Something I’ve been having on the board for 24frames almost since it’s inception has been Collections and management of same.
Since I already had the basic functionality for pulling movie data from tmdb.org and adding it to my own system, I thought it trivial to the necessary functionality to the system. Alas, I was wrong.
As it my way, the idea grew, and spawned new ideas and concepts. More features were added to the list, and soon it would take a comprehensive amount of time to get done. But get done, it will (did I just Yoda-out there for a second?).
As it stands now the collection bit of 24frames is set to contain not only a way for you to build your collection and view it from within the site, but also manage who you’ve borrowed that DVD of Star Trek IV to, as well as how long they’ve had (people never return borrowed DVDs, do they?).
I have, however, faced one rather large hurdle. Mainly, how to manage the different formats of physical media that it’s possible to accumulate. I have worked on the particular problem before, and have even written a bit about it. However, that particular solution didn’t pan out. It was irksome to get working, and it didn’t have quite the right feel. And finally it added an extra form field to the profile page (something I am not very happy about – I prefer profile forms to be as simple as possible).
So now I am back to planning out the solution, and I think I might finally have something I am happy with, and has an awesome look and feel.
So far 24frames will support four different formats (of which only three are actually physical) – DVD, VHS, BluRay and DigitalCopy.
James posted a lot of feedback on 24frames, and alot of it seems like something fairly general, so I am posting his comments as well as my answers here. Enjoy.
1. Could I search for “tarantino” and get a list of movies by him?
Currently, no. There is no way to search for Cast or Crew presently. I am still looking into this.
2. The movie pop-over and the single-movie page need an “I’ve watched this” button.
Indeed they do. Well caught, and it’s now added to my to-do.
3. “Goldeneye” doesn’t show up when searching for “James Bond”?
That’s because Goldeneye doesn’t contain the words “James Bond” in it’s title. Currently, you can only search titles.
4. Fantastically extensive selection of movies!
Why, thank you. I didn’t build this database by myself though. 24frames is powered by a most excellent API provided by themoviedb.org. Check it out. It’s a wiki-style IMDB.
5. I would be cool to see the ## of movies *I’ve* watched (added) in total.
This has been added as of yesterday, per your request. The information is available both in your dashboard, but also in your profile.
6. How do I add movies to my own collection?
Currently you can’t. I am still working out some kinks regarding formats; ie. DVD, BluRay, etc. Once I’ve found a way to do that, that I am happy with you will be able to add movies to your collection.
7. “Your Friends” timeline should exclude myself.
I don’t agree. The different timelines feature an escalation of the amount of data displayed. For instance, your data is also included in the “Everyone” timeline.
8. When searching there’s an “I’ve seen this” button on all results, even ones you’ve already added to your timeline?
Yup. You do know that you can watch a movie more than once, right? ;) For instance, I think I’ve logged 10+ viewings of Alien since I wrote 0.1 of 24frames.
9. Where’s the original “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”?
Dunno. As I said earlier, I pull my data from the themoviedb.org API, and tmdb’s database needs to contain a certain movie before you can log it in 24frames.
That being said, I strongly urge you (and all other users) to contribute missing movies to themoviedb.org. It will make it a more valuable ressource for all of us. Keep in mind that it will take up to 24 hours for a movie added to the site, to show up in the API (and therefor 24frames).
10. The Truman Show is now twice in my timeline…(by clicking it twice)
Yes. That’s how it’s supposed to work. If you click “I’ve seen this” twice, it must mean you’ve seen the movie twice, right?
11. There’s no way to “unsee” a movie you’ve added by mistake.
Not true. Go into your timeline. Find the offending movie and click on it. The pop-over box should contain a “Remove from timeline” link.
A big thank you goes out to James for his comments.
While building the recommendation feature for 24frames, I was faced with a difficult decision. It has been particularly exacerbated by the latest RealID scandal from Blizzard.
Now, I am not comparing myself in any way with Blizzard. But if recommendations are going to work, they need to come from people you know. And that means I need your name. More to the point – the people you want to send recommendations to need your name. Y’know, so they know who the emails are really coming from.
Anyway, your profile page now has two additional fields – firstname and surname. If you want any hope of using the recommendation feature you really should fill out those two fields.
Granted, full names are a dangerous thing to have flying around this big series of tubes, and as such I will only ever display names as Thomas M., for instance.
Anyway, what are you doing here … get over to 24frames and fill out those fields, so you’re ready for when the recommendation feature goes live.
Over the course of the next couple of days I hope to release the next feature in 24frames – recommendations.
Now, this feature won’t be a computed recommendation for you as a user. There is simply not enough data in the system to do that accurately enough to be useful yet.
No, this is a small button that let’s you send a recommendation to your friends.
It’s actually fairly simple. Click the button and you’re presented with a simple form where you can enter the recipients email-address and modify a small message (I’ve included a custom one for your convenience). The textarea for the message also has a few custom tags available, much like the Twitter message in your profile.
I’ve worked hard to incorporate a logical flow into the recommendation engine. It takes into account whether or not the email is registered with a user within 24frames. If that’s the case the given users preferences is taken into account.
The emails sent from the recommendation engine contain the following: your custom message, signed by your name, the title of the movie, a plot summary and the movies cover art. Finally it also contains an invitation to sign up to 24frames if the email address is not already registered with 24frames.
I sincerely hope this will help you share the movies you enjoy with friends and family. Let me know how it works out for you.
