Netflix Hack Day Results in Sleep Tracking, Kid Entertaining - The UpStream

Netflix, among some of the interesting initiatives the company does, hosts an annual Hack Day. As the company puts it, it is a way for promoting fun, experimentation and creativity for its engineers. And this year, a couple of experiments were so cool that a lot of people could put them to use in real-life apps.

The event, running from Thursday morning through the evening into Friday morning, is capped off with a presentation 24 hours from the start time. From solutions to existing problems to the creation of brand new concepts, ideas were categorized and then judged on a 5-star scale.

For me, a notable presentation was having Netflix check to see if you fell asleep while watching a movie, a common problem that happens to me a lot. By using a Fitbit Force (yes, the recalled tracker) to measure data that is then relayed to the system to then fade out the audio. After some time, it will display a prompt, asking if you're really asleep, and will turn off the movie or show after bookmarking the last point your vitals showed you were awake. The next morning or whenever you get back to the program, you will then be able to pick up where you might have stopped the stream after slumber or from where you fell asleep. This can be really useful for those who watch stream some movies before sleeping, and you don't have to remember what you last saw before you drifted off.

Another cool presentation was using the latest Apple-made-famous technology, iBeacon. Simply by touching two iOS devices together, you could easily share Netflix videos to and from the gadgets. They called it Netflix Beam. Obviously, apps like Nokia's Play To app and Samsung's Smart View app have similar features, using Wi-Fi Direct, NFC or Bluetooth to accomplish the goal, but their scenario for the use was most interesting to me. Say you're having dinner with friends, and they bring kids. Of course, you'd want to entertain the little ones with some Netflix watching, but say they want to watch something on their own devices. Instead of giving out Wi-Fi passwords, or setting up a guest network for a one-time deal, you can simply tap the devices and play video to and when they leave, it returns them to their own account if they have one. Easy enough.

These videos are both after the break, so check them out if you want to see some really great ideas. Hopefully we'll see them come to life in one way or another.