Boxfish Launches Political Tracker Indexing Broadcast Election Buzz

9.19.2012—We here at Boxfish wish to provide you with a unique glimpse into the election from data captured by our index of television with our new political tracker. 

Here, we compare how each candidate is buzzing on TV by tracking a number of things television is telling us about the candidates. Following the sentiment analysis lets us know what slant each major news source on TV is taking toward Obama or Romney. A negative slant is indicated in red and a positive slant is indicated in green.

The sentiment refers to the words most commonly associated with each candidate on a given channel. The more negative terms revolving around the candidate, the more negative the sentiment, positive terms around a candidate conveys a positive sentiment.

The graph index is based on a historical average of mentions across TV for each candidate over the course of the election so far. We plan to provide this data to you all the way to the big dance in November.

The election is ramping up and both the democrats and republicans have each other in their respective gunsights. However, the excitement revolving around Obama and Romney doesn’t just come from the latest debate, gaffe or traded barb between the two candidates. This the first time the digital community has made this big an impact on the discourse and analysis of the race. We provide this tracker to give you new insight into the election and fuel the already burning discussion surround the race.

Noise About iPhone 5 Dominates Our Search Queries

9.13.2012—In just a day after the iPhone 5 was officially announced, everyone has been inflicted with a voracious appetite for info about the coming mobile device. Even now, the most searched term on Boxfish in the last 24 hours is “Apple.”

Likewise, here are the mentions that “Apple” has received on TV since the beginning of the month:

That spike occurred during yesterday’s iPhone announcement.

In a time when Obama and Romney are going at each other’s necks about foreign policy, U.S. embassies and consulates in Yemen, Egypt and Libya are being barraged with protests and assaults after an anti-Muslim video by an American was aired on Youtube, the iPhone buzz is raking in search query numbers, tweets and articles like no other. 

We are the Fair and Balanced TV App

8.10.2012—We were greeted with a surprise after lunch by a text from one of our friends saying that Fox News listed Boxfish on their list of the 30 best apps for the iPad.

I hope our addition to the list is from Bill O’Reilly, Geraldo Rivera and Dennis Miller huddled around a tablet debating the merits of Boxfish, as that would be equal parts awesome and hilarious. Even if that isn’t true, why let the truth get in the way of a good story?

This Review Says We are a “Must Have App for TV Lovers”

9.10.2012—Parth Dehbar wrote a great review of Boxfish for Techie-Buzz, an India-based tech site with coverage spanning Asia and North America. It’s good to see our awesomeness ring out to people far and wide. Seriously, there are some exciting things coming in the future that we are eager to share with you all, so it’s great to see our name getting attention abroad. 

Mentions and Social Comments Abound Around the RNC

8.31.2012—The Republican National Convention (RNC) has come to a close, but the event’s impact is still reverberating across television, as analysis and conjecture abounds regarding the speeches given. The events of the RNC’s 3rd night, have created quite a buzz on TV, keeping key republican names in Boxfish’s top trending spots on TV today.

On the day of his acceptance speech for the republican nomination, Mitt Romney was mentioned 4,248 times on TV, double the numbers he had in the days prior. Paul Ryan’s speech generated 1,132 mentions for the VP candidate on the day it was delivered, but jumped to 2,708 the following day. The speaker who received the third-most mentions on the day they spoke was Ann Romney, with 768 mentions on TV—the most she has received so far in 2012.

While making a splash on TV the night he spoke, Clint Eastwood’s speech about the “missing” Barack Obama, where he had a conversation with an empty chair on stage, gained him more mentions on TV today, a day after his speech, than all who spoke at the RNC, save for Mitt Romney. 

The RNC seized the web’s attention as well. AdAge published the social media activity revolving around the live broadcast of the RNC over the event’s 3 days. 

Twitter was the main medium of conversation online, with 1.9 of the 2 million social TV comments being tweeted. The remainder (104,000) were on Facebook, according to Ad Age and Bluefin Labs, who provided the data.

Over the 3-night event, Romney’s speech gained the most social media comments per minute, at 17,458. A close second was Clint Eastwood’s speech, which generated 16,193 comments per minute and the hashtag #eastwooding, defining the activity of having a conversation with an empty chair. Marco Rubio’s speech came in third with 13,286 comments per minute.

We will see how the opposition fares on TV and web, as the Democratic National Convention is just around the corner, and will surely have everyone talking. 

Lost Remote Does Video Feature On Our Live Guide App

8.28.2012—We’ve been getting some video-love lately, and rightfully so! This time, Boxfish has made its way onto Los Remote’s video news show, The Pulse, which covers all things digital and innovative in the TV space. I’d say we fit the criteria. 

We’re getting video buzz now!

8.24.2012—We’ve made it onto the (web)tele! IPad Today featured us on their Youtube show that covers all things tech and geeky. Boxfish is the first app covered as they discuss “vegging out with TV apps.”

The Tech Giant’s Forey Into Cable Highlights Importance of Live TV

8.16.2012—It was reported by the Wall Street Journal today that Apple is making its way into the pay-TV world, seeking out a deal with cable service providers to expand content options on the next iteration of Apple TV. Techcrunch’s MG Siegler had a great take on it here. 

Moving away from the stream-only model displays one important aspect that, initially, those that wanted to “disrupt” TV content  with their set-top boxes didn’t consider…live TV matters. 

While the argument for live breaking news or sports is there, the same can be argued for shows as well. Sure, streaming services are great, how else do you get to power through season after season of a TV show, commercial free at the press of a button? But you are watching that show after the fact. 

In keeping up with the show, especially a show you like, there is no service that lets you watch it when it first airs…except for TV. Keeping viewers completely current with mainstream visual media is an integral part of getting into the TV space.

Apple gets it and in doing so is making the move to working with cable and content providers. The same motivation can be said about the creation of Google Fiber. As Siegler put it, “that’s where the content is.”

8.15.2012—Yesterday was the day we launched! So far, so good, the system is holding together with the steady traffic we are getting. Visit the iTunes App Store on your iPad to get the Boxfish Live Guide! 

We are thoroughly enjoying the press that Boxfish has gotten both yesterday and today. They are all great articles that approached the Boxfish story from different angles of utility to the user. Today, Forbes Tech just ran their Q&A interview with our fearless leader, Eoin Dowling. Here are the pieces that ran for launch:

Boxfish’s TV Guide iPad App is Like Crack For News Junkies by Janko Roettgers for GigaOm

Boxfish Launches An iPad App to Help You Find What’s Hot on TV by Ryan Lawler for TechCrunch

Boxfish Debuts its TV-Guide Killing iPad App by Molly McHugh for Digital Trends

Boxfish Live Guide for iPad: Real-Time Search for What’s Being Discussed on TV Right Now by Martin Bryant for The Next Web

Boxfish’s iPad App Brings the Twitter Model to Broadcast Television by Darrell Etherington for Betakit

Onward and upward! I kept tweeting that big things are coming soon, and they are, so keep your eyeballs locked here and here (or at least visit occasionally) for future Boxfish happenings.

Countdown: Just One More Day Until Boxfish is Available in the App Store

8.13.2012—Tomorrow, August 14th marks the day we’ve been working hard to get to, when you can experience Boxfish ON THE SECOND SCREEN! Details for how to get the app will be on here and spread through every means possible as soon as it’s available for download.

It’s the end of the beginning , essentially, but we are just getting started on what the potential that the index of television can provide to you, the user. There will be some exciting in development in the months to come, so stay tuned and thanks for sticking with us.