ShowMax launch plans for Chromecast and Apple TV

ShowMax boss John Kotsaftis said they plan to have support for Chromecast and Apple TV before the end of 2015.

Posted on the ShowMax blog, Kotsaftis said the popularity of “lean back” viewing, particularly its Samsung Smart TV app, was surprising.

He also said they have taken feedback from users to heart, and are working on feature requests such as “watched” indicators, suggested next episodes, and continuous play.

“You’ll see these rolling out in the coming weeks across the apps and browsers,” said Kotsaftis.

Streaming and sound sync problems

ShowMax has also been working on smoothing out video streaming – following complaints of pixelation and sound sync issues.

“In the end, we went with the nuclear fix for the sync problem and re-encoded all 11,000+ hours of content,” he said.

The buffering and pixelation issue was also tackled by lighting up new front-end server caches in South Africa.

“Our primary hosting location is offshore and the network latency to and from South Africa can be quite extreme,” said Kotsaftis, with round-trip times 300ms or more.

“We also did some optimisation work on our [content delivery network], which helped.”

Reporting problems

ShowMax said feedback from users has been helpful, and it asked subscribers to send in suggestions and problem reports via [email protected].

Details users should supply are:

• Email address used to register for ShowMax
• Device used
• Connectivity details
• Details if there was a technical hitch

Content

Kotsaftis said feedback on content has been divided between users loving the selection, or complaning ShowMax doesn’t have a show they want.

“We’d love to be the Spotify of video and have every single show and movie, but the numbers (and cost) are mind-boggling.”

He said there has been a shift from movies to TV series in Hollywood and at independent studios.

“For 50 years there were three broadcast networks in the US, so there were probably at any given moment 60 or 70 scripted original series.”

Today, there are around 350 scripted original series produced and marketed in the American television market.

“I can’t see anyone cracking the everything-in-one-spot model.”

He said they will post regular updates via their blog about new programming being added to ShowMax.

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