ABC wants to take Fast Forwarding Away..again :)

[tealcomp]

I thought I would post this bit of information I ran across today.

http://publications.mediapost.com/in...&art_aid=45264

[AWS]

If ABC were a person he'd be an idiot.

In the article the ABC spokesperson said "..I'd love it...' [disabling the FF buttons]. obviously this person either a.) never watches TV and lives in fairy land or b.) silently suffers like the rest of when being forced to watch 12 to 15 minutes per hour of commercials when we tuned into a show. If I wanted to watch commercials I'd watch the commercial channel or I'd record nothing but commercials. Either way, it's an idiodic idea...

Just my 2 cents worth.

AWS

[dbfresh23]

Actually it's even better when he said that he didn't think that people with DVRs cared too much about skipping commercials.

Either way, I agree he's an idiot in terms of knowing what consumers want. As a businessman - not so much an idiot.

He also seems to not know too much about the digital world of work arounds!

[stevech]

I heard this one the other day...


[telemarketer on phone] "We have a good offer for pay-per-view-TV, are you interested?"

[customer-prospect] "I don't watch a lot of TV, but maybe I'll give it a try. How much do you pay?"

[ChePazzo]

Didn't a TW exec say a few years back that as a consumer, you have an unwritten contract with the broadcast channels to watch the commercials and to not do so was "stealing" the show?

[domc]

If these companies can't change there business model, they should all just go away. Stop doing business, go out of business and such and don't claim bankruptcy. There will be some other business right behind you with a better business model and might be successful.
The old dinosuar Americana businesses just need to disappear.

Personally, I don't mind "target marketing". Dispite what the exec said, I do have a PVR for the purpose of skipping commercials. And using showanalyzer makes it even easier. I don't need the FF button, so go ahead and take the FF button away.

[AWS]

My favorite is when years back Gates says something like we'll never need more than 640K of RAM.

[stevech]

Originally Posted by domc

Dispite what the exec said, I do have a PVR for the purpose of skipping commercials.

With the amount that I have to pay the cable TV monopoly (TWC here), and with them buying Adelphia and there being less competition, and with the City/County giving them an unrestricted monopoly, I feel *no* guilt about skipping commercials.

I do feel sorry for the local city over the air broadcast stations - esp. their news staff - their days are numbered. And we'll suffer the loss of these watchdogs.

[ChePazzo]

The 'stealing' quote is much like the movie companies saying that when you buy a DVD, you aren't really buying it to own so much as buying the right to view it, which is how they justify not allowing you to back it up.

As more and more people stop watching commercials, be sure that they will find a way to get them to us. Personally, I record the show, then use an MPEG editor to remove the commercials completely, saving the show as a new file. Great for stuff like '24' where you can't stand to wait even a few remote clicks to skip commercials.

[Menehune]

Personally, I think we will eventually see a model where the TV show is in a 2/3 screen window with banner adds on the top, bottom and sides like webpages. No more full screen movies or shows. Networks already put bugs and flyins in the shows so consumers are used to the garbage in the bottom right corner of the screen. The credits in network shows are shrunk to a small window so the networks can show even more adds and "previews" during the dead air that credits occupy.

What gets me is that the "tv guide" channel on my local cableco has only the bottom 1/3 for the guide info. The top right is text adds, the top left is clip adds. And you need to wait about 5 min for the 80 channels to scroll thru.

Now if the networks and cable ops equalized their stupid commercial audio so I don't need to constantly adjust the sound levels as I switch from channel to channel, I wouldn't mind the commercials so much.

[stevech]

for those of us working with computers and the Internet (TV's next) ...

Do you ever feel like you are the marketeers' dart board?

Of course, the OFF switch stops it all.

[AWS]

Originally Posted by Menehune

Personally, I think we will eventually see a model where the TV show is in a 2/3 screen window with banner adds on the top, bottom and sides like webpages. No more full screen movies or shows. ...

I can see that happening. Plus then the networks would have the option for a "premium" service where the customer would pay for channels and then not get a commerical banner - the paying customer would off-shoot the cost of missed advertisments. "Plus" customers would have commercials during prime time and "basic" customers will not pay anything but have full-on commercial bars.

AWS

Just an idea...

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by AWS

I can see that happening. Plus then the networks would have the option for a "premium" service where the customer would pay for channels and then not get a commerical banner - the paying customer would off-shoot the cost of missed advertisments. "Plus" customers would have commercials during prime time and "basic" customers will not pay anything but have full-on commercial bars.

AWS

Just an idea...

Yeah-it's called Cable or Satellite. (Well it used to be anyways.)

Gerry

[Ken C]

Originally Posted by Menehune

Personally, I think we will eventually see a model where the TV show is in a 2/3 screen window with banner adds on the top, bottom and sides like webpages.

If this happens, it would be easy to block those portions of the screen similar to what's done in theaters. We also might see more and more 'placement' where the product is incorporated into the actual show. Could get interesting to see how ED products are used !!

Ken C

[stevech]

Originally Posted by Ken C

...We also might see more and more 'placement' where the product is incorporated into the actual show. Could get interesting to see how ED products are used !!

Ken C

interesting for WHO?

[roxy99]

I read that article. Were they really seriously considering that? How can they force SageTv to disable FF?
I'll boycott TV that's all.

[ChePazzo]

Originally Posted by AWS

I can see that happening. Plus then the networks would have the option for a "premium" service where the customer would pay for channels and then not get a commerical banner - the paying customer would off-shoot the cost of missed advertisments. "Plus" customers would have commercials during prime time and "basic" customers will not pay anything but have full-on commercial bars.

Don't bet on it. I remeber first getting cable where Nick was commercial-free. You paid for it, so there were no commercials. Then, they started advertising in between shows for thier other shows. Then, they started running full ads in between shows. Then, they started running ads just like the broadcast channels. All the while, I'm still paying.....

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

Don't bet on it. I remeber first getting cable where Nick was commercial-free. You paid for it, so there were no commercials. Then, they started advertising in between shows for thier other shows. Then, they started running full ads in between shows. Then, they started running ads just like the broadcast channels. All the while, I'm still paying.....

Just like PBS! "yeah, we have commercials now, but could you still send us some money?" and still we have "Send us money or we'll never end this pledge break and let you see the rest of the show!"

[stevech]

It's a small permutation of the V-Chips!