Clicker, the startup that looks to be a comprehensive video search engine for television content on the web, has launched to the public. The site made its public debut at TechCrunch50, where it generated quite a bit of positive buzz, and has gradually ramped up its private beta over the last couple months.
I spoke with Clicker CEO Jim Lanzone (formerly CEO of Ask.com), who says that the site’s beta was actually shorter than expected, in part because intital feedback has been quite positive.
Since appearing at TechCrunch50, Clicker has added 33% more content to its database, growing from an index of 300,000 up to 400,000 full length episodes. These 400,000 episodes come from over 7,000 different shows across 1,200 content sources around the web. Lanzone says some of the biggest changes since we last saw Clicker have been to its Playlist function, which new includes more DVR-esque features like new episode alerts and season passes.
Lanzone also says that the site has continued to build out its search engine, which now allows you to constrain your search to episode descriptions of a specific show — for example, you could do a search for “Michael Arrington” within the Charlie Rose show to see all of the times Michael has been interviewed on that show. Clicker has also launched a ‘related search’ feature that suggests shows you may like based on what you’re currently viewing (this feature was only a placeholder during the TC50 demo because it relies in part on user data to help determine what’s related). And there’s integration with Facebook Connect, which you can use to sign in and to share content to your News Feed.
Another big change is the addition of premium content to Clicker’s search engine: the site now includes shows from both Amazon Video on Demand and Netflix’s ‘Watch Instantly’ content (you’ll obviously have to pay for these to watch them). Clicker doesn’t actually host any of this content — instead, it provides deep links that point you directly to whichever episode you want to watch. All of this is provided free, but the site plans to roll out premium features (following the ‘imdb model) in the future. Stay tuned.
Open to public? It’s in Beta when I visited a few seconds ago.
It is a good news for us. Other else, it make more easy ways to search TV online. Clicker.com is new website to me at all. I always used to Youtube.com to be my premium of online video.
yes. still cannot get on to the service.
The biggest thing I wish they’d do is implement a Hulu-esque queue. I think they’re trying to do that with their playlist and season passes, but it’s not intuitive.
I think the problem is that there’s not an obvious way to add a show to automatically update in your playlist. Maybe that’s what a season pass is supposed to do, but I can’t find any explanation or functionality to that on their site.
Makes me sad, cause I definitely like what they’re trying to do.
Of course our company SetJam has had this premium content from the beginning. It’s a smart move for Clicker to include it now.
The real difference between Clicker and SetJam now is that Clicker is trying to build a destination, whereas, SetJam is building TV tools. If you’re looking for a place to go to hang out, Clickers more setup for that. If your looking for a quick, clean, and simple way to find your shows, SetJam is the right tool.
It’s kind of like the old Yahoo versus Google. Don’t take my word for it though. The first 500 people who sign up here can get instant access to SetJam: http:http://www.setjam.com/invites/techcrunch/
Btw… I explain the “Tool” versus “Destination” distinction in this blog post: http://drstarca...om/archives/239
Amazing how they raised $8M to be an online television show aggregator. It’s WHO you know people!
techcrunch50 company casttv has http://www.cast...online-tv-guide and is kicking butt http://traffic....licker.com&
Are all 1200 content sources legal?
Is a lot of the content they will link users to going to be coming through Megavideo? Btw, I hate the time limit on that service.
Continue watching the video in another browser. Works like a charm and every time.
There are alot of sites like this already in the market doing this better. CastTV? Sidereel, TvTubeX
I honestly just see them as a small player in the big market.
Who the heck funds this crap? A vertical search engine that competes with a million other search engines. This is a feature, not a company. And $8M for what? on campus massages? hiring a million “producers” (ie pre-1999 Yahoo web surfers).
And making this a destination site? Forget it. They aggregate Netflix? Come on. They can’t beat their recommendation engine or gather more reviews than Amazon.
And in terms of track history — what exactly has the team done before successfully?
That’s nice but the kicker would be if I could personalize the search to my cable subscription package and region. So when I login and search, it should only show those TV shows accessible to me, including local TV channels. Then I would use it!
Well its good that clicker went public i think it could really be the next IMDb,
here is pictorial review of the site
http://thetechn...omplete-review/
For US viewers only, of course.
Although Clicker excels in the TV space, a more comprehensive alternative for listings of pay movies is Movie Monitor, http://www.moviemonitor.com.