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Personal Video Recorders vs Ads
Kris_J writes "Electronic Media Online have an article about PVRs and their effect on viewing habits. Specifically it says that owners watch more TV, less ads and have less of an idea what channels they're watching. I like the last line; "The [senior advertising] executive said he had never heard of PVRs, and moreover, he wasn't interested in learning more." Good." Having owned a TiVo for about six months now, I can confirm this - my TV watching has gone up, a bit, I watch barely any ads - but I usually have a good idea which channel I'm on. CartoonNetwork has some great network promoting ads.
No, the best one is the supervillains' meeting.
"Look, I just want some pants! A decent pair of pants!"
I'm one of the many TiVo owners who tends to fastforward through ads (we used to have a phrase "quick, fast forward before we have to pay for TV") - and there's a simple reason why. Ads are crap.
I went to see Tomb Raider (don't laugh) at the cinema, and with the exception of one awful haircare related advert, I actually didn't mind sitting through them. They were generally funny. And this is what ads need to be.
If they want people to watch adverts, then they're going to have to make them worth people's while. They need to be short, memorable and funny, and, most of all, not frequently repeated! I'll stop fastforwarding even now if I see an advert that catches my eye - but, given the adverts on British TV, this is very rare. The adverts on American TV are too frequent, but less irritating (but then I was only over there recently for a week, times change)
You still need a PVR to watch West Wing - apologies to any ad executives reading this, but we start watching fifteen minutes after it begins live so we can fast forward through the ads.
The problem isn't if the channel is inconsistent, but if something follows (or runs before) the show you pad "just in case". I can't pad Sex and the City and still get the first showing (it will conflict with The Practice, and I don't want to miss the first minute or two of that).
Of corse it bugs me even more that it happens on HBO, after all that is one of the few channels I pay enough to that I'm not expected to support it by watching commercials, and they can't get the times in their schedules right!
I did find it surprising that folks watch 25% of the commercials. If the first commercial in a group is for a movie, or looks interesting I'll watch it, and sometimes same for the next, but the first irritating commercial, I skip the whole block (once in a great while I'll watch something out of the block). Or I'll skip the whole block if I'm really into the show (as opposed to having it on, and coding something on the laptop). I thought I would watch more then the average number of commercials, and I know I don't watch 20% of them...
Yes, but I do at least understand why. The theater chains (not the movie makers or distributors) are pretty much all bankrupt, close to bankrupt, or recently re-emerged from bankruptcy. They aren't making money on tickets, that just recoups the cost to rent the film. They don't even get the whole take on popcorn and overpriced soda, the film distributors are demanding a large percentage of that as well (plus I almost never buy the crap).
The commercials at the front of the movie (and the slideshows) are pretty much the only thing the theater owners get to keep!
It is still one of the big reasons I just watch most movies at home now (plus I finally have a nice sound system). Oh, and with the TiVo I'm not even watching as many movies. It's interesting how it has gone from I have 150 channels, and nothing is on half the time, to "Wow, I always have 60 hours of stuff to watch...",
It isn't unfair to ad-buyers, since they know what they are paying for. It is inefficient though.
The part I dislike is since the advertisers actually pay for the shows, they have more influence over them then the people that watch them. That's scary with TV news. Frustrating with TV dramas (why can't they say "fuck"? for cable channels it's the advertisers...)
Which will make it a whole lot less useful then the TiVo which once told "I like this show the most, and this one more then that one, and first runs of this one more then that one, and..." will just "do the right thing". Or at least pretty close. And it is surprisingly easy to set up. It handles schedule changes, and will frequently pick up things I didn't know were on.
That's not to say it is perfect. It would be nice if it could remember things I had seen for longer then 28 days, or if when the satalite box fails to change channels if I could tell it is hadn't recorded a show it thought it had (or better yet for it to OCR the channel number off the upper right of the screen and retry -- that is the first thing I would try to add...). Also the priority info is only used for local choices (X and Y are on now (and haven't been recorded recently, and...), X is more important, so I'll record X...not X and Y are on now, X is on again later Y isn't, so I should grab Y now and X later...)
A recorder without schedule info won't be worthless, but it just plain ain't as good.
That one is easy. The same box that records stuff and makes it trivial to FF over commercials also reports back channel and time usage (unless you opt-out, which is both possible and free with TiVo, not sure about the others).
Enlighten us (or at least me)...
Got you covered, check this out:
http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~epa98/work/apps/xmltv/
Next problem?
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Why can't I moderate something "Wrong" or at least "Grossly Misinformed"?
That's been going on at least since the late '80s. In some cases the spots showed up in theaters before they ran on-air.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Pepsi-Cola originated in New Bern, North Carolina and Mountain Dew somewhere in western NC about a half century or so later so I feel safe in saying that they're just as southern as Coca-Cola.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Anybody have any evidence that Cheerwine and Sundrop didn't originate in the piedmont of NC?
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
No. I'm pretty sure that if you poll everyone with a PVR, you will find out that the vast majority do not watch ANY ads. I surely don't wait at a commercial break and see if the ad is funny. And since TiVo only has FF, and no "30-second skip," there's no way in hell I'm stopping for any along the way. I hit FF, wait a second or so after I see the show come back, and hit play. No commercials at all.
Maybe that's just you. On my TiVo, I use 3xFF to scan through commercials at 60x and try to start back into the program as closely as possible also. However, if a commercial catches my attention, I will rewind and watch it. In fact, I do this regularly. I still skip about 95% of all commercials, but I often do watch the good ones. I'd rather not have a 30-second skip button -- not all commercials are 30 seconds, and it makes it too easy to miss the good commercials.
Even the ones I ignore probably make an impression, since I'm watching the screen closely for the program to start again. If the advertiser can get their message across while scanning at high speed, good for them. I just don't want to spend the time being a captive audience. If I had forced commercials from HDTV, I'd pick up a book. Viewers will ignore commercials that don't interest them, no matter what interlocks they design into the system.
Advertisers need to learn that the solution is not to try harder and harder to force viewers to see their ads, but to make their ads interesting and entertaining enough that they want to see them. People will sit down any watch "The best commercials you've never seen (and some you have)" because those commercials are good. People who hate football record the Super Bowl just to see the commercials. People will watch good commercials, but they'll ignore bad ones, no matter how much you try to force them to watch...
Deven
"Simple things should be simple, and complex things should be possible." - Alan Kay
I'm not shedding too many tears for cable networks - I'm already paying them, I shouldn't have to watch ads as well.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Actually, I have not noticed this problem with Tivo. It seems uncannily accurate. (But your milage may vary, don't consider this an endorsement.) I think one of the Tivo patents is related to a trick that Tivo uses, where it somehow scans the closed-caption information to determine when programs really begin, similar to your "program starts now" signal idea.
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I have already seen banner ads on "Hardball with Chris Matthews". The program suddenly shrinks to a window about 3/4 size in the upper right, and the bottom and left portion of the screen fills with some ad thingie for a few seconds, and then the screen returns to normal.
Also, many TV stations used to have a little logo (fairly unobstrusive) in the lower right corner of the screen in order to remind people what channel they're watching, but I have seen these things get more obtrusive. They sometimes include animations that invade other parts of the screen, and they are always (so far?) ads for other shows on the same channel. It probably won't be much longer before these are used to advertise tampons or Coke or whatever.
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I disagree about that being ideal. I think it's a decent short-term solution, but it's still an unfair approach.
IMHO, the real solution is to get rid of ad-funded content altogether. Ad-funded content is a subtlely-dishonest way to get around the TANSTAAFL principle. Remember that if advertisements pay for the content, then the people who buy the advertised product end up paying for the advertisements, so it's not like anything is really "free" -- it's just that there are levels of indirection, and the people who pay are not necessarily the people who receive. That is unfair (because content-funders and content-enjoyers are not always the same), and also inefficient (because of the indirection and middlemen).
The fairest approach is for there to be a direct correlation between whose who receive and those who pay, where everyone pays for what they get, and nobody pays for stuff they don't get. The only way to achieve this ideal is for content to be somehow paid for by those who enjoy it, and for there not to be other revenue streams (e.g. ads) polluting this relationship.
I'm not sure this is attainable, though, since people are quite happy to deceive themselves by watching TV that they think is "free" and then buying overpriced products that just "happen" to be heavily advertised (e.g. Coke).
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Didn't it piss you off that you had to sit through advertising before seeing a movie that you paid to get into. They already got their money for you being there, and they're selling your time! I haven't been to a movie in 2 years since they started doing this. If they're going to make money off of me then the shouldn't charge so much for me to get in. And the money I saved has bought me a huge TV and the movies on DVD sans adverts. The huge TV and the surround sound still isn't quite as good as going to see the movie in the theater though. I just can't bring myself to go. Damn, that just pisses me off!
I also own a TiVo, and I agree. It is unfortunate though. I used to spend over $700 a year going to see movies in the theater, and now it just doesn't seem worthwhile. There was always something that was just better about going to see a movie on the big screen, but now the whole experience seems less attractive. Oh well.
DirecTV can afford the bandwidth to digitally mark a section of time as "no fast forward." Defeat it, and they will have you prosecuted under the DMCA.
I can hardly see the TV networks marking their adverts digitally; otherwise easily-hacked digital devices could recognise them with no effort at all-- DMCA or not, making ads stand out from normal broadcasts would be enough of an incentive for somebody to invent technology to filter them with 100% effectiveness.
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Matthew
Matthew @ Bytemark Hosting
Just curious. I've been hearing about Tivo on virtually every media outlet and have yet to see one or a clone being shipped overseas. When can we get a device which can handle 220V, PAL AND record multiple channels? I'd dump by VCR in a second for one of these.
Don't forget how many new shows are launched on, say, NBC in-between Friends and Frasier or on Fox in-between The Simpsons and X-Files. At that point it's hard to tell whether the new shows get rated simply because they're between two other shows that people already watch in droves, or there's no other 1/2 hour shows to fill in the gap.
Incidentally, did anyone else besides me jump up and yell "Bullshit!" when they first heard of the so-called 500 channel universe that we were supposed to be in by now? All I could think was that it's hard enough filling 25 channels with worthwhile material.
PS: Daily Show rules!
Pope
What? Bear is driving car? How can that be?!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
I've been thinking about this since I got my Tivo, and I've come to the conclution that my PVR usage falls into three main uses:
1. Watching shows that I couldn't watch 'cause they're on while I'm working/sleeping. No big loss to the Ad world here. If I didn't have a Tivo anywawy, I wouldn't be watching the show, so now I'm watching the show, but skipping the ads.
2. Watching shows that I missed 'cause I have doing something else. Okay, here they might have a point. If I didn't have a Tivo, I might have stop to watch this show (with commercials), but instead I'm watching it on the Tivo and zapping though the ads. However, more likely I'd still be down the pub, and I'd just miss the show (and ads).
3. (And this is the important one) Watching shows as they're boardcast. If there's something on that I want to watch, I'm going to watch it second for second as it's broadcast. Commercials and all. Anything that's worth watching, that doesn't fall into the two above catagories, I want to watch NOW, not in half an hour. Okay, I might miss the first 5 minutes, rewind, skip one commercial, and catch up. Still, I'm getting my full dose of ads. Plus I can pause it when the phone rings.
Anything good on during Prime Time is always going to have ad money behind it. Not a Big Deal.
Open source means never having to say thank you.
Is there a way to set up a PVR to only record the TvLand Retromercials?
Given that the digital rebroadcasts of BBC channels don't carry it, it would seem that the restriction is technical.
A real pity, PDC was fantastic. How VCRs ought to have been since day one.
Greg
(Inside a nuclear plant)
Aaaarrrggh! Run! The canary has mutated!
Probably just printing space in the listings mags. From what I recall, VP simply assumes that the non-aerial system is tuned to a certain number and after that it's just a table to combine calendars and times. After all, it's not switching the decoder box yet...
Greg
(Inside a nuclear plant)
Aaaarrrggh! Run! The canary has mutated!
...or at least, a recent survey that was strikingly similar to this if it wasn't the same one [an advertiser at AVS Forum], it was an online survey with checkboxes. (And they were a little confusing at times.) A rate of anything around 10% or below should be ignored.
PVRs are great. I just hope the media doesn't become paranoid over them and somehow manage to ruin a good thing. Besides, I (like they asked on the survey) actually will stop FF'ing to view commercials that look entertaining or interest me. I keep on gliding past for Tampax and the rest.
Paraphrasing, mind you:
"[Snacks] for each of us will take more than a dollar! It will take all our dollars! That means snacks and change for each one of us, and that takes time we haven't got! This looks like a job for...a twenty!!"
CN has the licensing and the chutzpah to mesh cartoons from all ages, for the benefit and humor of all. God(s) bless the Cartoon Network!
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Co-founder of GerbilMechs
Sure, right now they are all hackable...
But really - there is no way to easily increase storage, or put shows "off-line" or to an external array...
Think about it - why do VCRs exist? The law says that time-shifting is legal. So many of us "time-shift" shows to a tape - so we may watch them again and again - including shows that we may never see again! I have all the episodes of X-Files on tape, as well as all the episodes of Millenium. Which one will most likely go into syndication? X-Files. Millenium will never be seen from again - but I have a copy I can watch again if I want to (including the pilot episode - which has never been rerun, AFAIK - due to the graphic violence portrayed in it).
Guess what? With these PVRs - time-shifting is still allowed - but archiving goes out the door. Slap the DMCA on top of encrypted content - disallow recording shows that you have to pay for (if you can record them at all) - and force subscribed content - and you have a televisions exec's wet dream.
Furthermore, you will never be able to watch those old shows - only what they want to allow you to watch.
This is why I am keeping my VCR as long as I can - at least until HDTV becomes standard - when that occurs, I might just chuck my TV.
Unless we can build an open homebrew platform for movie and TV watching, at-home TV entertainment is screwed as we know it.
Worldcom - Generation Duh!
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
However, I doubt a box set will ever appear - and I bet you won't see it running on FX for any real length of time, unlike X-Files.
There are also shows that I wish I could watch again, if just for the laugh factor - two that I would love to watch again are "Whiz Kids" (now I know that one is syndicated on some channel - not sure which, though), and "Automan" (cheesy, cheesy, cheesy). There was another one I wouldn't mind watching (called "Lost World" or something, about a family that wanders through parallel universes, going through these warping devices shaped like pyramids I believe - and no, it isn't "Land of the Lost" I am thinking about - it was like a family of four or five people).
Anyhow - these devices could cause the prevention of any such watching of this nature...
Worldcom - Generation Duh!
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
TiVo 2.0 has a feature where you can tweak the start/end time for a program so that it'll start early or end late (or whatever combination you need), which helps if a channel is consistently early or late. If they're all over the map, though, you're still SOL.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
Not quite. Stations get ratings from statistics gathered through various forms, including polls. If the poller asks someone what station they watched, and the person doesn't know, then the station gets no recognition. The poll results set the value of the stations advertising time, not the actual number of viewers.
When statistics gatherers can tell what station you were watching without having to ask (i.e. smart boxes that report back channel and time usage), then you would be correct.
This form has other problems, such as I left the box on and walked out of the house. Statistics get recorded, but I wasn't actually watching.
Station recognition has other benefits that I won't go into. It's not just about what the viewer cares about.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
Now that UK has more stations, cable, etc, this may have changed. But it used to be like that.
Which reminds me of a funny story. About 20 years ago I was watching TV with my cousin and her parents when an ad for Double-Decker candy bar came on. Some stupid jingle that sang something like "Eat double decker candy bars, it'll help keep your pecker up."
I was laughing so hard my eyes were streaming while these proper english folks were staring at that crazy American without a clue that pecker meant one's male member and not your chin in the U.S. I was crying as I said "Damn, I'm going to buy me a few cases of those things."
Fscking cool tech. Evil as hell (today it's sports, tomorrow it's the news, see that really is $POLITICIAN in $BAD_PLACE! We have video to prove it!), but I don't blame you for jumping at the chance to work with cool toys ;-)
The funniest thing I saw recently was an auto race where the cars kept driving past this billboard. The funny thing was, the billboard appeared only in one camera angle, and cast no shadow. Sometimes, the billboard was blank (probably because I was watching an over-the-air broadcast, not cable.) Translation: somebody goofed. (Either that, or there was a Glitch in The Matrix, and I'm waking up :)
Another cute trick comes from F1 - for several years, advertisers have laid down billboards on the grass surrounding the racetrack. The cute part is that the ads have been stretched/distorted so that they appear "flat" when viewed from the camera that happens to cover that turn. (And really weird when another camera happens to catch a glimpse of them :) Basically, the inverse of what you'd do in GIMP (screw Photoshop ;-) to make a billboard that you took a picture of at an oddball angle look like you were viewing it face-on. No computers required. (Though it'd be trivial to digitally-insert new ads on top of these, since the shapes are known in advance to be "nearly-perfect rectangles surrounded by green" to any software fed input from the camera.)
Prediction: Part of the fun of watching live sports and news (they digitally-edited Times Square for New Year's Eve, Y2K) will soon be figuring out how much of what you're seeing is "live", and how much is digitally-generated.
Well, I do own and watch TV now, last year I was paying for cable without having a TV... My apartment complex had this deal where we got 1/3 off, but subscription was mandatory. It was pretty obviously a "we think more than 1/3 of you will steal cable anyway" type of move.
No, it was sarcastic. However, the poster apparently anticipated that some might not get it, and put a reference to "Brave new world" in the last sentence. In case you don't know "Brave new world" describes a distopian society that you'd rather not live in...
> Have you ever seen clips of the news in Iraq? They still say that they won the Gulf war!
Not that the CNN "Nintendo-wars" reporting was any better...
Say no to software patents.
PVRs are a godsend. I've had my TiVo for about half-a-year, and I almost refuse to watch TV without it. I watch twice as many programs as I used to, and I do it all in the same amount of time I've always had.
:)
TiVo's suggestions and season passes are fantastic. I have a very intrusive work schedule, and I used to have a hard time keeping up with a lot of the shows I like to watch on a daily basis. With my modified 144hr TiVo, I literally set season passes up for every show I like to watch - and view them whenever it's convenient. Skipping commercials saves a good 1/4 of my time, and it's ideal for watching time-shifted sports. Wrastlin' for example (ok ok, sports entertainment... whatever) is awesome on TiVo... 60x FF through commercials and "reviews", 2x FF through matches you don't care too much about (since you can still see all the action), and watch all of the rest of the program. I nuke a 1:07 WWF RAW in 31min. I also will purposely start watching shows late, just to have the ability to burn through any TV show. I can watch yesterday's and today's Simpsons episode in just about the same half-hour.
Probably the best feature of TiVo is the instant replay. I use it often for catching those commercials that are absolutely hysterical, or even more for "live TV mishaps"... when someone accidently cuts to a backstage camera or puts something on the screen that certainly shouldn't be there. It's perfect for that flasher that walks up behind your local news guy's stand-up.
I personally have a box very similar to that at home. It's a Windows 2000 box (stop throwing things at me!) that has an ATI All-In-Wonder Pro inside of it, a huge 40 GB hard drive (the only reason it's not a Linux box; older BIOS couldn't recognize the large HDD), a PII 233, 128 MB of RAM, and a TV-out so I can view it on the big screen. It captures directly into MPEG-1 format, at about a Gig per hour (which can be further trimmed down by DiVX for archival purposes). The ATI drivers even have a scheduler, so you can say "I want to record channel X for Y minutes on Z date" and it will do it for you.
It's not quite as elegant as a TiVo, but it is highly adaptable, and can be used all over the world. It just takes a bit more time to set up, and a bit of a hacker mentality in order to deal with all the problems that arise (especially cutting off the beginning and ends of programs... Does TiVo have this problem?)
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That's just the way it is
We already know where this one will go. When that senior executive finds out what PVR's are and what they can really do, you can bet that he's going to scream bloody murder and threaten TiVO with lawyers unless they put in a piece of hardware that makes you watch the ads. Wouldn't it be cool if instead of reacting with lawsuit (which we all know the networks will inevitably do) they responded to PVR's by making ads fun to watch?
Do you have problems with excessively pointy nipples? It seems like at some point in our lives, we have all had problems with embarassing nipple points! Well in more primative days you might have had to reach for a sweater. Not any more! Now you can ask your doctor about Flern! The miracle drug that can eliminate your pointy nipple problems! Forever! Ask your doctor about Flern today! (Possible side effects include liver problems, psychotic episodes and projectile vomiting. Ask your doctor before taking Flern if you are pregnant or nursing.)
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
There are exactly two sources of online television listing information for U.S. cable systems: Tribune Media Services, and TV Guide.
Both of these providers make their money by selling access to the data, and have a TOS on their web site that forbids extracting the data and loading it into your own PVR without paying them for their data.
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
I think this could lead to a complete change in marketing. No longer are we going to be bombarded with ads we don't give a rat's ass about. Now the billboards in movies are going to sold, and changed to suit differet areas/cultures/people. Now I am going to see Coke or Dr. Pepper (since I am in the south) while yankees will see Pepsi, and the such.
Obviously marketing strategies are going to have to change if people are not watching the ads. Companies will find a way (e.g. X10) to MAKE you see what they want you to. Then, things like browser.open can be shut off...and oops...they found another way.
It's a cycle that we go thru. It's all part of being in a free market economy. They want to sell, we want to buy, so they find a way to tell us what they have! It all goes in a circle.
------ This has been provided as a public service! ------
Actually [certainly in the UK] adverts breaks are already marked to allow local re-broadcasters to insert localised adverts and content in broadcasts. They are also syncronised [iirc] to 1/6th of a second. It's also possible to buy analog recorders off the shelf that recognise these and jump-cut adverts automatically.
OTIt annoys to hell out of me that subscription channels also carry adverts, usually more adverts than the terrestrial channels which [in the UK] have an hourly advert limit set my licence regulation.
I do all of my tv watching via TiVo now, and personally I think this report is rubbish in regards to branding and advertising. My rebuttal, in no particular order:
First, people who use a PVR do watch more tv. As a result, they are exposed to more ads during the same time period then they were before.
At least on TiVo, it is impossible to skip over the commercials. Even on maximum fast forward, which is mighty tricky to stop with precision, you get the gist of the commercials and the advertisers still get brand recognition.
Many networks use station branding to fill gaps in their commercial windows (which can be seen even during fast forward) and many place little visual "bugs" in the corner of the programming itself. (TNT is particularly annoying in this regard.)
While 12% couldn't say which network the show was on, atleast that many wouldn't have watched it at all had it not been for their PVR. Ain't statistics great. Think about it. Wouldn't you rather have viewers, even if they don't know who you are, than not have them. If they don't know what network the show is on, how were they gonna watch it without the PVR; and for many shows, who's gonna stay up to 4am to watch it.
Networks may get better ad revenue at night, eventually. I regularly record programming that I wouldn't stay up for. As PVRs become more common place and rating systems catch on, the time of day a show airs will become less relevant to the pricing for its advertising.
Many of the described problems can be addressed through simple changes if the networks care. For example, if you want to record a half-hour show starting at 8:30 and running to 9:00, the PVR will start at 8:30 and run to 9:00. Instead of starting the program at 8:30:00, start it at 8:30:05 and preceed it with 5 seconds of "You're watching ____."
Some people have a way with words, and some people, um, thingy.
Which is why my wife and I sit down 15 minutes into a show TiVo's recording, FF over the commercials, and if we time it right, catch up exactly at the end. No commercials, effectively real-time viewing, and a bit of extra free time (and with a two-year-old, fifteen minutes makes a difference!)
http://www.showstopper.com
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Crap, that's not the right link. And now I can't find it. But it is out there. There have already been ask slashdots about it.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Tivo has recently introduced a new "feature" to brand the shows for the networks. For example, some of the shows it tapes for me have a peacock icon next to them, in an attempt to make sure people know what channel it came from. I wonder if the 12 percent was measured before or after that change.
Of course, even that doesn't exactly do wonders. First off, I don't even remember who the hell the peacock is (CBS? NBC?). Furthermore, I don't care. I tell Tivo to record shows that I've heard are good. When I want to watch live TV (never), I browse the show names. The only reason I want to know which network shows what is so I can understand all the jokes about UPN.
Will channels as a brand die? It's possible, but I doubt the brands were ever as strong as they'd like to think. It's the content, stupid.
Telling them that you just found a way to skip all of the ads is as clever as telling a store owner that you found a neat way to shoplift from his store (although the former is not illegal -- yet).
Its more like telling a waiter you dont really have to tip him. Or telling a priest you arent required to put money in the collection plate.
If enough people stop doing these things voluntarily, well then they will probably start charging outright for their services.
There is really nothing wrong with that per se. But the store/stealing analogy is all wrong. Content is not a product. It cannot be stolen.
"
The other option, of course, is all-pay channels, or pay-per-view on all shows. That's what you want, right?
"
That's exactly what I want.
When I buy a chocolate bar, I am paying money to their marketing departement to pay a TV company to produce programs. I'd rather have a cheaper chocolate bar and have to pay for the TV thanks.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. (Einstein)
Ok... here is what I want to know. Is anyone working on an open-source Tivo-like device which doesn't require a monthly service fee to access programming info, and instead you would program it in a similar fashion to a VCR? IMHO, I think this would be a much better, and more easily attainable application of linux + cheap hardware for a consumer device then something such as a gaming console. With a device like this, you might have the option of buying a prebuilt one, paying a bit more for the hardware in exhange for not needing to pay monthly service fees, or you could build your own using published specs and software. If done right, this is something that would appeal to both techies and non techies. People who frequent slashdot would more than likely build our own, but if the device was as simple to use as a VCR then non tech people would still be interested in buying prebuilt devices.
Time for some tasty Shiner Bock!
With only one agency reporting the news, it would be more concise, clear, and best of all, not biased at the least in order to get ratings.
Is this a serious post? Have you ever seen clips of the news in Iraq? They still say that they won the Gulf war! Of course, it is government-run, but if only one source is reporting the news, you only get ONE viewpoint.
It's nearly impossible to write a truly unbiased story, giving fair time to all viewpoints. Having a multitude of news sources ensures that most sides of a story are heard, and not even this works all the time.
I'm sorry but the logic behind all the statements in the previous post is just very odd. Think about so many of the major stories over the years, if there were only one news source, most of those stories wouldn't be uncovered. Would there have been a Watergate if there were no Washington Post? Maybe, maybe not. The point of having free media coming at you from different viewpoints--be it liberal, conservative, environmental, industrial, pro-life, pro-choice, or whatever--is that everyone is heard.
Like I said, if you want a country that has one news source, try Iraq.
Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?
It wasn't an assumption. I'm willing to bet that the other poster followed your lead, when you referred to the person that you're going to marry as your fiance. A fiance is a man who's engaged to be married. A fiancee is a woman who's engaged to be married.
People aren't 'loyal [network du jour] viewers' but will go where they perceive the best value is. At least, some will.
Not really true. The true thing Networks should fear about the PVR is their fall TV lineup. It's hard to do a "must-see Thursday" if no-one's watching it live. Heck, it's really hard to promote a new show if everyone's watching from "tape". Say you find a show (obPlug: Whose Line Is It Anyways) that you enjoy. You set it to record. Say they cancel the second episode each night, and replace it with something else. You're no longer taping it, since it's not Your Show. You'll notice it eventually, but the first few weeks are key to see whether a show will survive.
And people are lazy, which is why stuff like "Must See TV" exists. Hell, there are shows that existed for YEARS that were utter dreck. But you are correct that brand loyalty went out the window. It left when the networks started trying to get the audience from the others. Check out Leno vs Letterman these days. They're almost identical. Joy. Guess I'll go watch Jon Stewart.
"Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
It's already on its way.
Background: I worked on a project which took LIVE video from at camera at a sporting event, searched for a "target" in the video, and if found, mapped an advertisement over the target (appropriately scaling, rotating, etc.) and sent the generated video out to a payperview TV channel. NOTE: This was a couple years ago; it required about $BIGNUM of computer and digital video equipment, and a couple of people to operate it. The goal: targeted advertising based on destination country (e.g. Budweiser in USA, Guiness in the UK.)
With the recent, and continuing, advances in video cards and computing horsepower, I can see the day when this is done in each user's PVR! The programming challenge we faced was actually locating the target in the video. With pre-recorded content, the coordinates could be determined in advance and shipped along with the video to the PVR -- then it's just a minor effort to map the selected product onto the specified coordinates.
For example, "Mary" might see Jennifer Anniston drink a Diet Coke, but Joe SixPack sees her down a Budweiser. (Programming challenge: hack the PVR so that it can target and replace clothing with skin tones. :*)
I've been using a PVR for years now. What are these things they call ads? I have no idea what an ad is, and I have no interest in finding out. I have no more comments.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
The fact that both the advertising companies and the media companies backed the PVR makers should give you pause before you start celebrating the death of either.
Milo
Speaking of which, remind me to pick up some VHS tapes to collect those Dr. Who episodes that are eating up my disk space...
std::disclaimer<std::legalese> sig=new std::disclaimer; sig->dump(); delete sig;
Notice how Hemos still watches the ads on Cartoon network. Did you stop to wonder why he'll watch those ads, but not others? I've seen them before, and I'd gladly watch them again. ... If they want our attention for 30 seconds at a time again, they're going to have to work for it by making commercials entertaining!
No. I'm pretty sure that if you poll everyone with a PVR, you will find out that the vast majority do not watch ANY ads. I surely don't wait at a commercial break and see if the ad is funny. And since TiVo only has FF, and no "30-second skip," there's no way in hell I'm stopping for any along the way. I hit FF, wait a second or so after I see the show come back, and hit play. No commercials at all.
The only time I see anything at all ad-related is if I press the play button too soon, and I catch the last second or so of the commercial break.
I think you're going to see more advertising within the program itself. Sporting events have the arenas, half-time shows, etc. with corporate names. Soccer matches have little ads next to the clock.
Pretty soon I expect to see a scene like this on West Wing:
President: Leo, have the generals come up with a plan of attack yet?
Leo: No, sir. They expect to have three to choose from within 5 hours.
President: (Checking watch.) Damnit! We're going to be here all night again! Charlie, would you go fetch me a Code Red?
Charlie: The internet worm, sir?
President: No! Mountain Dew Code Red, of course! The best drink on earth! The President of the United States always drinks Code Red when he's pulling an all-nighter!
"And like that
I do believe he was using a bit of the old sarcasm there - judging by the reference to Brave New World at the end anyway. I think that 95% of the world can agree that having an official version of the news is a bad thing. We are, however, moving very closely to that today. All the major networks are owned by multinational corporations who have the same interests. Notice how little news there was about the G8 summit protests beyond the one protester getting shot in the head, and then blaming all the violence on a small fraction of the protesters. Now go to indymedia and see how they report it. I'm not saying that indymedia is not sensationalist or that they are entirely accurate, just that the truth has to lie somewhere in between.
The things you do to save a few hundred dollars on a Personal Video recorder...
I am trying to peice together something like the TIVO unit - I have a couple large HHD's, a motherboard that can do RAID, and a Matrox g400 Marvel. Not really a great gaming card, but it a fair job with MJPEG capture.
After waiting and waiting for drivers, I downloaded the final cut of the PC-VCR tools and drivers for Win2K - which holds the promise of getting over the 2M file limit I had in WinSE. What did they do? It is now a TV tuner with no recording. Way lame for a (at the time) $300 card that was bought just for that kind of thing. What did Matrox say? Hey, here is a coupon for $50 for one of our new shiny Marvel 450 cards that don't have hardware encoding, so no issues! Hmmn, only $170 more to get a version that does software encoding... I need a shower.
Yup, I was trying to use Win2K for this rather than Linux. Video4Linux might give me what I need for capturing, but I'm still learning the config and install stuff on Linux. (Got tomcat and apache to run, still struggling with Oracle... but getting close, I think). That, and my editing software is Window's based...
My wife just gave me that "your crazy" look when I vented to her last night - I know you guys care....
+++ UGUCAUCGUAUUUCU
You referred to your "fiance" -- a word that means a man who is engaged to be married . It's like referring to your "son" and getting angry when someone assumes that your "son" is male.
In your first message you wrote:
My fiance[sic] and I deliberately fast forward through all commercials
Now you write:
We don't simply ignore all advertising.
At least try to be consistent. First you tell us that you fast-forward through all commercials because you "want advertisers to realize just how ineffective their advertising has become." Now you tell us that you are trying to vote on which commercials that you like through your remote. If you want to show which ads you like, buy the products advertised in them. There have been plenty of entertaining ads that failed to sell products.
The bottom line is this: If you convice all advertisers, except The Cartoon Network ("We will watch those cartoon network ads on occasion though"), that their ads are worthless, then the ads will go away. The ad revenue will go away. And we will all end up paying for television channels that we now enjoy at little or no cost.
I said that telling advertisers that you have found a way to skip their ads is "as clever as telling a store owner that you found a neat way to shoplift from his store." I did not say that it was stealing and, in fact, pointed out that, unlike stealing, it was not illegal. The end result is the same nonetheless: You get something from them while depriving them of their revenue stream -- either directly, in the case of shoplifting, or indirectly, through skipping the ads.
It's simple economics: If advertisers do not believe that the ads are cost-effective, they will stop placing them or demand a lower advertising rate. If the networks lower the advertising rates, then they have to run more commercials to get the same amount of income. When the number of ads goes up, viewership will probably go down. The networks will have to lower the rates again when that happens. Eventually, advertising will not be able to pay for the programming and then the viewers will pay or the programming will go away.
DirecTV feeds encrypted digital signals down to its receivers. You can't decode them or access the digital stream. They can take one of the popular TiVO/DirecTV combo boxes, put a little software in it to recognize a "no fast-forward" code, and you're hosed. End of story.
The networks aren't particularly concerned about the handful of hackers that might find a way to circumvent their commercials. They want the public at large to be forced to see them (remember the scene from A Clockwork Orange?).
So the networks won't mark commercials in an unencrypted manner on broadcast television. But you can bet that they will on DirecTV, Dish Network, and digital cable systems. And they will threaten, or buy contracts with, TiVO and the other PVR manufacturers to make them honor the codes.
As for PVRs reducing ad revenue - it probably will, though perhaps NOT as much as folks think. Remember, with HIT shows, folks like to discuss the latest episode the next day at work. Worse, if you have a recent episode recorded and then folks start talking about the surprise ending - ugh! I plan to get a Tivo soon and I'm sure I'll use it lots, I doubt I'll ever record West Wing unless forced to - I want to watch the new episodes live. TO me PVRs are just another tool for my TV watching.
At some point, TV exces will get clued into this and ad rates for hit shows will go higher while adds for syndicated reruns and lesser known shows will go down.
Also, the networks will make up the ad revenue using the new product placement technology like they now use in ballparks and stuff to put brand name stuff in sets. The production companies will also work hrader to sell product placements than they do now. I honestly could care less if a guy takes a swig from a Bud bottle instead of the obviously fake label bottles they used to use (remember the cans that looked JUST like coke cnas without the trademark logos?) The thing that will turn me instantly off to a show, however, is if the plugs get REALLY obvious during dialog. Its too jarring.
Only time will tell, but I sincerely doubt PVRs will kill network or cable TV. What I fear is PVR vendors selling out and selling ads that you CAN'T skip when you watch shows or look at menus, etc.
Top Most Bizarre/Disturbing Error Messages
On the other hand, networks that have more popular and well-known shows won't have any problems. For instance, who can watch UPN without realizing it's UPN? Perhaps it's the grainy quality of the signal (even though I have cable) or maybe it's those ads for Special Unit 2. A crime-fighting dwarf is hard to miss even at max fast-forward.
Take a look a TNN, they're halfway there. Instead of an opaque icon in the corner (which is annoying enough) they've got a damn great black banner across the bottom of the screen all the time! It's the size of the news scroll on Headline News but it's just a promotion tool. I expect ads on in the forseeable future.
www.lucernesys.comHorizon: Calendar-based personal finance
So when these things are pretty much in every house with a TV in the world (or part of the TV), how are networks (including cable networks) going to raise revenue if no one is watching commercials. I hate to think of banner ads on the CBS evening news (oh wait, those don't work), I hate to think of those big banners in the middle of the screen while watching (wait, those don't work either), I hate to think of someone pouring a Coke in the middle of my screen and then have it fade off the left while watching a program I would normally be interested in.
Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor
Fear not, pretty soon(2-3 years maybe less) directed advertising will be a reality thanks in part to seachange international.
/. ) this would be a very welcome revolution in TV.
www.seachangeinternational.com (plain text link for the goatse fearing.
If their targeted advertising shapes up like they hope I won't be fast forwarding through commercials.
The way it works(although most will scoff at this) is by using the MAC address built into cable boxes, it will keep a generic profile of your viewing habits, and then direct ads to you. say I watch farscape on SCI-FI and ED on NBC, I'll get more SCI-Fi related ads, and ads relating to comedy shows, lawyer shows, and bowling shows, etc. I saw a glimpse of it at a recent trade show.
If people can get over the relatively anonymous and generic profiling(even though I see that could never happen, esp. on
Local news is 80% "Puppies Down Wells" and "Kittens Stuck in Trees."
*FOX* Local news is "When Puppies Down Wells Attack" and "Kittens Stuck in Trees Who Rob Banks."
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Once: you're a philosopher. Twice: a pervert.
What is the solution? Well, the ideal mix of users includes a large majority who view the ads, and a small minority (this usually turns out to be the technically-inclined Slashdot crowd) who knows how to avoid them. Keep this mix, and everything is great for both groups. Let the balance get out of hand, and the result will disappoint us all.
The rise of PVRs can improve our enjoyment of TV, or it can destroy the content providers. And at this point, it could go either way.
-all dead homiez
I'm sure NBC/CBS cares that you don't know which channel you're watching. Us TV Stations spend a lot of time and effort giving themselves a sort of brand image with "Fall Lineups", "Tuesday Action Nights" or whatever. They also spend a lot of time and effort scheduling their lineup so that when they catch viewers they can keep them.
Of course they probably care even more about the fact that viewers won't be watching adverts, for obvious reasons.
I think the 'one channel reporting the news' concept is a little dangerous- you think a single news channel would really be more consise, clear, and unbiased? Imagine if you could only go to CNN for all forms of news; no slashdot, BBC, etc.
If there is any doubt, look at the popularity of sites like AdCritic.Com and the ratins for shows like "The Best Commercials You've Never Seen".
Personally, I enjoy both although I wish adcritic.com would grow some fair use backbone and offer a greater selection (they remove ads by request).
If an ad is done properly it can be quite enjoyable. Not just the funny ones either, there are some ones that really get a reaction.
Personally, with respect to PVRs, I believe the future of ads lies with product placement just like in the movies. Monica and Chandler drinking a Pepsi. The Simpsons ordering from Domino's. Frasier buying a new car from...whatever online car site hasn't gone out of business.
People I think have grown accustomed to the subtle influences that advertising has on their life. But any time you force someone to watch a commercial they are not interested in, you are asking for backlash. I am boycotting a new theater in town because they show 15 minutes of paid commecials (just like TV) interspersed within the trailers (which I sometimes do want to watch). I refuse to pay $8 to fill a seat, $8 for a light snack, and then still provide the theater with another income stream by being a captive eyeball.
- JoeShmoe
-- I wonder which will go down in history as the bigger failure: the War on Drugs or the War on Filesharing
The executive said he had never heard of PVRs, and moreover, he wasn't interested in learning more.
Radio Executive circa 1950: "I don't know anything about this 'television', and quite frankly, I'm not really interested in learning more."
Newspaper Executive circa 1920: "I don't know anything about this 'radio', and quite frankly, I'm not really interested in learning more."
Telegraph Executive circa 1870: "I don't know anything about this 'telephone', and quite frankly I'm not really interested in learning more."
Town Crier Executive circa 1450: "I don't know anything about this 'printing press', and quite frankly I'm not really interested in learning more."
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
> I watch barely any ads - but I usually have a good idea which channel I'm on. CartoonNetwork has some great network promoting ads.
THAT is why. Notice how Hemos still watches the ads on Cartoon network. Did you stop to wonder why he'll watch those ads, but not others? I've seen them before, and I'd gladly watch them again. All because they are actually entertaining. You forget that it's a commercial when you watch those ads, and that makes them much more effective.
The usual product pushing ads are boring. No one wants to waste their time watching 30 second informercials. "Jet dry will keep your dishwasher dishes clean and walk your dog too!" Bah! It's boring and has no entertaining value. I wouldn't voluntarily watch it either.
People with PVRs skip commercials for the same reason that most people don't watch Saturday afternoon infomercials. Because they are boring!
PVRs aren't going to go away anytime soon. Marketing drones are going to have to learn that the hard way. If they want our attention for 30 seconds at a time again, they're going to have to work for it by making commercials entertaining!
Maybe we're now moving to a time when all the companies will merge together and begin concentrating on actually providing quality television, rather than scrambling for ratings.
I hope that, in the future, there is only one or two channels that show us quality television all the time. Especially the news. The fewer people that are reporting the same stories, the better quality those stories will be.
Think about it; how many channels have a dozen people reporting the news? Tons. And if you could concentrate all those people into one large group and send them out on non-overlapping missions, that would be great! With only one agency reporting the news, it would be more concise, clear, and best of all, not biased at the least in order to get ratings.
I look forward to this Brave New World.
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That's just the way it is
It is no surprise to hear that people are watching less ads when they have a PVR, but we must ensure that we can continue to provide a Free way to create a PVR from commodity traffic. The question is why is their not yet a tivo type service for every tv station on the planet (like Ireland please, I could grey import a tivo now but what would be the point?). We need to release a Free package that can control a video capture device by using a db of your interests/program choices and an online db of all the tv stations available to you. I started to gather the resources to do Irish TV, can anyone point me to any projects that might like my help?
Never underestimate the dark side of the Source
Corporate investors in TiVo:
DIRECTV, Inc
NBC Multimedia, Inc.
Philips Corporate External Ventures
Advance/Newhouse Programming Partnership
CBS Corporation
The Walt Disney Company
Comcast Interactive Investments
Cox Communications Holdings
Discovery Communications, Inc
TV Guide Interactive, Inc.
Showtime Networks
Corporate investors in ReplayTV:
News America Incorporated
Adelphia Communications Corporation
Comcast Interactive Capital
Motorola, Inc
Sega of America Dreamcast
The Walt Disney Company
The Endeavor Agency
Liberty Media Corporation
Matsushita-Kotobuki Electronics
William Morris Agency
Murdock Venture Partners
NBC Multimedia, Inc
Showtime Networks, Inc
Time Warner Inc
Tribune Company
Shaw Communications Inc
At Home Corporation
Omnicom Group Inc
Echostar
Grey
The Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc
Rogers Communications
Scientific-Atlanta, Inc
Sharp Electronics Corporation
Universal Music Group, Inc
Enjoy!
Milo
The correct explanation of why you got a PVR (when talking to someone doing a survey for television advertisers) is: "I sometimes miss the toll-free phone numbers on ads and wanted to be able to pause them. I also like to watch really good ads over and over. Don't you just love the Budweiser ads with the frogs and lizards? Advertising has gotten so clever..."
Remember, the television networks took DirecTV to court to prevent DirecTV from giving subscribers network signals from stations outside of their local area. The networks are violently protective of local and national advertising revenue. Telling them that you just found a way to skip all of the ads is as clever as telling a store owner that you found a neat way to shoplift from his store (although the former is not illegal -- yet).