TV Listings, Straight Up

TV guides. Not the most exciting things in the world, we’ll admit. But they’re necessary. Few guides offered by satellite providers are genuinely good, and I can’t think of any content delivery services, apart from the bridge made between Yahoo! and TiVO (neither of which actually provide any content in and of themselves), that give you the programming forecast both on your television and inside the web browser – or desktop widget or whathaveyou.

Couchville, an Ajax-based TV guide, doesn’t tie in with any cable or satellite (and now telephone) providers, and it is “just another” Internet site devoted to helping make the best of the world of couch-potatoedom. But it does give you some useless things that similar places around the Web don’t supply to users.

Like its “live TV bar”, which literally is red bar that displays what the current time is in relation to the network streams. Couchville visitors click and drag their cursors inside the tan-colored grids to view other parts of the guide; its designers have also implemented scrolling via keyboard commands (arrow keys), which works more to our liking than the first option. And Couchville’s ‘Buzz’ page (link at the top of the browser window) provides a glimpse of top recorded shows among Beyond TV’s (similar to TiVO but smaller) user base.

None of this warrants any appreciation of the service. Snapstream, the company “powering” Couchville and responsible for bringing Beyond TV to fruition, makes it simple to quickly view a list of what’s on and what’s coming up, but that’s it. Then again, that’s really all we want from sites such as this, isn’t it?

The listings are easy to read, show all necessary and relevant information in the window to the right with a single click. You can add programs to your favorites list, and even customize the window to show only the channels you’re interested in viewing. What more can one want or need? Perhaps a live over-the-net video stream? Give Couchville a few years to see what comes of that idea. For now, all the glitz you’ll find on the site is in the thin red bar slowly proceeding through the television guide.

There’s clearly nothing special about Couchville. Go to ‘TVguide.com/listings’ or Yahoo! TV and you’ll find similar pages. But if you just want something that does one thing well, Couchville is what you’re after.

Screenshots:

Couchville Listings Page

Couchville 'Buzz' Page