A rep from Jaman.com contacted me today to bring my attention to a new widget they’ve launched to complement their recently launched TiVo downloads. The Cinema Slots widget is perfect for the indecisive who want to watch something, but just can’t decide what to download. First select a genre (sorry, you have to decide at least that much), and then hit ‘Spin’ and the slot-machine style widget will suggest movies. The genres are: Anime, Bollywood, Action / Adventure, Sci-Fi and Fantasy, Independent, Hollywood, Drama, Documentary, and Comedy.
OK, sure, it seems to mainly be a cute little toy to play with. But I could see it being a conversation starter if you’re trying to decide on a rental with friends or family. Though they might need to work on the randomizer a bit. I tried anime and it kept suggesting Ghost in the Shell, repeatedly, alternating between GitS: The Laughing Man and GitS: Solid State Society. Certainly not bad choices (far from it, Ghost in the Shell is one of my all time favorites), but since I’ve seen it I was looking for something else. Eventually it recommended something called Conehead, which appears to be a free short. Still, it was fun to play with for a little while just to see what it would suggest in different categories.
It brought to mind the Urbanspoon iPhone application I’ve seen mentioned on numerous other blogs, podcasts, etc.
