M+E Daily

With its recently launched MediaEcho technology, Technicolor looks to bring BD Live — the standard for Internet-enabled bonus features on Blu-ray discs — into the app era.

The technology refines “what we’ve been trying to do with BD Live for the past four years,” says Robert Gekchyan, Technicolor’s director of product management. “We feel this is the app that will take the disc business to the next level of connected features.”

Unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, MediaEcho looks to capitalize on the trend of simultaneous media consumption: for example, using an iPad or tablet as a second screen to browse the Internet while watching a movie on TV. MediaEcho integrates the two screens into a single, cohesive experience via an Internet-connected Blu-ray player. Viewers of a Blu-ray movie could watch the feature on their TV and receive a stream of trivia tidbits on their iPad, with specific information in the app timed to actors’ entrances in the movie.

Gekchyan notes that MediaEcho apps also can enable e-commerce tie-ins with home entertainment programming — offering movie viewers the opportunity to buy clothing worn by characters or other merchandise. Previous BD Live attempts at on-screen shopping required viewers to navigate menus with a TV remote; tablet users, in contrast, are already used to making purchases online with their devices.

The new technology arrives at a time when home entertainment studios are reconsidering just how much “value” bonus materials add to their bottom lines. Last year saw several studios begin to withhold bonuses from rental copies of movies, in an attempt to reposition making-of documentaries and other traditional extras as exclusives for those who purchase discs.

With MediaEcho, studios may take that repositioning a step further, offering extras as paid downloadable content in much the same way videogame publishers now market new game levels. Value-added materials could then become revenue generators themselves.

In certain respects, Gekchyan adds, apps are easier to develop than BD Live features. While compatibility issues can arise among tablet makers’ various Android implementations, Gekchyan notes that such issues are minor “compared to what we fight with on Blu-ray.” The installed base of Blu-ray players from various manufacturers can sometimes resemble 50-60 different platforms, he says, due to each manufacturer’s interpretation of the Blu-ray specs.What’s more, entry-level disc players often have far less processing power than higher-end models.

Not so with tablet devices, Gekchyan notes. In addition, Google’s recent release of Android 3.0 — a version of the operating system optimized for tablets — should alleviate many of app developers’ compatibility problems.