@noahchestnut I love B/R, but have actually never been a user of any sports scores/highlights apps. None have ever stuck with me. I know people loved Team Stream, though. So why the big change?
@andrewett Thanks for the comment. I read two questions in your comment so let me break them apart.
(1) Why build a dedicated sports/scores/highlights app and (2) Why invest in big changes to the Bleacher Report app?
**(1) Why build a dedicated sports/scores/highlights app?**
Like I mentioned in my earlier post, I first installed the Team Stream app years before I joined Bleacher Report. For me, I wanted to know if my teams won or lost, stay up to date on trade rumors, follow the NFL draft when I'm away from my TV, and stay up-to-date with all the little moments throughout the calendar year.
Over the last ~5 years, the Team Stream app has become a daily habit for millions of sports fans because a lot of fans want a dedicated sports experience tailored to their teams. You can follow sports on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Apple News, etc... but you usually miss out on scores, major highlights, and all the little moments that help keep you involved in the drama of the season.
We think that there are tens to hundreds of millions of sports fans who will want this type of experience. Some will want to use the app multiple times a day whereas others will open the app a few times a year.
**(2) Why invest in big changes to the Bleacher Report app?**
It was time? Does that work as an answer? The Team Stream brand was a tad stale. The look and feel of the app was 5+ years old. The UI was based in design patterns for iOS 9 and Android K...
It was also time for us to recognize that Bleacher Report has grown over the last few years. Our Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, and Twitter accounts are some of the best social accounts on each platform, regardless of if you are a sports fan or not. We want to showcase our best work from other platforms inside of our own app. You can see the beginnings of this in our new 🔥 tab.
We also want to test new ideas and rebuilding our app gives us a bit more room to create, learn, fail, repeat.
Thanks again for the questions!
Hey y'all!
We've spent the last ~8 months working on an overhaul of our app: Team Stream. Long before I joined Bleacher Report, I was a loyal Team Stream user (a longtime listener, first time caller situation). Team Stream was the first sports app to let me say "these are my random assortment of teams" and then get fast push alerts, scores, and custom news feeds pulling in tweets, instagrams, articles, videos, etc from all over the internets.
We've taken the core spirit of Team Stream - your teams + fast alerts + best information agnostic to who published it - and used it to build the new Bleacher Report app. Bleacher Report 5.0 is still built on your teams and interests (NFL Draft fanatics, sneakerheads, Madden fans, sports history nerds, etc... we've got you too).
If you are a longtime Team Stream user, let us know what you think. If you are a sports fan who wants something a bit more personalized and, well, fun, check us out. Thanks!
-Noah
Lead PM, Bleacher Report
@noahchestnut awesome! Team Stream is one of my favorite sports-related apps. Will the curated Tweets still be included in the stream? Any notable changes to the iOS widget thingy?
@matt_kiser Yup! Curated tweets aren't going anywhere. We're working on adding more curated IGs and improving some logic with quote tweets v retweets v original tweets as well.
The iOS widget thingy is still a personalized scoreboard, but a new widget is on our 2017 roadmap.
One thing to keep an 👀 for: rich media alerts. Check out gifs, video, and other rich media directly in alerts.
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@noahchestnut, as a person that uses the Team Stream app more than Twitter and FB combined, I was happy to see a significant update that simplified the home and teams tab.
Can you explain the difference between the old trending stream and new fire tab?
Really hope an iPad update is on the way too. Bonus points if the new iPad app makes it easier to get to scores :)
@jared_mess Thanks Jared.
**What's the difference between Trending & Fire?**
We're still working in this, but Fire = video-first, best sports*culture videos sourced from all social platforms. Trending = trending news focused. There are times where they may overlap, but as we learn and iterate we expect the lines between the two to become clearer.
**iPad Update?**
Working on it!
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I had a hunch this was coming after you redesigned the articles (which look great btw). Been using TeamStream daily for a long time now, just about the only one I check. Love the redesign! Adjusting my following feed order💯
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@noahchestnut I'm really digging the new app, but for most of the sports scores excluding soccer and maybe 1 or 2 others, the scores are iFramed in from external sources instead of being native in the app. Which I think takes away from the overall experience. When you're watching soccer scores, there's a nice stream of tweets and related articles. I love that, it's a super nice touch. But me being a huge NBA guy and being forced over to the nba.com site and not having that is a bit of a letdown. Hopefully that's something you all can fix.
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I wish bleacher report would stop blocking me, I can’t comment or see any alerts. I didn’t do anything wrong. But yet other users say and do much worse and they don’t get blocked. Unblock me or I’ll sure bleacher report and take them to court for every cent they have
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