The receipt is honest
ShowNext can explain what synchronized, what is pending, what failed, and how fresh each answer is—even when the library contains thousands of titles and a lifetime of plays.
The product contract
Make history useful.
ShowNext is for people whose watch history has outgrown a simple checklist. It should prove that the whole library is represented, make tonight's next choice easier, and reveal what is approaching—inside an experience that feels native to Apple platforms.
Three promises
Trust, decision, identity
The first screen earns its place
It turns deep history into a small set of timely, explainable choices and a personal view of returning, delayed, and newly available shows.
Posters, time, and space
Artwork is treated as an object, progress as quiet context, and time as a first-class material—not another endless streaming grid.
Operating principles
The rules that keep the product coherent
Local first, remotely reconciled
The interface reads immediately from an account-scoped local projection; a visible receipt explains the remote truth.
Posters are objects
Artwork leads. Data adds quiet context instead of turning every screen into a dashboard.
Time is a core field
Tonight, next week, returning soon, changed, and TBA are first-class product states.
One authority per field
Trakt owns viewing truth. ShowNext and private iCloud own personal overlays; neither silently overwrites the other.
Explain recommendations
A visible, deterministic reason is more useful than a mysterious score or generated confidence.
Safe writes are one complete feature
Optimistic state, durable outbox, undo, retry, uncertain-response reconciliation, and a visible failure belong together.
Apple platform sequence
One shared truth, four native expressions
ShowNext shares domain rules, persistence, sync, artwork, and design primitives. It does not stretch an iPhone layout across every screen.
First
iPhone
Daily decision and tracking
A focused Today, fast actions, and a compact release horizon.
Next
iPad
Couch planning and library review
A multi-column horizon with keyboard, pointer, multitasking, and useful drag and drop.
Then
macOS
Deep review and management
Resizable windows, menus, commands, fast search, and dense library tools.
After the shared core is proven
visionOS
Ambient living posters
Mounted posters, glanceable countdowns, and spatial detail verified on a physical headset.
Explicit non-goals
What this is not
- A public social network, follower graph, or direct-message system.
- A general streaming playback client.
- A product whose launch, sync, or canonical facts depend on cloud AI.
- A full mirror of Trakt viewing truth inside CloudKit.
- An automatic bulk overwrite presented as a sync “repair.”
- Four Apple apps shipped before the iPhone spine and shared core are proven.