RunPee – Because movie theaters don't have pause buttons

Yes! We call it "Interval" or "Intermission". For a moment, I was wondering what's the need of this app :)

It also helps in increasing popcorn and coffee sales. I have witnessed many folks buy items at the start and during intermission (break during the movie)

This is before my time, but I have heard from a few people that there were a few, at least one Hindi classic movie [1] back in the 70's that had a running time of 255 minutes and this movie was screened with two intermissions, understandably.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mera_Naam_Joker

That's because Bollywood movies tend to be on the "longer side" its crazy how short most Hollywood films are now....catering to the short attention spans of their viewers.

having said that.....this app must die, its a terrible idea :)

The only US movie that I've seen this for was Gettysburg when they showed the Director's Cut in theaters for a limited run. My father, rest his soul, took me to see that. I recall playing Street Fighter on the arcade machine at some point during that trip. Thanks for bringing up that memory!

I think we used to have intervals here (the UK) but we later stopped having them.

TIL that intermissions don't exist in a lot of countries. I always get pop-corns and coke during the second half.

No wonder the theaters often cut to black (for a break) at abrupt points during Hollywood films. A lot of Bollywood films on the other hand have well defined "half time" or intermission.

>We think 4D movies; movies that gets the audiences' devices involved into the experience could be a way of the future.

That is certainly an interesting idea. I'm thinking, though, that getting it to work and be stable across the many devices we have is prohibitly difficult.

If I were to do something like this, I'd look at the Firefox OS phones. I don't think they are ready yet, but crazy cheap Firefox OS phones will come. They target developing countries, but would also be good for something like this. So when people buy their ticket, you also sell them this cheap device which you've prepared so that it'll work out of the box. It'll be similar to the way they currently sell 3D glasses at the cinemas.

this isn't similar at all...

Oooooh, how smart. I imagine a soccer/football game, give speakerblast your seat number for timing/placement purposes, rolling vuvuzela/team cheer-wave. Me likey!

Apparently it uses vibration.

"The Timer is our ace in the hole. You start it when the movie begins and it will vibrate before each Peetime"

You could use XPrivacy[1] and prevent access to anything you wish.

1. http://www.xprivacy.eu/

That's almost as practical, comfortable, and dignifying as the alternative non-App solution of just peeing in your pants.

YOU try a controlled peeing after drinking a 40oz soda. I'm pretty sure it will... 'overflow'

Or watch the movie at home like more and more people are doing.

I'm probably just giving in to my terroristic anti-consumerism pinko tendencies, but... don't buy a soda?

Not necessarily - the non-pee-time bits might be barely non-peeable, or absolute 'do not pee, even if you're about to wet yourself' moments :-)

That's a common comment but actually isn't true. Some great movies have fantastic Peetimes. Take for instance Captain America: Winter Soldier. (Lets not debate how good the movie was. I think it was at the very least a well told story.)

At any rate it has a fantastic Peetime. There's an entire 4+ minute span of Steve and Natasha entering the old Army base where Shield began. There's almost no dialog, it's just them searching as the tension builds. As a story telling device it's an important scene - building the tension. But if you need to take care of some urgent biological needs this makes a perfect time to run and pee. :-)

Jack Warner got there first, basically: http://articles.latimes.com/1990-06-10/entertainment/ca-378_...

I don't think that's the case at all. Most good stories ebb and flow. It's important to give the viewer a chance to relax and build up tension before another exciting scene. But you're right, "Crank" is one of those movies that puts the peddle to the metal and doesn't let off. There is of course merit to that type of story telling as well.

Well even in the screenshots it says you can go pee in the first few minutes of X-Men because it is "just silent exposition".

Now I haven't seen the movie, but that doesn't sound unimportant...

Sofia Coppola, on the other hand, makes entire movies that you can spend in the toilet

I usually try to go during a scene I've seen online (for example, XMen:DoFP had the airplane scene that was available online well before the movie came out)

When they're talking on them...

I hate seeing the bright phone screen in the middle of watching a film. [I have no idea if cinemas have a formal policy on that, though]

That said, the app had a "low key" design so it doesn't shine bright in the theater. ( Theoretically anyway).

When the movie starts you start the timer, and put the phone in your pocket. The the phone vibrates when a pee-time comes up. You don't have to take out your phone [until you're in the bathroom and want to read about what you're missing].

I've put a lot of thought into that. If you take a look at the app - it's free for now - you can see that it's easy to use without bothering others in the theater. The Timer feature is the most obvious method of using the app unobtrusively, but there are also other ways, like simply memorizing the time/cue for the Peetime of choice and looking for it during a film. We try our best to make the "cues" as memorable as possible.

That being said, there's nothing I can do to prevent, how to put this, less than considerate people from abusing the app.

I work for a relatively major cinema chain and we're experimenting without outright phone bans in a few of our trendier cinema sites. Seems to be going well so far, people respond well to it in general. Hopefully we can push it out to more sites.

>> I really think there are more important things to do with all this technology.

Then get crackin' buddy ;)

Believe me, this is something I've been thinking about. Hopefully by year's end I'll have some integration like this. Not that it takes that long to develop, but I have a lot of other things on my plate right now.

Also, integration with Google Glasses. #WIN

ew! Why do so many ppl use their phone while on the toilet!

I highly doubt that Stephen Fry would miss-spell "Lets".

It's not their problem. Possibly people would just not leave if too many left already since with waiting in the queue they could not make it back on time.

Btw, I think we had startups like this already. Is it the same one with some more sexy domain or something different?

How easy is it for devs to release two versions of an app on the various app places?

One is free but ad supported; the other has a single upfront cost and no ads.

Because it vibrates during the best times to run and pee. That way you never have to look at your bright phone in a dark theater. At the Alamo Drafthouse in Texas looking at your phone even once can get you removed from the theater if you're noticed.

Exactly. It's not new. I'm a little curious why this has resurfaced now.

That's what it seems like - In the 3-4 years I've used them (usually to see whether there's a scene after the credits, which last time I looked was a paid feature but may now be free again) they've seemed to stay pretty good at it.

A friend of mine knows the guy and both he and his wife do attend all the movies. His Twitter handle is @PolyGeek.

I know people who won't go to a movie on opening weekend because it isn't on runpee.com yet. If Hollywood was smart they'd give them advance screening privileges.

I know the guy behind this fairly well. I think the movie watching is split up between 2-3 people (Creator, his sister, and someone else). I believe they also have a movie critic on board to get the pee-times early for expected blockbusters.

For many years he has had very busy Thursday/Fridays.

This. I've been using it for a couple of years (old version, no timer) and it has saved me so many times from being frustrated later that I missed a scene in the credits.

What? No one told me. Sometimes things get crossed up during updates. Happens to all apps, iOS and Android. Uninstall and reinstall fixes it 99% of the time.

Very happy to hear it. I'd love to hear exactly how you use the app and if there's anything you think I can do to improve the experience. It's certainly a tricky situation: making an app usable during a movie without bothering the other people around you. Email me: Dan@RunPee.com if you have any feedback.

Either that, or your just not eating enough bread. Of course.. if you're trying to lose weight, peeing a lot is good. Just sayin...

Is it safe to assume that since I have always peed a lot, I am OK?

At university (nearly 20 years ago) I had a friend who was the same (or worse) than me. He was a bit of a hypochondriac, went to the doc, got tested for diabetes, and a number of other things. They shoved an endoscope up his parts (most painful thing ever, he said) and told him he had a weak bladder, deal with it. Since hearing that story, I have basically ignored the problem.

Frequent urination is also an indicator for type II diabetes, get your sugar checked.

Thanks for the PSA about PSA (public service announcement / prostate-specific antigen).

The idea seems to be that you open it when you go in. The app has settings to vibrate during the times when you are safe to leave, so you aren't taking your phone out to check, it's a push notification to you that you can go.

yes, please dont read the features of the app and instead make a snarky reply full of assumptions that are actually incorrect.

(this is why i dont go into the comments section anymore.)

Popcorn or other food makes films more enjoyable.

There are theaters that don't have plastic bags, though. The best ones are all 21-and-over, in the US, which cuts down on the noise and crowding considerably. I like CinéBistro, for example.

For many, including me, going to a cinema is to treat ourselves and have a good time. If all I wanted was to watch a movie, I could've done that at home.

I don't think you need an app to screen moviegoers for that, you need an app (or, really, a website) to rate theaters for that...Type and level of distracting behavior (whether its food related or conversation related) is a cultural preference, and different theaters serve different client bases with different dominant cultural preferences. This is in part an effect of geography, and in part self-selection through experience, but making it easier to share experience would make it easier for people to align their theater choices with their cultural preferences.