5 ms·

Viggle Acquires GetGlue For $25M Plus 48.3M In Shares

23 points by Gertig 14y ago

Gertig 14y ago
GetGlue being acquired by Viggle is really quite sad. Viggle is traded on pink sheets so the full details of the deal will be available at some point. Based on GetGlue raising a C/D round of about $18M it looks like the preferreds will just be getting their money back. No company has figured out the Social TV space yet. I hope someone does but it doesn't look like there is going to be a clear winner out of the current bunch of players in the space.
mikeryan 14y ago
The social TV check in space is kind of bizarre right now there's a ton of players Viggle, Miso, Zeebox, Shazam, Umami, Into Now etc. The networks love the idea but adoption rates seem pretty low, I'm expecting to see a lot of consolidation in this space. Zeebox probably has the best chance of success since its backed by Comcast/NBCU which controls a pretty large swatch of the networks available.
gorbachev 14y ago
Viggle made $0 in 2011, and according to latest filing only made $1.7M in revenue and costs of $5.6M. I'm with Gertig. GetGlue is a better brand, and they're merging with an entity that is completely unproven and practically unknown.
graupel 14y ago
As a broadcaster, I don't get what's 'in it' for GetGlue users - but I do get what Viggle does, so that's a very interesting pair-up. Curious to see where it leads.
- randall 14y ago
  Wait, a broadcaster on HN? We should be friends. I'm @randallb on twitter... run http://vidpresso.com/ http://vidpresso.com/. We'd give you a discount just because you're on HN.
  - graupel 14y ago
    Randall - @stevebaron here - our paths have crossed about a millon times & 2 of our stations use your product, but you are most certainly welcome to give them a discount. :)
randall 14y ago
I'm really against the second-screen space. I feel like it's this weird industry where broadcasters, who have checks to spend, want this tech that users tend to avoid. Users like interacting in the places where they already interact, with the people they already know. Getting them to buy-in to a specific place to interact isn't that compelling. Maybe try a gameshow via iPad, and you might have something pretty compelling. 1 vs 100 would actually be pretty amazing if you could pull off the backend video infrastructure needed. And why not make it 1 vs 1,000,000... and have each member of the mob be worth $1.
- smalter 14y ago
  My impression is the same as yours--that this space is currently being driven by broadcasters and advertisers. Bringing actually fun, consumer-happiness focused interactivity to television (you gave a great example) sounds disruptive.

23 points by Gertig 14y ago

GetGlue being acquired by Viggle is really quite sad. Viggle is traded on pink sheets so the full details of the deal will be available at some point. Based on GetGlue raising a C/D round of about $18M it looks like the preferreds will just be getting their money back. No company has figured out the Social TV space yet. I hope someone does but it doesn't look like there is going to be a clear winner out of the current bunch of players in the space.

mikeryan 14y ago

The social TV check in space is kind of bizarre right now there's a ton of players Viggle, Miso, Zeebox, Shazam, Umami, Into Now etc. The networks love the idea but adoption rates seem pretty low, I'm expecting to see a lot of consolidation in this space. Zeebox probably has the best chance of success since its backed by Comcast/NBCU which controls a pretty large swatch of the networks available.

gorbachev 14y ago

Viggle made $0 in 2011, and according to latest filing only made $1.7M in revenue and costs of $5.6M. I'm with Gertig. GetGlue is a better brand, and they're merging with an entity that is completely unproven and practically unknown.

graupel 14y ago

As a broadcaster, I don't get what's 'in it' for GetGlue users - but I do get what Viggle does, so that's a very interesting pair-up. Curious to see where it leads.

randall 14y ago
Wait, a broadcaster on HN? We should be friends. I'm @randallb on twitter... run http://vidpresso.com/ http://vidpresso.com/. We'd give you a discount just because you're on HN.
- graupel 14y ago
  Randall - @stevebaron here - our paths have crossed about a millon times & 2 of our stations use your product, but you are most certainly welcome to give them a discount. :)

randall 14y ago

I'm really against the second-screen space. I feel like it's this weird industry where broadcasters, who have checks to spend, want this tech that users tend to avoid. Users like interacting in the places where they already interact, with the people they already know. Getting them to buy-in to a specific place to interact isn't that compelling. Maybe try a gameshow via iPad, and you might have something pretty compelling. 1 vs 100 would actually be pretty amazing if you could pull off the backend video infrastructure needed. And why not make it 1 vs 1,000,000... and have each member of the mob be worth $1.

smalter 14y ago
My impression is the same as yours--that this space is currently being driven by broadcasters and advertisers. Bringing actually fun, consumer-happiness focused interactivity to television (you gave a great example) sounds disruptive.