The new service is to be added to the eBay channel available today on Philips Net TV.

Ever looked on eBay for something, could not find anything and then thinking why is there no option to save your search and to automatically receive a notification when the article becomes available? Well, AuctionFlunky does just that. AuctionFlunky is a web based service which enables a user to save a search item for eBay and once the item becomes available on eBay, a notification will be sent to the user so that the user can start to bid for it. This functionality provides an improved customer experience and ensures that a user never misses a new article.

“We are extremely excited about this technology acquisition and will soon enhance our TV based eBay experience with this new service” says Dick Schiferli, CEO of PamConsult.

PamConsult plan to include this function as part of the Jaast “eBay on TV” offering, currently available on Philips Net TV enabled TV sets. When using eBay on a TV, the normal PC environment is not available (it is not so easy to switch back and forth between the eBay channel on the TV and the programs to search for items). Thus the new functionality will make searching on eBay much more pleasant, simpler and effective.

During the transition, the AuctionFlunky website and internet service will not be available to new customers.

By now over 1.3 million sets are active in the market and all of them can access our eBay channel and enjoy a rich eBay experience by Jaast.

Usage has grown fast. Philips and us have monitored where to do improvements. We’re happy to announce these are now completed. The results are very impressive.

On the older TVs the improvement is 42% faster loading and with the newer TVs (which have a higher performance Net.TV module) the improvement is a whopping 68%.

As a result the Philips user will enjoy significant shorter application loading time and an increased responsiveness of the application overall.

And the best: all this without any additional hardware, setup, installation, …

Internet with remote control on TV/Media Center/Wii are things we have been working on for years and thus we are proud to say that Ebay and Philips have selected us to provide an Ebay channel on the new sets.

Based on our mceAuction technology we have adapted the Ebay content to work seamlessly on the new Philips systems.We will provide the channel via our Jaast brand.

We will be providing the Ebay channel on all new Philips Net TV enabled devices!

Ebay navigation on the TV is very simple, the same intiutive way of browsing Ebay as with mceAuction on Microsoft Media Center and Jaast on Wii.

The 8000 series are connected via wire compared to the 9000 series/Cinema 21:9 which are connected via WiFi.

Picture of initial Net TV launch at IFA 2008 (note the Ebay logo is missing).

You can download the Philips Net TV – Feature Press Release.

You can get a quick impression of the new user interface in the YouTube video of mcePhone for Skype 3.0.

Be aware that there are still edges and problems in this beta version. Just let us know what you think or if you experience any problem. Our contact form is the best way to submit any feedback about mcePhone.

This is a screencam of the complete overhauled version with new UI:

Unfortunately, Skype was unable to add an API to Skype in the past 3 years to give us access to the video of Skype calls directly, although we have asked and pushed hard for so long. As Skype video calls on TV was the most requested feature of mcePhone, we have invested a vast amount of time to make this possible even without any change from Skype’s side. With this new version, you will get fullscreen Skype video of the person you are calling on your TV and even see your video in the lower left corner (see ~1:30 in the video above).

Another very nice new feature is Skype chat integration: While you can still see the current media playing in the lower left corner of your TV (i.e. while the commercials are playing), you can chat with your friends and family. You even get a notification overlayed over your current media (TV, DVD, …) if a chat message comes in. With one click, you are in the chat conversation to answer the incoming chat message (see ~3:30 in the video).

We plan to make a beta of this new version available very soon to you. Be prepared to get a totally new feeling of Skype in your living room

Let us know what you think.

We already received this award back in 2006 for our software mceAuction. So we feel very proud of getting this award again this year. I don’t know if there was ever any company who received this award twice.

Here are some photos from us getting the award (click to enlarge):

	A slide showing that we received the award on stage
	Me and Max Mancini (Senior Director of Disruptive Innovation of eBay) on stage after receiving the award
	Max Mancini and John Donahoe (CEO of eBay) giving the award to me

Big thanks to eBay for giving this award to us. Let’s see what we can do for next year