Panasonic TVs with VIERA Connect (once known as VIERACast) continue to offer owners a variety of the latest apps to enhance the home viewing experience. These interactive features, both paid and free, have been designed to work with IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) equipped VIERA Connect-enabled models from this year forward, as well as 2010 VIERACast models that have taken advantage of last month's firmware upgrade to VIERA Connect, empowering a new order of information and entertainment. More than 50% of customers who purchase Panasonic connected devices (Blu-ray players can go online too, don't forget) are in fact connecting them to the internet, and that figure is increasing.
A newly-developed social network application, dubbed Social TV, is one of Panasonic's proudest achievements. The beauty of this app is that it integrates Twitter and Facebook, enabling consumers to access accounts in real time while also watching live TV programming. Other new applications include gaming from PlayJam and the Bollywood movie/video-on-demand channel, BigFlix. All three are launching with no additional fees.
Also just announced is the enhanced Accuweather service, which in addition to providing the usual basic meteorological data and forecasts serves up multiple video feeds of newscasters at different locations doing what they do best: pantomiming approaching cold fronts in front of a green screen.
Wealth TV, the 24/7 lifestyle channel in HD (and some content even in 3D) is also new to the world of VIERA Connect, now offering a linear feed that delivers a cable-like experience of their programming for 99 cents per month. The Wealth TV feed is available in eight different adaptive streams to best accommodate most consumer internet connections, the current connection speed indicated by a four-star meter on the lower right corner of the screen. At its best the signal can be considered HD, with about 40 titles in 3D as well.
Just as important as the list of supported applications is the careful way in which Panasonic VIERA Connect-enabled TVs deliver that experience, since third-party apps don't necessarily perform the same across all brands and devices. The Associated Press (AP) app for example provides high-definition news photography, and the Panasonic flavor not only displays the images in HD but gives users a deeper, richer layout and a more immersive experience than other TVs that might for example leave portions of the screen blank.
The VIERA Connect feature opens at the press of a single button, with seven applications presented on each screen layer. Not surprisingly, Panasonic reports that the most popular apps include Netflix and YouTube, but also more practical uses such as weather. Gaming is an up-and-comer, with optional accessories such as game controllers now available. This raises the issue of backwards compatibility, a desirable but not always attainable goal. Certain demanding apps such as some of the titles on Gameloft, for example, require technology that only exists in the 2011 sets. (Gaming has long been one of the most processor-intensive tasks on the PC.) The evolving graphic user interface however is Cloud-based and so should be readily updatable on all of their VIERA Connect-enabled TVs. Kudos to Panasonic for continuing to add value to connected TVs.
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