viewer with the game and gets him to interact with it on both a general level - facts about rugby - and a specific one - will he make the conversion? Essentially, we are asked multiple choice questions and given a few seconds to give our answers. The app's mechanics include the ability to pit players against their Facebook friends.

We begin with a warm-up in the 40 minutes before the match kicks off. A few questions, quickly answered and away we go. When the match gets under way, the app keeps asking more questions, like this one during Scotland v Wales this weekend:

Which of the following Scottish coaches was born Scottish?

Then another question. And another... and soon, I'm closing down the app because I've come to watch the rugby not participate in a pub quiz. Each time I look down to read the question and select my answer, I'm missing something that's happening on the field.

The app is quite highly rated on the App Store but I wonder for how many rugby fans does the app add to the experience.

Twitter isn't saving TV

This morning at the Westminster Media Forum, Sir Peter Bazalgette stated that social media, far from competing with TV, has assisted TV.

Yet Tess Alps, Chief Executive of Thinkbox, the marketing body for commercial TV in the UK, provides a different viewpoint. She says that there is a lack of perspective about social media and TV; data from online chat is used unscientifically and leads to a false analysis of TV audiences.

If 40% of primetime tweets are about TV (as Alps says), is Twitter saving TV? 

Social media experts will point to an increase in TV viewing over the last couple of years, from around 3.75 hours per person per day to just over 4 hours. That increase coincides with the growth of social media, especially Twitter. Hence, Twitter has grown TV audiences.

I see flaky analysis like this every day. There is no evidence of a causal relationship.

The TV industry is also somewhat deluded. In her editorial in Broadcast last week, Lisa Campbell says "We've been treated to quality drama, breakout comedy and hit entertainment. It's no wonder TV viewing remains stubbornly robust". Again, there is a lack of causal evidence.

There are two things we know for sure:

1. Average TV viewing time has remained close to 4 hours for years.
2. People are spending less money, going out less often.

My hypothesis is that TV viewing has increased almost entirely due to the current economic climate; and that TV viewing has in large part fuelled the growth of Twitter, not the other way around.

As I pointed out in my previous piece about Zeebox - hardly an earth-shattering revelation - TV has always been social. People have always talked about it, even while watching it. Twitter is just another medium for people to share their thoughts and emotions about what they're watching on the screen, in real time with far more people.

Game shows and reality TV are fighting for audiences with online interaction: voting on Big Brother; play along with Million Pound Drop Live etc. Social media isn't saving the TV: social media is the latest theatre of war for broadcasters chasing armchair-bound consumers.

Does Zeebox flop sound early death of Social TV?

News this week that Zeebox has received a lukewarm response from users might announce the stillbirth of Social TV.

Zeebox ran a trial with E4 show Desperate Scousewives but found that only 100 Twitter updates were made via the service out of 80,000 posted during the series, despite promotion and close collaboration between the program and the app.

The app is just one of many in the Social TV landscape, dominated by fast-built American offerings such as Fav.tv and a host of others including Clicker, which was acquired by CBS Interactive in March 2011.

Zeebox was founded by ex-iPlayer CTO Anthony Rose and former EMI board director Ernesto Schmitt with $7 million of seed funding. It is perhaps most similar to GetGlue, which started off life as a service to show you who's visiting what on the web but refocussed its business on social check-ins and has partnered with a whole host of channels, including the UK's Channel 4, in 2011.

Last year, 31,000 people checked in to the Oscars on GetGlue. While the figure is supposed to demonstrate traction, it's a tiny percentage of the people who watched the Oscars. How can such small user numbers ever generate significant revenue for the services?

So is Social TV dead?

Perhaps that's the wrong question. TV has always been social. From its origins as a box in the living room to the present day, TV has generated conversations between its viewers. And it seems the predominant app today for interaction in real time is Twitter.

The question then arises, is there any need for a conversation platform that is dedicated to TV? or even a Twitter app for it, a Tweetdeck for TV?

BSkyB thinks so. Murdoch's business acquired a ten percent stake in Zeebox not two weeks ago for an undisclosed multi-million pound sum, according to the FT. It transpires part of its intention is to sell advertise alongside BBC programming in the Zeebox app on the companion screen, be it smartphone or tablet.

For that to work, scale is required. It doesn't cost much to buy eyeballs - no one has used the term since 1999 - but what's required is engagement - can we say stickiness and get that 90s feeling again? - for users to keep returning and advertisers spending. Is a Twitter app, albeit with some bells and a couple of whistles, sufficient to do that?

Wait and see.

In the meantime, a few million pounds is a small punt for the Murdoch empire that could result in substantial returns if Zeebox takes off.