Comcast Launches Fancast<< Didja Stop and Think About This | Main | YouTube's Future: Aesop's Fable Version >> Joseph Laszlo | August 10, 2007, 12:20 PM Comcast's long-awaited foray into the online video destination (or perhaps e-EPG?) business took off today with the beta launch of Fancast. It's definitely worth checking out. One early surprise: Comcast's famous Fan, the UI for video on the Comcast.net portal, is apparently not a part of Fancast. Comcast's doing 3 things at present: national TV listings, movie tickets (hello, Fandango), and online video (heavily geared toward pro content--movie trailers, TV episodes, etc.) The most interesting thing I've run across so far is something called "Six Degrees." On most show info pages, you can click on the six degrees button and it pops open a new window with the show or actor you're looking at and an array of 5 other related things, presented in an interactive flashcard style. Click on one of the other cards and you see 5 new things. Breadcrumbs indicate past things you've clicked on, and related titles, actors, and tags are presented in a more traditional list form at the bottom of the screen. Haven't played with it enough to give a thumbs up or down yet, but I'm intrigued by it. Although the video destination market is getting extremely crowded, Comcast brings a lot to the table. I'm looking forward to seeing how Fancast evolves. |
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