What is StevieTV?

Background

Back in February 2016, (wow I didn’t realise it was that long ago), I wanted to finally watch the X Files, I know I’m late to the party. What I didn’t realise was, that meant watching 216 episodes.

Quite the investment of time, I say that now after binge watching Married At First Sight Australia recently (more on that at a later date)

I wanted a way for me to easily keep track of how many episodes there were, how many I had watched and how many left to go. Ideally broken down by season, with the title of each episode included.

I had a decent look around to find an iPhone app that suited my needs, sure there’s IMDB, but that doesn’t left you check off what you have watched. I did manage to find some apps that got close, but they either were missing episode information or just too much hassle to use.

The Task

I wanted a quick and easy way to check off each episode as I went along. After a bit more thought, I decided the only option was to build something myself.

The original requirements were

  • Web based (as I’m not really into native iPhone app development)
  • Clean and simple design
  • View the full list of episodes
  • Include season number, episode number, episode season
  • A quick way to mark each episode as “watched”

Off I went to start building a database and a straight forward front end, a day or so later, my proof of concept was complete and I had all of the X Files episodes loaded and ready to go.

StevieTV was born, I did exactly what I needed it todo, I was pleased.

But wait, there’s more than just the X Files

Initially when I came up with the idea of “Stevie TV”, X Files was the goal and nothing else. But after i began checking off the X Files episodes I was watching, I realised I wanted to add more TV or Movies and track those as well.

A small rethink of the database design was required to handle multiple different shows, movies, and a few things that didn’t really fit into their own category, documentaries were one of these edge cases.

After that, I was good to add as much TV as I wanted.

What’s included?

I don’t have a hard and fast rule on what i include as part of StevieTV and what I don’t.

Generally speaking, anything I want to watch on streaming services like Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video etc will be included. But things like I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here are not included.

Movies are also included as well as a small number of one of shows, documentaries etc

Sharing’s Caring

At least I think it is. I’m not sure if I’m proud or ashamed to document my time spent watching TV (keep reading for some stats) but I felt like it was something I could share.

Originally, I would tweet once a day for anything I had watched (that day). Every Sunday I would tweet what I had watched in the last 7 days. Some days/weeks there would be nothing, and others there would be more than I should be admitting to :)

This does still apply now, but using Mastodon instead, but I’m working on different ways of sharing StevieTV content.

Evolution

The core functionality of StevieTV remains the same, it has evolved slightly with different in the moment sharing options. I can add them to Buffer to share later, or to Drafts to add a bit more customisation before I share.

I’ve also added a search function and also the ability to pin shows I’m currently watching, this allows me to manage them at a glance rather than finding the next episode each time. I can sort my favourite shows as well.

StevieTV is still part of my daily life, with new shows being added and watched at least once a month. The deign is pretty much how it was when I started, simple.

What am I currently watching?

  • Below Deck Sailing Yacht
  • Welcome To Wrexham
  • Young Sheldon

What’s left to watch?

In short, way too much.

I have 206 active shows, with 6,942 episodes between

That’s approx 4862 hours or 202 days of my life, if I don’t sleep or work.

As mentioned the number of shows / episodes is growing all the time.

What’s Next?

A redesign as its getting a bit dated and it needs a refresh.

My biggest consideration is this. Currently StevieTV is just mine, one user and no one else. A few of my friends know I’ve created a TV tracker and they want todo the same thing.

The question is, do I want to open it up to multiple users? Maybe even make it public. I don’t know is the simple answer. Right now, I quite like that it’s just me.

Sneak Peak

A screenshot of StevieTV with a few shows listed

Where do I get the data from?

My main source of TV shows and episode data is EP Guides. It has a huge database and you can easily export to CSV

Chat GPT and Google Bard are great sources as well

Outside of that Wikipedia and IMDB are useful as well.

It’s worth noting that whilst the data is generally pretty accurate, it doesn’t always match, sometimes episode titles can vary. Oh and sometimes there are no titles, just episode 1, 2, 3 etc

Stats

For those of you that kept on reading, I did promise some stats:-

  • 2019 I watched approx 400 hours of TV
  • 2020 I watched approx 701 hours of TV
  • 2021 I watched approx 637 hours of TV
  • 2022 I watched approx 571 hours of TV
  • 2023 so far I have watched approx 452 hours of TV

Can you spot when Covid was?

So there we go, any questions, let me know.