Category: Columns

Pieces that don’t focus on reviewing a particular episode or season of a show. Think of it as an op-ed you would see in the Sunday newspaper.

Amazon vs Netflix: iPad App Viewing Experience

I only subscribe to Netflix when there’s a show I want to watch, which lately means a new season of Longmire or House of Cards. Being a month out from the later – read my thoughts on season four here – I logged in tonight to cancel until Longmire comes out in September.

For the last year and a half, Amazon Prime has been my streaming provider of choice. You could debate which one has the better television library. Prime has the HBO library, I think Netflix has more Showtime archives (it’s an add-on to Prime). Netflix probably has more heralded original content with House of Cards and Orange is the New Black compared to Transparent as Prime’s most notable show. Unless you consider The Man in the High Castle notable for being awful. Prime definitely tops Netflix for streaming movies. The point is, which has the better streaming library depends on what you want to watch.

But after using both, it’s definitively the case that the Prime viewing experience in the iPad is far superior to Netflix. Here is a screenshot comparison.

Prime has several overlay options for navigation and information. You can hop forward or backward by 10 seconds while Netflix only lets you go backward. Both let you turn on closed captioning, and Netflix has an option to jump straight to a different episode (upper right, to the left of closed captioning).

From there, Prime leaves Netflix in the dust. Prime has an awesome overlay feature it calls X-Ray. Powered by the IMDB, X-Ray delivers everything IMDB knows about what you’re watching: actors, music, trivia and characters. It’s a fantastic feature, especially if you’re the, “Hey, wasn’t she in…” type. Which I am. I enjoyed it most when I was watching X-Files, which I eventually gave up because it was boring. But before that I swear every episode had an actor who went on to appear in some other show I watch. It’s like the Bill Walsh coaching tree of television.

Netflix:

Netflix House of Cards Season 4 Screenshot

Prime:

IMG_0408 IMG_0407

You’ll notice the second Prime screenshot is when using Airplay to send it from the iPad to Apple TV. Lack of an Apple TV app is Prime’s biggest shortcoming if you’re in the Apple universe, but Airplay works just fine and an app is surely coming.

This isn’t intended to be a total Prime vs Netflix comparison because that would surely entail a much deeper look at their catalogues and pricing. But if you are keeping track at home, Prime has one feature Netflix can’t match: Offline viewing. Prime lets you download TV episodes and movies to your device to watch offline, such as in the car, on the bus or at the gym. Netflix isn’t doing this, for the most preposterous reasons you can imagine.  Basically it thinks you’re too stupid and lazy to do it.

I won’t be re-upping with Netflix until the Longmire season five (season four ended with someone breaking into Walt’s house while he and his GF were getting friskay). Until then I’ll enjoy the superior viewing experience Prime offers and wondering why Netflix is so far behind.

Where You Been, Blogger

Well. It’s been ages since my last post so I guess I owe an explanation. Nothing scandalous, I just have a job. Landed it about a year and a half ago. Since that time I’ve wanted to make sure it was getting my full attention and my full creative mojo, which meant the blog had to take a back seat. But I’m back now and there is a lot to catch up on, including the site design, which is going to get a change.

Let’s start with the biggest travesty since ABC axed Last Resort: A&E canceled my beloved Longmire after its third season. A third season that ended with an empty shell bouncing on the ground after Branch and his father stared each other down over shotgun barrels. Who shot whom? I thought it was Branch because the shell landed by a box that would have been at his feet. Thankfully Netflix saved us and put out a pretty bold 10-episode season.

The decision to cancel unleashed a hell storm of angry fans on the A&E Facebook page, a problem fed not so much by the cancellation but the given reason: Longmire’s audience was too old. The cable channel is moving to populate its primetime lineup with cheaper “reality” shows that follow the likes of Donnie Walberg. Months after the cancelation fans still bombard every A&E update with messages conveying their displeasure and pledge to never watch the channel again. I’m one of them. The only other A&E show I watch was Bates Motel, and I never got into season two. Life goes on.

Let’s see, what else happened…

Alyssa Milano left Mistresses. Yeah. That happened. After filming wrapped on season two the show joined the long list of productions that packed up to follow the lucrative stream of taxpayer revenue offered by cities and states that aren’t Hollywood, California. Finances aside, it’s a mind-numbingly stupid decision by ABC executives to move the show 1,800 miles to Toronto after its star and main character had her second child. Babies are known about well in advance of their birth so ABC either knew she’d quit and didn’t care or foolishly thought she’d uproot her growing family. Stupid calculations either way.

Milano was open to the idea of a one-episode appearance to wrap Savannah’s story. I don’t think that’s a good idea and it didn’t happen. Season three went on just fine without her. I think the writers did an admirable job of crafting a storyline that left me thinking the Savi character would have been a real drag on the show.

Apart from the off-screen drama from my two favorite summer shows, the television world kept turning. The old standbys still move forward. Some rising, some stumbling. There’s a lot to talk about. Stay tuned.

Thoughts from the Minnesota Bloggers Convention

Minnesota Blogger Conference

I am new to blogging and, to be honest, I don’t have an enormous audience. The Wandering Lostie just notched its 1,000th view and most of my traffic comes when I tweet a link. It’s a very modest endavour in that regard, but it is something I want to be more serious. To that end, I attended the Minnesota Blogger Conference a few weeks ago in St. Paul.

I could fill a mountain of screen space with my eight pages of notes. One of the things I like most about blogs and blogging is being exposed to other people’s perspectives, so I want to use this post as an opportunity to provide mine about some of the questions and topics the presenters and panelists covered. It is outside the normal course of topics for this blog, but it’s about blogging. I think blogging about blogging is always germane to blogging.

Blogging as a passion.

I used to work in politics, a very passion-driven line of work. I left because even though I am still very passionate about it my passion diminished enough that I could imagine myself doing something different. It’s a fine line, to be sure. Blogging strikes me as very similar. I talk in my About page about how I became interested enough in television to write about it. Listening to more successful bloggers talk about how passionate they are made me wonder if this is something I am passionate enough about to put in the time and effort to attain the audience and respect they do. I believe it is. I enjoy this. However…

I’m in a rut right now, and it is all Walter White’s fault. I binged the entire series in the four days leading up to the finale. From the pilot at 7 p.m. Wednesday to the finale that ended at 9:15 p.m. Sunday I watched nothing but Breaking Bad. It totaled about 48.5 hours of program time in 96 hours with the longest break being 6-hours for a wedding. Put another way, that’s two full days of watching one television show in a four-day span. Insane! (I’ll have more to say about Breaking Bad and binging TV shows when the TV year slows down.)

I loved Lost so much it boosted how much I enjoy other shows. Breaking Bad caused the opposite effect. I was enjoying FOX’s new Sleepy Hollow until Bad made it feel like a children’s book. Even an 8-season stalwart like Criminal Minds can’t work up the drama for me that it used to. All of this means I’m less excited to write, which is why there hasn’t been much new content lately. I hope this is a temporary post-Bad phenomenon.

How do you write? 

I was surprised to hear Ed Kohler and Purple Jesus Diaries writer Aaron Wahlstrom say they write directly into their platform. I compose everything in Pages so I can write in a word processing mindset. When I type right into WordPress it is much more difficult to get in the part of my mind where the writing lives. In that way I’m with Kate in the Kitchen and Kate Arends, who talked about shutting the world out and finding a quiet place to do their blogging. If I am writing a review or a column I almost always shut out the world and dig in.

Typos.

“When people email me about a typo in my blog…I just don’t care.” – Ed Kohler. I care. I obsessively care. I loathe typos. If you see one, please email me about it. I will feel bad about myself but it will help in the long run.

Making a connection. 

A question from Missy Breggren’s session addressed how you know your blog is making connections. Style and fashion writer Zhenya Hutson and happy person Jennifer Prod of talked about comments and outreach from other bloggers as things that tell them they are on the right track. This is something I’d like to attain. Right now I’m me talking largely to me. Forming connections with other bloggers in the television field and boosting site comments are long-term goals.

Other topics. 

Rich Neumeister has been fighting for open government at the Minnesota Legislature for well over 30 years. He asked a great question I want to touch on: What about adding other topics to your blog? Like I said, I worked in politics for a long time and still have strong feelings about it. But I promise you will never read a political post on The Wandering Lostie. Ever. If I’m writing about a show that is heavy on politics, such as Scandal or The West Wing, I will use my political experience as an asset for writing better posts. That does not mean you’ll see me espousing a position on taxes or Obamacare. You can take this promise to the bank.

People have asked me if I plan to blog about politics, and I appreciate the compliment in saying they would be interested in what I have to say. My answer is if I wanted to be immersed in politics I would have stayed in it. I also want to reduce the impact politics has on my online identity, most of which came through Twitter via my previous jobs. Now I’m trying to use the Twitter equity I earned (is there such a thing?) over the past several years to become known for other things. Such as this.

Analytics. 

I can’t begin. Go to http://www.jeffalytics.com and read everything.

The future of blogging. 

This was a great panel with Blois Olson, David Brauer, Lee Odden and Greg Swan and moderated by Julio Ojeda Zapata. It was pretty heady stuff, here are some highlights.

“Blogs should just be called media.” – Blois Olson. I tend to agree.

David Brauer rarely goes to the local papers’ homepages anymore. He finds news from links in his Twitter feed. I tried doing this a while back and found that I missed too much news. I also tried exclusively using the papers’ iPad apps and had the same experience. I want my online newspaper reading to feel as close as possible to scanning a regular newspaper. Twitter has potential for that if I took the time to make a list of all the news sites I follow, but they update so much it would be impossible to digest all of it. There is a new social links feature in the upcoming release of Safari that will aggregate links posted by people in your social network, so that has potential as well. Flipboard replace the void Google created by dumping Reader. It is probably the closest to a real newspaper experience.

“Social media shouldn’t make you sad.” – David Brauer. He’s right. We have the Twins and Vikings for that. How many times did Josh Freeman look at the sidelines after a play Monday night with his hands up like he had no idea what he was supposed to be doing? I think he’d be right to feel angry about being thrown out to play in that situation. And the Twins, don’t even get me started.

Talking about the plethora of social networks available, Greg Swan said think about what ones will be around in the future. This is why I stick with the big ones. Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn give me everything I want from social media. I am not inclined to join others until I am clear about what they offer me that these three don’t. Tumblr is a great example. I’m on it but rarely use it because it duplicates Facebook and Twitter. I mostly use it for posting things that I don’t think are worthy of the other three. I’ve also used it to post thoughts on a variety of topics that don’t fit anywhere else. I briefly considered putting The Wandering Lostie there but decided WordPress is a better long-term solution.

“Figure out a way to reach people who care.” – Blois Olson. Great point for building your blog audience. I will need to do this for my blog to grow.

A Hollywood star screaming my name in bed is why I love Twitter

Michelle Stafford, who played Phyllis on Y&R before leaving to create The Stafford Project, was doing a Spreecast web chat live from her bed this morning. When host Arthur Kade started reading questions from fans, pretty much the greatest moment of my life happened. You can see the video here, scrub ahead to 13:30.

Here’s a transcript:

Michelle Stafford: “KEVIN! YOU’RE SO! I LOVE KEVIN! I LOVE HIM!”

Me: [faints]

To recap, that’s Hollywood actress Michelle Stafford screaming my name in bed.

I’ll let you pick your jaw up off the floor.

[pauses for effect]

Okay.

Why is a Hollywood actress screaming my name? Let’s go back to yesterday when I ranted against an article from some lifehacker who wants everyone to stop watching television because, among other silly assertions, he thinks it robs us of social interaction. I rightly obliterated his argument with examples of how watching television actually increases social interactions thru social media. This is an example of one type of interaction I left out.

On her Twitter account, @therealstafford has a running joke about guys who do random things being “bad in the sack.”

So yesterday when she tweeted her misgivings about hairless cats:

I could only respond:

Which got a nice response that will surely boost my Klout score:

LOLs were had, retweets were made, good fun all around. Since this happened only a day ago, presumably she remembered or recognized my avatar in the chat stream today and could only think to exclaim gleefully upon seeing it, as many women tend to do.  Either way it was very cool for me as a viewer that a celebrity from a show I watch would make a note of me. And that’s why I love Twitter.

Thanks to Twitter, stars and fans can interact in a way they never could. While some celebrities have purely promotional accounts, many television stars use theirs exactly the way Twitter is meant to be used: to interact. Stafford is one example, many of her former colleagues on Y&R are, too. As a Y&R fan for almost two decades, I was over the moon the first time Joshua Morrow replied to one of my tweets. Nick Newman the person talked to me!

That was so cool that I decided to embark on a mission to get every Y&R star who is on Twitter to respond to one of my tweets without pathetically begging for a retweet like so many losers do. I hate crap like that. Instead, I decided I would show you can get celebrities to respond to you by simply tweeting good stuff. Instead of treating them like OMG CELEBRITIES! I responded to their tweets the way I would respond to anyone else in my feed.

The results have been a blast. To date, at least 8 Y&R actors have responded to one of my tweets.

Most of the time it’s a simple “Ha!” or “LOL” and there’s nothing wrong with that. The goal is a response. The result is an even stronger bond with the show, or in Stafford’s case, a bond strengthened enough to follow her career to her next project. Had there been no Twitter and Phyllis got shipped to an island medical clinic off the coast of Georgia for coma patients I likely would not have bothered to figure out where the actress went.

When I decided to embark on getting a response from my favorite Y&R stars, I certainly didn’t anticipate it would result in one of them screaming my name in bed. That’s what Twitter can do, that’s what television can do. It is what makes it a great tool for social interaction and a powerful tool for marketers. What happens with TV stars happens countless times every day with brands helping customers solve a problem or right a wrong. It means sales, good will, and word-of-mouth advertising that no television commercial can buy. In politics we motivated candidates and volunteers by telling them the most trusted endorsement of a candidate comes from a voter’s friend, neighbor or relative. Twitter gives brands the opportunity for that endorsement. Delta lost my luggage but their Twitter assist team tracked it down and got it back for me. 

So back to our lifehacker who is busy practicing kung fu or hanging out with his “girlfriend.” Watching television isn’t a bad thing. It’s not a sin. It’s entertainment and there is social interaction.

Keep watching, keep tweeting.

Considering an amendment to the spoiler policy

I’m considering an amendment to the official spoiler policy I established a few weeks ago. It is based on primetime dramas and may be faulty when considering the unique viewing traditions for daytime soap operas.

Time-shifting is so ingrained in soap culture that it seems like there should be a different set of rules. Being a daily show airing during the work day is very different than a drama that airs once a week at night. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to watch it live, so shouldn’t there be a short grace period?

This consideration is prompted by the Y&R Twitter account live-tweeting episodes during the day.

Developing…