Tag: Live TV »

The Olympics have come and gone, leaving nearly everyone in a temporary state of "What the heck am I going to watch on TV right now?" Besides old reruns of Golden Girls, but that goes without saying.

I say temporary because we're not too far away from the start of the new fall TV season, and even though the networks' decades old paradigm is becoming increasingly obsolete, there's no question that the seasonal concept still carries a lot of weight because of all the new and returning shows that will flood at us in fairly short order.

To prepare for the deluge, you're going to want to be able to watch as many ways as possible. That means apps, and while this isn't a true guide to cord-cutting -- because taking in live TV still requires a cable subscription sometimes -- it can at least help untether yourself from your living room this fall.

For far too long, us multitaskers of the world have had to suffer through the indignity of having to track two entirely different screens when we want to play a game and watch TV. There has to be a better way! Now it's possible with the 2.0 update to the official Cartoon Network app. A selection of arcade-style games based on Cartoon Network shows have been added to the app. They shine on the iPad, where in portrait mode, a video can be played on the top half of the screen, and the game played on the bottom half. Just simply rotate to landscape to watch the video in fullscreen. Users with pay TV subscriptions can log in to watch the most recent episodes of shows, and can also stream Cartoon Network live, as announced earlier in the year. It all works with AirPlay as well. Now it's possible to be distracted while watching Adventure Time from anywhere, not just at home!

The future of TV on demand is undoubtedly live TV on any platform that you see fit. If someone wants to watch TV on their iPad, they should be able to watch anything they want at any time. Comcast today is taking the first step towards this TV watching future with their Xfinity TV app.

Their press release is a bit tough to follow, but from the looks of it, Comcast is planning for customers to be able to watch "live news, TV shows and movies in their homes whenever they want." While I'm not sure if this means that I can only watch live TV from selected networks (sports is curiously omitted), but anything live from the app would be an improvement and a step in the right direction.

In the coming weeks though, Comcast is adding a "play now" feature to the Xfinity TV app which will add "nearly 3,000 hours of On Demand content, including popular movies and hit TV shows, either in the home or on-the-go, including anywhere there is a wireless connection." In the near future, they have plans to add "thousands" of additional content choices to the iPad, making it a fairly comprehensive on-demand source.

“Live streaming and the play now feature on our Xfinity TV app are two important pieces of our strategy to deliver any content to any device, any time,” said Brian L. Roberts, Chairman & CEO of Comcast Corporation. “Comcast has a series of upcoming online enhancements and app releases that are part of a much larger effort to reinvent how customers interact with their entertainment on TV, online and on mobile devices.”

Be sure to pick up the Xfinity app if you are a Comcast owner (it's free!), and have fun with the coming glut of on demand content. If anything, you'll be happy to have the coolest TV remote on the block.

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If I was betting, I'd bet most of you now watch TV through your Mac or PC .. sometime in the day, am I right?

Well, set aside that rather expensive computer of yours, and instead pull out that rather expensive phone of yours. How would you like to watch live TV on your iPhone (or iPod touch) instead? Your frantically nodding your head, aren't you? Since Apple introduced the SDK which has gradually been getting more feature-full as the months have gone on, we've seen an influx of applications from companies promising us our live TV fix, on the move. Ed Lea's Live TV for example.

Elgato is also one of those companies. Most known worldwide for it's easy to use and accessible Mac based software, EyeTV. The software allows you to schedule, record, watch and rewind live TV. Not only that, but the software will also convert this recorded content into .MP4, and import them into iTunes if you so choose. This is partly why the software is so popular among the iPod crowd. It is worth noting though, that in order for any of this to work you will need to invest in one of the company's many 'Freeview' USB sticks, available here.

I've been using their Mac software for quite some time now. It's like having TV on demand. So, when this tweet shot across Elgato's Twitter stream, as you can imagine - I was very, very excited.