Theaters Encouraging Audiences To Use Shazam During Movie Preshow

In the days where Alamo screens a voicemail of an angry moviegoer being kicked out of a theater for using her phone during a film and being shot during trailer, there shouldn’t be any real reason for theaters to encourage audience to use their smartphone – or any phone for that matter – before, during, or after a film. But they found away.

Sony has already experimented the use of Shazam on The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Audiences who were smart enough to pull out their phones while the after credit song played were treated to a post credit scene on their phone where they were teased with what looks like the six villains that make up the Sinister Six.

Now theater companies are catching on to the Shazam craze, and have found a way to utilize the smartphone app to bring audiences closer to the experience. Hit the jump to find out how.

In a new deal between Shazam and NCM Media Networks, you will now be able to use the app during the preshow of every movie starting this weekend. NCM is best known for their FirstLook behind the scenes look that are screened before every showing. So using Shazam during these segements will unlock even more info about the subject, purchase options, and more. TechCrunch was the first to report on the news.

A Shazam spokesman told TC that “every single piece of FirstLook content, both ads and otherwise, will be Shazam-able, although the exact experience will vary from segment to segment.”

These FirstLook segments can be seen across major theaters like Regal, AMC, and Cinemark, with about 20,000 screens showing the company’s stuff in the US. So with Shazam going beyond music, and moving onto TV Shows and Films, the integration doesn’t come off as a complete surprise.

But I can’t remember a time where I had any interest in researching any of the FirstLook promotions I have seen, in fact I don’t know of anyone who can remember one of them. So asking me to pull out my phone and use the app to find out about the subject I could be less interested in is asking a lot. What makes it even worse is that this deal comes at a time where people already don’t like seeing phones being used before, during, or after a film.

I just hope Shazam doesn’t get the idea of using their app during the actual film itself.