The Darker Reflection of Ourselves

From DCTVpedia
Jump to navigation Jump to search
The Darker Reflection of Ourselves
Number 137
Broadcast Date September 19, 2016
Episode Length 1:04:08
Hosts Brian Brushwood, Tom Merritt
Guests Dan Trachtenberg

Does Netflix have too much influence? Is Twitter’s NFL gambit working? And guest Dan Trachtenberg talks about his upcoming episode of Dark Mirror and why TV may come to theaters.

Guests

Intro Video

Primary Target

Charlie Brooker about Dan's episode "Playtest" - “Dan is fantastic at creating suspenseful and tense mood; this is our Evil Dead 2.”

Signals Intelligence

Twitter announced the launch of apps for Apple TV, Xbox One and FireTV Wednesday, letting users watch live video content like NFL games. On Apple TV live tweets and the video stream are viewable side by side. Users do not need to be logged in to view content.
Twitter streamed its first NFL game Thursday and CNET's Terry Collins had a representative summary of the response from viewers which was largely positive. The stream was accessible from the top of the moments section as well as on new Apple TV, Fire TV and Xbox One apps. Streaming quality was largely smooth with a few buffering glitches here and there. The delay relative to the OTA CBS broadcast was the biggest complaint followed by request to be able to choose different kinds of tweet streams.
The game had 2.1 million unique viewers who watched an average of 22 minutes worldwide and an average audience of 243,000. The CBS/NFL Network combined TV audience was 15.4 million with a total of 48.1 million.

Gear Up

If you want to test out new Chromecast features before they're released to everyone, you can sign up for the Chromecast preview program. Open up the Cast app tap the menu icon next to the name of your Chromecast device, choose settings, select preview program and press Join Program.
Apple TV got its tvOS 10 update this past week.
Combine multiple queries for Siri (Gangster movies from the 1980s)
Third-party apps support Siri "Search YouTube for Brian Brushwood")
Use Apple TV as a HomeKit hub (and use Siri with it)
A dark mode especially meant for projectors
Photos app has Memories, albums
Apple Music has discovery and Favorites mixes
NOT INCLUDED, Single Sign-on.
Sign into cable subscription once, applied to all apps. Coming later in the autumn.

Under Surveillance

Netflix has ordered 10 episodes of a series based on the Spike Lee movie She's Gotta Have It. Lee will direct each show and produce with his wife Tonya Lewis Lee.
Star Trek: Discovery will not debut in January as previously planned but is delayed four to five months. A statement from producers Alex Kurtzman and Bryan Fuller said, "‘Star Trek’ deserves the very best, and these extra few months will help us achieve a vision we can all be proud of."

Front Lines

The Emmy Awards were announced Sunday evening. Netflix took home 3 for Master of None, Bloodline, and 'Patton Oswalt: Talking For Clapping'. Amazon took two for Transparent. HBO and FX topped the medal count with 6 apiece though HBO took home best comedy series for Veep and best drama series for Game of Thrones. A sentimental win for Spoilerin' Time fans, as Rami Malek who plays Eliot on Mr. Robot won Best lead Actor in a Drama Series.
In a blog post, Sony announced that HBO and Cinemax will soon be available on the Playstation Vue TV service. Each channel will be available for $15/month unbundled. The company also announced HBO Now will come to the PS4 and PS3. Sony committed to launching both offerings before the October 2nd premiere of Westworld.
Layer3's so-called "concierge cable" promises high-end video from a robust selection of channels delivered over the Internet but by renting privately managed networks for better streaming quality. Its set-top box has search and discovery capability similar to Netflix and even bundles in apps for Netflix, Amazon and others. Layer 3 plans a national rollout over the next year and a half.
21st Century Fox is suing Netflix for interfering with employee contracts after hiring away two Fox programming executives. Tar Flynn was hired fro drama programming development last week and Marcos Waltenberg has worked in a similar role since January. AND Apple has hired Time Warner cable executive Peter Stern as vice president of cloud services, reporting to Eddy Cue. Stern was involved in negotiations between Apple and Time Warner regarding a potential television service.
Vimeo announced Lionsgate will be the exclusive partner for a new Vimeo-operated television store launching in 150 countries October 18. Lionsgate's entire catalog of TV series including Orange is the New Black, Mad Men, Nurse Jackie and more will be available for purchase. Movies are expected to be added to the store as well. Vimeo hopes to attract more studio partners in the months to come.
The National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) will change its name to NCTA-The Internet & Television Association. NCTA will stay in the name as a nod to the group's past, even though the initials won’t stand for anything. Last year, the NCTA changed the name of its annual conference from "The Cable Show" to "INTX: The Internet & Television Expo."

Dispatches From The Front

Hey there, fellows and maybe guest(s).

I’ve been having an internal struggle between Sling TV and Playstation Vue. I love Playstation Vue because every channel and every show has the cloud DVR feature, which means I can show up 5 minutes late and watch something from the beginning or rewind when the connection craps out. Sling, though, has the ability for me to watch when I visit my girlfriend’s house, which is about half of the nights in a week. If either of these got the missing thing from the other, I would jump on immediately. For the moment, though, I have Vue, because I simply don’t trust Sling or Vue without the ability to rewind.

Unrelated, I recently finished watching Game of Thrones via HBO Now. Before every single episode, an ad would play for some HBO show. I vowed to never watch 'The Night Of’ out of spite because I got so annoyed with the same ad playing over and over. I’ve always heard people complain about hulu’s ads, but I’ve never heard anyone complain about the ones on HBO Now. The variety of ads is better on hulu (which is saying a lot), and I’ve already been informed of HBO’s shows while trying to navigate to the show I’m watching. Why do you think there hasn’t been more complaining about HBO?

Game of Thrones was great, by the way. I look forward to hearing your spoilin’s in real time next year.

Keep up the good work.

- Greg



Is there a summary of all your recommendations? Something like a CordKillers Bible?

- Kirk



Jim had problems activating a Tivo OTA Roamio so returned it and...]] I ended Up getting the Channelmaster 1T unit and am loving it. Very easy set up and was up and running in less than 10 min. Also worth noting is the tuner in the unit is very good As I am getting channels in the opposite direction of my antenna that I couldn't get before. My 81 yr. old mother and 73 yr. old neighbor now have CM DVR's also. Love Your show, thanks for all the information and helping me with my cord cutting. I have officially been a true cord cutter with OTA antenna and Netflix and Amazon Prime for 9 mos. now, and have saved 900.00 this year so far.

Thanks again,
- Jim



Wanted to note that the HDHomeRun antenna system now works with Plex as a DVR.

https://www.plex.tv/features/dvr/

Just wanted to mention it as an option that you might want to take a look at.


Seth was also wondering how PS4 was going to do HDR when it's HDMI 1.4 port is incapable of it. The fact of the matter is the HDMI port on PS4 is actually HDMI 2.0 capable but only came with the 1.4 firmware. So an update to the PS4 will supposedly enable HDMI 2.0 on the existing port.

- Seth B.


YouTube

Links



Preceded by:
"Netflerks"
The Darker Reflection of Ourselves
Followed by:
"Can’t Beat That With a Roku Stick"