On Time or Not on Time: A User Study on Delays in a Synchronised Companion-Screen Experience

One major challenge in creation of compelling companion screen experiences, are the time delays between the presentation of content on the TV compared to the presentation of content on the companion screen. Through the use of a synchronised, interactive textbook application, we conducted a user study to evaluate the potential influence of different delays, between the TV and the companion screen, on how users experience watching a Shakespearean play on the TV. Our results indicate that although users do not notice delays of up to 1000 ms, for the kind of experience tested, they feel significantly more distracted by the tablet content for increasingly higher delays. We discuss the implications of our findings with regards to the time delay tolerances users might have when using a synchronised text accompaniment to these kinds of TV programmes.