Over the years, TV viewing habits have changed significantly. These days, it’s hardly earth-shattering to miss an episode or two of one’s favourite show; the viewer no longer has to wait for the repeat telecast. There’s Youtube for backup, while for the privileged, there’s a recorder in their set-top box and of course, torrents do the job for some. Of late, most TV networks have taken to streamlining their shows in the form of an app.
Convenience, clarity and timeliness play a major role in these apps, but the big bosses of most channels (Zee, Sun network) are yet to get a firm balance of it, save for brands like Hotstar (Star network) and ETV.
Despite these issues, the crowds are patient and embracing the shift rather smoothly, more with patience than excitement.
For Pranith Bramandapally, the director of a web-series who doesn’t own a television set, the app is the only way to catch up with shows and television trends. “Beyond that, I don’t want to push myself to watch a show, say Jabardasth at a particular time. I prefer to use the app to watch at my own convenience,” he says.
All this doesn’t mean that the television apps do their job efficiently.
There are situations where shows aren’t categorised neatly, there are time lags in updating shows, frequent network errors, all turning viewers away from the app altogether. The problem lies in the way television channels network themselves to the streaming portals.
Most production houses that make the shows upload them well in time, but the keywords are vague. For a normal user who may not be a tech-aficionado, it’s tough to tap the right resources.
Only when one is extremely specific about choices, say like filmmaker Satish Kasetty, television-channel apps work easy. “I prefer to watch only sports and news channels. I’ve had a good experience with the updates of such channels (through apps) and the immediacy has been quite impressive. Even in cases of lags, it has been nothing more than 10 minutes,” he says.
Yupp TV, both as an app and as a website has done this part well, telecasting shows of multiple channels mostly in parallel with the television timings and the divisions being neat. However, a bulk of its services is paid. A viewer would be forced to opt for this, if the television app-services of individual channels don’t do the job well.
What works in favour of television-apps are the uncut versions of the shows, especially in cases where there’s explicit content that can’t be telecast due to local censorship regulations or cultural norms. Ananya, a student and a regular viewer of international shows switches between watching such shows online (both website and app) and downloading them through torrents.
Until now, watching shows with television apps has been as inconsistent as the efforts of channels in making the platform user-friendly. The trend is likely to change in favour of apps if the channels focus on improving them and their ad revenues increase.
App-bonuses
The makers of the popular 'Is Pyar Ko Kya Naam Doon' serial that went off air over three years ago, produced an eight episode (10 minutes each) long series exclusively for Hotstar, titled ‘Is Pyar Ko Kya Naam Doon Ek Jashn' as a continuation of the series. This version was quite a hit with social media users and provided an alternative venue for showcasing content.
Reasons for gradual growth
-Slow pace of ad-revenue on digital platform
-Lack of proper monetisation of content
-Clarity issues
-Integration of content to the portals
