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TiVo Lets You Respond to Ads
WalletBoy writes "TiVo is implementing a new feature in their Series 2 recorders where viewers can choose to have their personal-contact information sent to advertisers when certain commercials air using just their remote control." This is actually exactly how I think advertising should work. If I want more information, I can press thumbs up and have my email address sent to the advertiser. It's opt-in. I'm sure it will work because they use the same concept for letting you record a show by pressing thumbs up when a commercial for it is airing. If only every commercial supported these functions. Now if only MTV would use the same thing to email me song info for videos I like instead of covering the screen in tacky text.
And for the vast majority of iniane advertisering wouldn't it be nice to have another button that lets me tell them to "fuck off" :)
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
I assume, of course, there will be a thumbs-down button so I can indicate I have no intention of ever purchasing the product featured in a particular ad, and will be never shown it again.
I should buy some cement.
...and when I click the "unsubcribe" button they'll stop sending me spam.
What I'd rather have is the "Thumbs Up/Down" buttons act as direct feedback to the advertizers:
:)
I like/Don't like this ad. You missed/hit your target audience. This ad was funny/offensive. That's cool/inane. More/no more Purple Pill commercials. That movie looks interesting/boring. Etc...
But of course, I miss most of the ads anyway with TiVo.
Get off my lawn.
Don't like it. Too much potential for abuse.
Just imagine someone getting ahold of your remote and the 'fun' they could have with this feature at your expense.
"This is not unsolicited e-mail, you clicked thumbs up on Tivo to learn more about V1aGrA"
I would be afraid of the "spam" I had "voluntarily" opted-in to due to a fitful session of rolling over the remote in my sleep, except I already get it all now.
I, along with the article submitter, am all in favor of opt-in. I opt to provide the following feedback:
1) Unscrew back of remote.
2) Use X-Acto knife to cut the metal traces on the circuit board (or shave off the conductive traces on the plastic membrane) corresponding to the thumbs-up key.
3) Replace the "thumbs up" key with a picture of my middle finger.
> Now if only MTV would use the same thing to email me song info for videos I like instead of covering the screen in tacky text.
That'd be a cool idea, and might actually return something of useful information to the viewer in exchange for his/her expression of interest in the content. Unfortunately for the poster, MTV last showed a "video" in 1997.
That's news to me.
...
When I was resting up before flying back home from LSM I was at a hotel [Kyriad rocks btw] with MTV.de and I'd say most of the daytime shows were "pimp my ride" and "newly weds" [genre].
They played some music here and there and showed constantly repetitive SMS ads [e.g. order this ring tone, get this logo, etc].
It's like they forgot that the M stands for Music
Also if I was a parent I'd buy my kids music on the condition they didn't watch that brainwashing bullshit that is "kids oriented television".
Frankly I'd rather a kid watched a porno then the "chocobot powerhour" that is kids programming...
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
It would allow people to search on google, and click on contexual VIDEO ads that download to the PVR.
BBC has an open source video codec availible.
Google could decide the design(much like microsoft makes hardware people adhere) and just let hardware makers use the design for free. Google would just cash in on the ad flow(ad peoples bandwidth), and it would launch podcasting/videocasting to a new level.
Stop invalid scientific research. Ask your local scientists to feed their lab rats with a phytoestrogen-free chow.
I don't use TiVo, but I wonder how many ad companies would really want something like this. Right now, it usually takes the effort of a phone call or going to an internet site or something to learn more about the featured product, which means those who take the effort, generally have a bit of interest. With it being made so easy now, I bet a lot of people would think 'Hey, thats might be interesting', hit the button, and then not think about it until the ad mail comes unexpectedly. This would probably be not as good for advertisers...fewer quality results, even if they reach a much broader audience. I certainly wouldn't want to use this method if I was marketing something.
I've never heard anyone say, "Oh wait! Don't turn the channel. This is my favorite commercial."
Time is comparison of movement to other movement.
If the content cartels would invest in a real micropayment system, Tivo would be awesome for them. In fact, I bet it'd be more profitable than anything they've had before. Instead of watching ads, I'd pay $2/episode for something like Battlestar Galactica or Stargate SG1. After the series is over, people who have paid for half ofthe series should get a 25-30% discount on the boxed set for the season and people who paid for the entire thing should get about 60-70% off. If I've paid $40-$60 for the entire season already, that's real, guaranteed money in their hands. Then, if they play their cards right, as a loyal fan I can buy the entire series on DVD for $25 including S&H since I already paid $40-$60 for the series.
The cost of making DVDs is really low now. If they pay only $1/DVD to make and it costs them $2 to make the box and shrink wrap it, a 5 DVD set like Stargate SG1 would cost $7 to make. They could realistically go to $15 before S&H if they were really gung ho about getting a paying fanbase going. Just think, right after you watch the last episode in the series, the TV channel popups up a message saying "Thanks for supporting this series with your micropayments, if you would like to own this series, because of your generous support we'll give you a 70% discount on the boxed set." They'd make a killing doing that for many series.
The problem though, is that regular TV sitcom bullshit would probably be hit hard initially by that. Imagine people having to pay for an episode of Friends or Seinfeld? At any rate, if the Cartoon Network, Comedy Central and Sci Fi Channel offered this, knowing their audiences, it'd work like a charm.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
There is no way I'm logging into my DVR when I watch TV, but not sure how they would work the demographics without 'switching' roles. What my bride, child, and I watch are quite different. That said, can't think why I would ever actually watch a commercial just to rate it. Bad enough I can only 'fast forward' rather than jump ahead on my DirectTV DVR.
+++ UGUCAUCGUAUUUCU
We all want to see ads for products which appeal to us and the advertising industry spends billions each year trying to create ads for products which appeal to us. Yet, for some reason, the majority of ads just annoy us. Even ignoring those aimed at a different target, that's still a pretty hit-and-miss affair for something which should be an exact science by now.
I'm all for anything which would improve the system and more direct feedback seems like a good idea.
Advertising: The necessary, but evil grease which keep capitalism moving.
Unfortunately, I am not Wil Wheaton
I like this idea, and I think it could be used in other areas. What if users could use their remotes to review shows, much like how slashdot users moderate posts. For example, if you were watching an Episode of The Simpsons, and it wasn't as funny as usual, you could press a button to e-mail the creators "BELOW STANDARDS"...or if it was good "VERY FUNNY".
Voice your opinion!
Without them you wouldn't have the option of watching the millions of channels of quality TV we can all enjoy today.
Where can I get a refund for the hours of commercials I've watched for shit TV?
When I got DirecTV some 4 or 5 years ago, it had this same function. When watching a commercial an graphic "I" would appear to mean that it's interactive. If you pressed the "I" button on the remote it would ask if you wanted more information mailed to you.
Not every commercial had this mind you. In fact only one I know of, some SUV commercial did this.
DirecTV has since got rid of it. They had a number of interactive features they since gotten rid of. I used to be able to enter a zip code and get weather. It would also store my favorite cities. One channel, Bloomberg maybe, let me store stock tickers, and it would display the current stock price. So much for interactive TV.
What I really want is a way to vote on commercials. If I give it a thumbs down I don't want to see it again. Or better yet, let me subscribe to a show, for a small fee, and let me watch it commercial free. Stop rehashing the same bad ideas please.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Lois, this isn't my Batman glass. - Peter
Please explain why you won't buy the season on DVD at full price. You're a loyal fan, are you not?
You don't think the "loyal fan[boys]" aren't already ready to give up their 85 bones for the season set? Sadly, they are, so your scheme to get your copy at a cheaper price won't hold water from a balance sheet standpoint.Let me ask you something: why not go in with two friends and swap the disks around your group? That way, you get 69% "off" and you get the use of the whole set.
Yeah, right.
I keep reading this and other comments like it and the sillyness of it keeps annoying me. When you grow up, you are no longer part of their target audience. Of course you'll think it "sucks ass" then, but it's not really the fault of anyone. Just stop watching it and quit whining.
Despite what TFA says, Tivo has had this for ages, it's not new. What the article is talking about is "enhanced showcases", and it's where you can see a "Press Thumbs Up For More" icon during an advertisement.
Pressing thumbs up pauses the material and takes you to a special showcase where they can have an extended video segment or pages of text or, yes, a "Please send me more info" screen where you can have them send more info.
Chevy did a big promotion a while back using this, and most of the Chevy commercials you saw on the screen took you to this showcase. There was a video of various cars doing speedway tests or something, and selecting the more info thing got them to mail you a packet of material. You could even request to have a dealer call you, which I did not try.
Some of the showcase material is quite cool, other times it's not as cool. Regardless, you don't have to see the ad to see the material, these extended showcases are shown on the normal "Showcases" screen as well. There's usually one or two available at any given time.
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Anyone else immediately think of those Starship Trooper commercials? "Would you like to know more?"
Actually, I will occasionally analog-capture a commercial from the TiVo to my computer if it is particularly good. Or laughably bad. The last one I did was the GE "green/seafoam shirt".
But from my past experience, these interactive features throw a graphic up on the screen. You can clear it (at times only temporarily) from the screen with the Clear button, but the capture is already marred by then. But so far ads that have done this haven't been worth keeping.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Different story over here in Britain. MTV has no music videos (Apart from on TRL), but we have a whole crapload of other MTV channels to make up for it, like MTV Hits for pop, MTV2 which plays rock videos almost all day, MTV Base, MTV Dance and so on. Glad to see we Brits get it better for once :)
Some think the Internet is a bad thing. I just think that AOL is a bad thing.
Select-Play-Select-3-0-Select
Entertaining for a moment the fiction that, in some parallel universe, I might actually want TV advertisers to have my contact details, I can still see some major problems with this.
The Yahoo! article speaks about sending your 'contact details' to an advertiser: the Slashdot poster interprets this as meaning 'email address'. The question is, "which email address?". I currently only use tagged disposable addresses (of the kind supported by SneakEmail, for instance) for communication with companies. This allows me to dump them if the company sells them on or won't take 'unsubscribe' for an answer. It also fingers the culprit if the address does get abused. So I'd like my hypothetical TiVo to let me specify the address that I want to send to each advertiser.
But if I can do that, then that opens the door to all kinds of abuse. Think of the fun I could have by entering the address of the person who last flamed me on Usenet and then spending the evening clicking through ads on the crappiest channel I can find. So my guess is that if TiVo supports sending email addresses, it will only send the user's address as registered with TiVo, making it impossible to figure out exactly which piece of sneaking mainsleaze scum sold that address to every mailing list company on the planet (and meaning that when I'm eventually forced to abandon that address, I lose contact with all the advertisers I did want to hear from).
This is part of a larger question: which information will it send to advertisers. My guess is that it would send a complete 'packet', including phone, physical address and email. What if I want an advertiser to email me, but not to phone me? Or if I want them to send their brochures to my house (at some measurable cost to them) but not spam my inbox (at negligible cost) four times a week? I'd hope there'd be some way of releasing information selectively, but I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't.
If I owned a TiVo the first thing I'd do would be to disable this feature, and the second thing I'd do would be to enter garbage data in all the fields I could, just in case.
"Thumbs up" and "Thumbs down" info can also be aggregated, to provide ratings others can use. This drives a blog system, so you can go on and discuss what's good and what sucked. That's also useful as a way to make consensus corrections to the TV schedule, since the free sources of that info can be a little off.
The fastest and most accurate commercial-button pushers get listed on a web site as high scorers.
When they're younger, yes.
As they get older, they tend to find the thought disgusting.
There are a lot of other things they stop doing as they get older, too.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.