When Fanhattan launched its iPad app last year, it had just four content sources to choose from. With the latest release of its app, being launched today, Fanhattan’s now got content from 14 different providers, including some new cable TV offerings from networks like NBC, HBO, The CW, and Cinemax.
The whole point of the Fanhattan app is to provide a way for users to search for and browse content across a wide range of content providers without jumping back and forth through their apps. Fanhattan seeks to defeat fragmentation by aggregating content from multiple sources and displaying it side-by-side.
To do that, it hooks into different content providers’ iPad apps — like apps from Netflix, Hulu Plus, and now cable networks like HBO GO — and lets viewers find the shows or movies they want to watch, without worrying which apps that content is available through. So if you search for Modern Family, for instance, Fanhattan will show you available episodes from Hulu Plus, ABC, and iTunes.
With new content, Fanhattan is also adding new ways to discover and access the movies and shows you want to see. Altogether, there’s more than 175,000 movies and TV shows available through Fanhattan, so managing what you want to watch becomes a new challenge. For the first time, the Fanhattan app lets users add content to a watchlist, which they can use to save content for later.
Interestingly enough, it doesn’t even have to be content that is available on the iPad for viewers to add it to a watchlist. You can add future movies, for instance, like movies that are coming out next year. When they become available, either in theaters or through various online services, you’ll receive a notification telling you where you can watch those titles.
The Fanhattan app also lets you browse through content that your friends have liked or added to their own watchlists, thanks to integration with Facebook’s Open Graph. And when you add a movie or TV show to your watchlist, it will be shared with Facebook friends, so long as you’ve tagged social sharing on.
I got a demo of the new app from Fanhattan CEO Gilles BianRosa in the video above. If you want to see how the app actually works, check it out!