Slashdot Mirror
The Simpsons Worth More Per Viewer On Hulu Than On Fox
N!NJA writes with this excerpt from PCWorld:
"A tectonic shift has taken place for the digital age: ad rates for popular shows like The Simpsons and CSI are higher online than they are on prime-time TV. If a company wants to run ads alongside an episode of The Simpsons on Hulu or TV.com, it will cost the advertiser about $60 per thousand viewers, according to Bloomberg. On prime-time TV that same ad will cost somewhere between $20 and $40 per thousand viewers. Online viewers have to actively seek out the program they want to watch, so advertisers end up with a guaranteed audience for their commercial every time someone clicks play on Hulu or TV.com. Online programs also have an average of 37 seconds of commercials during an episode, while prime-time TV averages nine minutes of ads."
Apparently the advertisers haven't heard about window managers and multitasking operating systems... especially since Hulu goes so far as to tell the viewer how long the commercial will be.
Then again, since Hulu commercial breaks are so short compared to those on television, there is far less of an incentive to do something else.
Note that it sounds like it's worth more per viewer to the advertiser, but not to the TV network. The advertiser will pay more for the Hulu version, but since there's only one of them it brings less income to the studio.
So I don't think you can use this story to go "look, the studios should embrace online distribution" on its own.
It also guarantees that the users seeing the ads are foolish types and likely to spend money. If they had any clue they'd be watching it ad-free through The Pirate Bay.
Actuallu, they don't ahve all the episodes.
It does depend on the show. For example, all the episodes of Simon & Simon are available, but only a few Simpsons.
I hope this means that will changes.
One of my favorite shows in the 90's was 'NewsRadio'. It interesting that on Hulu the season after Phil Hartman died isn't there. I wonder if that's just good taste on Hulu's part(that last season is horrid) or of the network just wants them forgotten.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I'm guessing because you see the ad sitting there for the entire show. Of course it's more expensive.
Still, keep in mind that you have many more viewers on TV.
I honestly can't wait until I don't mind watching adverts. That is, they're MORE FUCKING RELEVENT TO ME. I would ENJOY giving any company my personal data if it meant all the adverts I viewed were very relevent to my needs.
Its not a good idea to compare watching commercials on TV vs. Hulu. One major difference that should be taken into consideration is the fact that there is only one commercial between segments of shows on Hulu; while on TV there are multiple. Its easier to "remember" the commercials after only seeing one rather than multiple but at the same time the overall revenue that the episode gets per viewer would probably be much less.
You also need to consider that you have to buy last years viewers this year when figuring out your $$$ per 1000 rate on television. Hulu should be like google and you can buy 10,000 views of your ad instead of being forced to buy the entire market.
Anyone know the numbers of how many viewers the average new episode of The Simpsons gets on both mediums? While it is interesting that the cost per viewer is significantly more online, I doubt the number of viewers on Hulu is within the same order of magnitude compared to how many people view a new episode on standard television. Also I still find it crazy that they're actively fighting Boxee when that only adds more viewers. It would be one thing if Boxee blocked the ads, but it's definitely not the case.
Sadly, PS/2 was yet another victim of USB, which doesn't care what you plug into it, the electrical slut.
My daughter, aged five, watches youtube, managing to plug in and switch on the PC, login to her mum's account, start Firefox, type "you" and then somehow (this part I've not yet figured out) bootstrap herself into cartoons, music videos, and other random nonsense. She clicks on similar videos and can watch TV like this for several hours. My son, two, is almost there too. I guess, thank god youtube removes adult content.
First, they ignore the real old cable television, it's utterly uninteresting for them. Secondly, they watch each youtube clip from start to end, and treat advertising, if any, as part of the content.
How can this //not// be more profitable than legacy TV?
Keep in mind that Hulu has more Simpsons episodes to run at any given time.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Err, what? I've never seen a banner ad on Hulu, even when I drop to Chrome (no ad-block).
Hulu ads are interstitials, just like on TV. Sometimes they are exactly ads that I've seen on TV also. They cut in at about the same places too. The only difference is that they only last a few seconds rather than a couple minutes per commercial break.
Aside from that, I don't see how it's obvious that if there were some ad sitting there for the entire show, that it would be more expensive than an interstitial placement.
Fuck. No one can do Math anymore. An episode of The Simpsons absolutely isn't worth more by the numbers in the summary. In fact, it's worth about 1/15th as much. Doh!
Maybe the article is worth something, but the summary is so bad I can't bring myself to click.
-Peter
This does not need to be made public. I love only having to sit through 25-30 seconds of commercials verses 2-3 minutes for each break. This is what drove me to Hulu in the first place, but I can't fault them for wanting to make more money. I just knew it was too good to be true for as long as it has been--soon it will be just like watching regular TV, and then I'll be back to torrenting the shows I like _sans_ commercials. Meh! Remember these halcyon days. I know I will.
There is simply too much glass..
I just started watching Hulu last week. It's a great service! There is only one short commercial per break, and I'm willing to tolerate that. The only thing that would make it better is if they put banner ads around the window and took the commercials out completely.
But that's not what'll happen. The company serves its bottom line. I give it less than six months before they start stuffing commercials into the show, equivalent to broadcast television. There's already at least one advertisment that cranks the volume up to 11 -- some jamacian shit I'm sure you've probably seen by now. It instantly pisses me off when the commercial comes up. It's a great reminder about why broadcast television is shit.
As many have already pointed out (and many more will), it might be tricky to compare the numbers between TV and online broadcast, *but* I personally don't care. What I hope is that the media companies buy into the numbers and let me (outside US) watch my favorite programs online! :-D
Err, what? I've never seen a banner ad on Hulu, even when I drop to Chrome (no ad-block).
Hulu ads are interstitials, just like on TV. Sometimes they are exactly ads that I've seen on TV also. They cut in at about the same places too. The only difference is that they only last a few seconds rather than a couple minutes per commercial break.
Aside from that, I don't see how it's obvious that if there were some ad sitting there for the entire show, that it would be more expensive than an interstitial placement.
Uh, well, look again. They *DO* have banner ads. And it can be annoying because when you hit "lower lights", the ad doesn't get dimmed, so it stands out even more.
I don't think all advertisers choose to have a banner ad, but i know I've seen them a few times at least.
-Taylor
Worldwide Military budgets: $2100 billion. Worldwide Space Exploration budgets: $38 billion. Really, world? Really?
Network, usually.
Just like how the Homer vs New York episode is buried.
(It features a gag involving the twin towers. Get over it, it was 8 fucking years ago!)
Why does it cost more for adverts per person during the Simpsons? It could be the case that Hulu is charging more per viewer because those who watch the Simpsons are more receptive to advertisements, but I doubt that. I think that Hulu just uses a poor pricing model for advertisers.
2 to 5 minute ad breaks = I walk to the kitchen to make a snack, or record and watch later to fast forward through junk. 30 second ad breaks = Not a big deal. I chill out and take in the advertisements. Same thing with internet banner ads. I didn't look for an ad blocker until people got greedy and littered their sites with junk.
Slashdot is simply following the dumbening of the internet.
Soon, all /. summaries will be capped at 140 characters.
Saying it's worth more per viewer is like saying hard liquor is "worth more" when you buy it at a bar. You're selling to two different audiences, and a much smaller amount. The Simpsons on hulu might get tens or hundreds of thousands of viewers; whereas the Simpsons on Fox will get millions. Comparing the price for advertising on the two is telling about 1/3rd of the story.
It costs $60/1000 viewers on hulu because they have exclusive advertising. Sure they make less per advertiser on TV but they are showing ads from 4 or 5 diferent people every commercial break. So it's more like $30*5=$150/1000viewers on TV.
A Magic the Gathering Article and Forum Aggregator
I was actually watching NewsRadio on Hulu the other week and was wondering why that is. The only thing I could think of was it may have something to due with it being cancelled and then restored before that season. Though it was on the same network so I'm not sure why that would affect it.
Wait, people still watch new Simpsons episodes?
So if Hulu actually profits by number of viewers, what's the point of blocking non-US users?
Sure, I can always get the episodes from torrents almost right after regular broadcasting, but that way there's no profit in it for the makers of show. And unless someone offers it online "in my country" (I rather despise the concept of country borders on the Internet), that it's being broadcast at some point in time way later, at a time of day I probably won't be able to watch it, and certainly on a channel not available to me, there isn't a good reason to make the episodes already online from a US service, unavailable to me.
We are all God's parents.
That season wasn't all bad. Jon Lovitz's bit about dogs being boys and cats being girls was pretty funny. Also, I think Joe's bit about having made the parts to make the spy gear was in that season as well.
So, you know, two jokes worked that season . . .
-Peter
IHNRTFA, but aren't there fewer ads per online episode? If FOX sells 10 spots at $40 vs. 4 spots at $60, TV is still more lucrative.
I just took a look at it (watched a few minutes of a show) in a basic (no extensions, no nothing) install of IE. No banner ads. Maybe logged in people don't get them? Or maybe they're being inserted somewhere along the way (virus or your provider).
There are two kinds of fool One says 'This is old therefore good' Another says 'This is new therefore better'- Dean Ing
The real tectonic shift comes when the online episode make more money overall than the prime time TV showing.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
> Online viewers have to actively seek out the
> program they want to watch, so advertisers end up > with a guaranteed audience for their commercial
This is a pretty flaky argument if you ask me.
People have to actively seek out a program to watch on TV as well. On TV, this is known as applying rule of the "least horsehit" while channel surfing.
But unlike TV, where an advertisement in a lame program usually drives me away to a different channel, never to return, on the web, I just launch another browser, kill the sound, and skip the commercials (mentally if not actually). People who have a computer and know how to use it well enough to find hulu are not dumb enough to watch some crazy commercial.
If anything, the channel surfers do not stumble upon HULU content, like they might while avoiding commercials on the TV.
Its a good price to ding the advertisers if you can get it, but it has to translate into sales or it is a waste.
On line ads used to be sold on a cost per impression basis. Advertisers woke up to that scam, and the current scam is cost per click.
(Advertisers are waking up to that scam too.)
I seriously doubt you will long be able to demand enhanced revenue based on cost per impression.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
I think many people are probably watching it fullscreen or watching it via feed. The banner ad definitely doesn't show up in full screen.
Have they never heard of AdBlock plus, and his fiends?
Yes, they filter TV stream too! (His friends are better at this than he is though. ;)
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
I just took a look at it (watched a few minutes of a show) in a basic (no extensions, no nothing) install of IE. No banner ads. Maybe logged in people don't get them? Or maybe they're being inserted somewhere along the way (virus or your provider).
I just clicked on a Simpsons episode and I got one. It was an OLPC ad, which was the sponsor for that episode (i.e. the normal commercials in that episode were for OLPC also). When i have seen banner ads, it has always been the same as the sponsoring company.
It's definitely not a virus and I can't possibly imagine my ISP is inserting it in the page, since it looks well placed and is always the same as the sponsoring company for that episode.
I was not logged in, so that may be it.
Here's another grab when i clicked again and got a USO sponsored episode:
http://tlalexander.com/hulu.jpg
So i dunno when it happens, but I can see why that would certainly be worth more.
-Taylor
Worldwide Military budgets: $2100 billion. Worldwide Space Exploration budgets: $38 billion. Really, world? Really?
I don't feel like checking, but OLPC is definitely a charity, and USO is a charity of sorts. It's my understanding that Hulu runs charity ads when it can't find an actual advertiser. Maybe the charities are the ones with banners?
Anywho, I just run popped out or full screen (depending on the power of my computer.) So I don't really see what the fuss is about.
A tectonic shift is a slow drift over time that has a sudden, jarring result one day. The metaphor seems apt.
Describing an increase in a discrete variable as a "quantum leap" is also accurate.
The problem is that some people misuse them to mean titanic shift/leap. That is incorrect. But in this case, as well as many others, the phrases can be used correctly.
In the 70's(?) everything was "hifi" and in the 90's everything was "laser". Sometimes though (stereos and pointers as easy examples) the terms were correctly applied.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
I hope that TV execs learn the lesson that they've got too many commercials in their shows. I remember when commercial breaks on my shows (as a kid) were 2 minutes or 4 X 30 second spots). Now, I'm actually deterred from watching TV. I'm a huge football fan and I'd watch every possible game I could (in the pre-Tivo days). Now, I only follow my favorite team as the annoyance of commercials overcomes my casual interest in other teams. Monday Night Football IMO died because they inserted so many commercial breaks that, beyond their normal annoyance, they started to interrupt the continuity of games and even omit game coverage like kick-offs.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Some advertisers do it, some don't. It's random.
I love Hulu - in fact, Hulu is the only place I watch "television." House, 24, Bones, Heroes, Family Guy, Simpsons, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report... sure, some shows like House aren't available until 8 days after they air but what do I really miss out on.. a couple days of water cooler chat? Seriously, I can wait for my fix. Not to mention the fact that they just posted Season 4 of Stargate SG1 - now Seasons 1-4 are all available whenever I want them. Hulu is the best thing to happen to television since color.
Down with the career politician! SUPPORT TERM LIMITS
thank god youtube removes adult content.
It doesn't filter out dirty words looped for a minute. Heaven help your five- and two-year-olds once they discover YTP.
This is a great example of picking numbers to tell your story. In this case, its "per thousand viewers." Isn't it the total income that really really matters? 1000 people viewed it, woop woop. TV viewers are in the millions, and Ads run for, what, 9 minutes? Compare that to the 30 some seconds of Ads and n-thousands of viewers, your online TV ad revenue isn't going to save any networks anytime soon.
The exact opposite story could be written if the writer picked different parameters. In the end it just depends who gets paid more to say what. Reality is always an after thought in modern journalism.
btw Tivo might kill TV ads, but ALT+TAB works fine for me, although I'm usually listening more rather than watching. I also wonder if Hulu tells their paying advertisers how the buffer doesn't work as good with ads... The ads stutter pretty often.
Where else can you just walk away from someone, and tell him that he is the biggest asshole, even when it's the biggest bully and criminal organization on the planet?
Three words: False OCILLA takedown. A bully can file an OCILLA takedown request against a video that you uploaded. Because OCILLA's safe harbor applies only to providers with a policy against repeat infringers, this puts a strike on your account that you can only remove by filing a counter-notification and waiting a month. This counter-notification includes your name and home address, ostensibly so that the complainant can seek a court order against your alleged infringement, but the information can be dangerous in the hands of a bully.
Point of jurisdiction: OCILLA is only in the United States, but so is Hulu. Besides, YouTube's "international complaints" follow pretty much the same procedure as OCILLA complaints.
What twin towers?
The same reason it shits pieces of those horrible sliding controls (these don't work on touchscreens, if anyone who can do anything about this cares) and the friend/foe indicators all over comments pages.
There are fewer commercials. In my experience, Hulu puts one commercials for every break instead of 5, and one short commercial at the beginning. Taking an hour-long show down to about 45 minutes. Plus, you can not record Hulu to a DVR or VCR meaning that every one of those thousand viewers actually watches your commercial, instead of only about half.
It's psychology, and it's what geeks have been telling advertisers for ages. VOD, even over the internet, should mean more to these companies. The viewers are going after shows they like, that they actually want to see, and not just leaving the TV on to what ever crap comes on. You can not ask for a better audience, for influence by a commercial, than one pumped about the show they are watching.
I'm a huge football fan [...] Monday Night Football IMO died because
Monday Night Football died because the football format played in the United States encourages commercials in the first place. If it were 45 minutes per half, no TV time-outs, no padding, and no grabbing the ball, then there wouldn't be as much of a chance for advertisers to interrupt flow. Case in point: the FIFA World Cup gets more viewers (1100 million) than the four Super Bowls held during the same period combined (400 million).
No, I got a bank and credit card company when I went to watch Burn Notice. However, the banner certainly isn't there in full screen mode. And the irony of a bank sponsoring a show that often involves bank fraud to trick the bad guys? Well, I would say priceless, but that would be the wrong company. But this sure makes you want to check what is in your wallet.
Soon, all /. summaries will be capped at 140 characters.
If Slashdot is going to embrace Twitter, will it also use those characters to rag on "M$ Windoze" through over a dozen sockpuppets?
Think of it this way also. . .
People who are watching adverts on the internet are more likely to buy the products you tell them to buy because they're not smart or willful enough to sculpt their own environment and thus are more easily duped into believing. . .
A) That it is their moral obligation to allow advertisers access to their brains.
B) That it's too much effort to figure out how to avoid seeing adverts on the web.
A rube in hand is worth a dozen smart and willful guys in the bush.
Hallelujah.
-FL
"Plus, you can not record Hulu to a DVR or VCR meaning that every one of those thousand viewers actually watches your commercial, instead of only about half. "
Huh? Since when did they plug the analog hole?
Also, what's to stop people from checking their email, opening another tab and browsing for half a minute, or raiding the fridge while the commercial streams, same as TV?
I do agree about the increased value of active choices via the Internet, but most of the time, if there's an ad, instead of clicking to close it, I go do something else for a few secs.
This is something Hulu needs to work on, actually. For shows like the Simpsons or House, which are highly popular, the commercials are always spot on. For less popular shows, such as some of the oddities like Paranormal TV, cooking, and anime, the commercials can cut in at the worst times. Sometimes you get lucky and they're only +/-second from where they should be, but I've had the occasional show where they cut in during the middle of an action scene. In many instances they seem to ignore the pre-created spots for commercials, with obviously fade-to-black and scene transitions, in favor of whatever random place they like.
That said, I enjoy Hulu greatly; I'm using their Desktop program right now, and am also developing a Firefox add-on for organizing the queue (something useful for those like me, with 300+ entries).
How many people are going to go through the hassle of looping an HDMI cable around, just to record an episode form Hulu? How many of the people who do would find it simpler to just use a torrent?
I should have been more specific and said "it doesn't matter that someone can record from Hulu, they probably won't." but come on. And nothing stops them from going to the kitchen or another tab. But advertisers count on that anyways. They know that on TV most of the thousand eyes on the program don't see their commercial. I'm saying that the eyes that do are more valuable to them when they are actively seeking the show and not when they are just watching TV because it's on, or because it's the SO's favorite show, or any other reason. Internet VOD provides that, and you can be the ad execs and psychology folks they hire for marketing are paying attention.
Oddly enough, I've only ever seen that episode on TV once, but it was a year or two after 9/11.
all the episodes of Simon & Simon are available, but only a few Simpsons. I hope this means that will changes.
Do you hope they add more episodes of the Simpsons or remove some Simon & Simon episodes? Either way, it sounds like a step in the right direction to me.
I think a big factor is that people watching the Simpson's online have a higher disposable income than those watching on television.
Also, what's to stop people from checking their email, opening another tab and browsing for half a minute, or raiding the fridge while the commercial streams, same as TV?
Absolutely nothing. On a couple of occasions I have hit 'play', then gone to get dinner or something, then rewound the video and played it that way. Honestly, though, I don't do that often. I think the main reason for that is they show one commercial AND they show you a countdown for how long it lasts. Also, there are times where they'll ask you to watch a 2 minute movie trailer in exchange for an uninterrupted stream. *IF* Hulu stays the way it is, I don't forsee ever really exerting much effort to skip commercials there.
I do agree about the increased value of active choices via the Internet, but most of the time, if there's an ad, instead of clicking to close it, I go do something else for a few secs.
You'll still hear the audio.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
I wonder what the costs are for a broadcast versus a webcast? For a broadcast you'd need to coordinate multiple stations and time zones, there are power costs to push the signal, station costs, licensing costs.. For a webcast there's the server and pipe sized to the load you expect. Maybe you need Akamai or some other similar system, but I expect that it's much cheaper than broadcast.
I don't watch in fullscreen. Here I'll make a screenshot. I'm on windows right now, shame.
http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/2609/hulu.png
Yes the ad is there the entire time. Unless you're really absorbed in what you're watching you can't help but notice it at least every few minutes, which makes it valuable space.
Can someone please add an "American flag" icon to this and all discussions about Hulu?
The rest of the world is blocked from watching stuff there--even Dr. Horrible is no longer available outside the US on it. (even though it was on release.)
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
Now I feel like a Luddite.
But, I wanted socialized health insurance!
Because lawyers hate when people are happy.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
This is something Hulu needs to work on, actually. For shows like the Simpsons or House, which are highly popular, the commercials are always spot on. For less popular shows, such as some of the oddities like Paranormal TV, cooking, and anime, the commercials can cut in at the worst times.
Has nothing to do with Hulu. The segment times are programmed by whoever submits the show. And yes, I know this from experience.
It is possible that Hulu's system could just be screwing up occasionally - it wouldn't be the first time - but if you watch an episode more than once and always see the breaks in the same places, then obviously it's working properly and those breaks were programmed by the TV channel, not Hulu.
I wonder what the costs are for a broadcast versus a webcast? For a broadcast you'd need to coordinate multiple stations and time zones, there are power costs to push the signal, station costs, licensing costs.. For a webcast there's the server and pipe sized to the load you expect. Maybe you need Akamai or some other similar system, but I expect that it's much cheaper than broadcast.
For most TV channels, it is much more expensive to broadcast via the web than it is to broadcast via standard television. The obvious reason being that TV channels are set up to broadcast via, well, TV. All of the equipment is already bought and paid for, the processes are in place, the staffing level set, etc. Now you throw this wrench in the works of suddenly asking a TV channel to worry about digital codecs, about digital delivery, about server capacity, all this other crap... it becomes a huge clusterfuck. And it means adding staff, adding equipment, redirecting resources, etc.
I'll say that when Hulu first launched, I was responsible for getting some clips - just clips! - ready for one of the launch channels. We were trying to do the minimum required of us because we knew it was going to be a big headache. And it was. First of all, most of the tapes (yes, tapes) were stored off-site and needed to be located and transported. Then they needed to be digitized, then edited, then encoded. At the time, Hulu would allow you to submit either flv's or "mezzanine" files that were either mpeg2 files (yes, mpeg2) or QuickTimes using the DVC Pro codec. Well, we tried both flvs and QuickTimes and had major problems with both. First, encoding to flv from our digitized files took approximately 24 hours for each clip. (You don't realize how large uncompressed digital files are.) So that was obviously out. Rendering from Final Cut to DVC Pro was much quicker, so we did that. Then we had to figure out how to actually get them the files, and it turned out buying a bunch of drives and FedExing them all over the place was really the only way. But then every flv they encoded from our files ended up stretched, because they couldn't figure out how to handle the non-square pixels that were in their own QT spec (the spec calls for a 720x480 file at a 4:3 aspect ratio).
All of this (plus dealing with the metadata and various other things) ended up taking up basically 100% of my time, plus 100% of two PAs' time, plus a large chunk of various other departments' time, plus probably 30-40% of my boss' time. And we had to buy a bunch of new hardware and software to do all the encodes ourselves that we ended up doing, and come up with all new processes.
You have to think about all the hidden costs. It's not just a case of "oh webcasting uses no bandwidth so it's practically free". Would it be "free" if, say, you suddenly asked General Motors to start making rubber ducks or bathtubs instead of cars? That's pretty much the equivalent. It is a totally new process that needs to be created from scratch. There's almost nothing about webcasting that is similar to broadcasting.
It doesn't even save money after you've got things set up and running somewhat smoothly, because now you've got *two* separate processes going on - broadcast TV still exists and will exist for the foreseeable future.
Thanks. I wondered that, but wasn't sure. I would have thought that the show's submitters would take a bit more time to plan breaks than Hulu.
I rarely, if ever, re-watch shows, so I wouldn't be able to tell if the problem is due to a technical failure or a human one.
Buried? I saw it on TV, real OTA TV, a month or two ago.
60*37 20*9*60
Primetime is still more valuable. Fewer commercials means more expensive commercials - that has been long established.
http://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
there's also several episodes scattered throughout that are missing. it's a damned shame really. that's one of the few shows i bought all the seasons of as they came out. somehow, now every season is missing. i had a craving to watch andy dick be a spaz in front of james caan the other day, but alas, that episode is one of the missing (celebrity)
yeah, my spelling sucks, but i've been drinking for the last 13 hours.. can you do better?
Anyways, these are the reasons he and one of the executives had given for why they expected to eventually be able to charge a good deal more for 30 seconds of Hulu advertisement than one would normally charge for the same time*viewers over the air. It came up when we were complaining about the studios' decisions to delay some shows by up to 8 days compared to the actual air date. While it was clear this was to prevent an uprising from the affiliates, we still grumbled a bit about it.
At $60 vs $30 the studio breaks even.
The quote in the summery is wrong, i just checked: there are 3 commercials 15-30 seconds each. This comes out to between 45 seconds and 1:30 of advertising; there are 8:30 in commercials for the regular broadcast.
On a recent episode of the Simpsons local adds took up about five of the adds. This means that in order to break even, supposing the internet draws away customers on a one-for-two basis(more tv can be watched), the studio must charge two times as much.
You have been scored "3: Funny". A legal team has been formed to file suit against you and anyone who may find your comment humorous.
ed duval the very last person
"yeah, my spelling sucks, but i've been drinking for the last 13 hours.. can you do better?"
Spelling or drinking? ;)
"an experienced, industrious, ambitious, and often, quite often, picturesque liar" - Mark Twain
Why don't you use the "pop-out" option and you can size your screen accordingly and not have to deal with the banner ad?
At night I drink myself to sleep and pretend I don't care that you're not here with me
When you are watching television, you end up watching whatever is on, which is not something that generally excites you, and then on top of that, you have the additional insult of having to spend 40% of your time watching ads.
So, in short, because the quality of the show is marginal, you put up with further marginalization in order to have it "pay" for the content provider.
But with Hulu, you watch what you want. When you want. You CLICKED on the show. It's something you DESIRE to watch, not something that's "on". So I don't end up watching golf on Saturday afternoon, I watch stuff I happen to like: Bones, House, Burn Notice. I just caught a new show ("The Philanthropist") so good that it actually made me tear up more than once. Against this backdrop, I'm more than happy to watch a SINGLE commercial 4x in a show, and I'm even OK with the fact that I can't skip the ads. I watch what I want, when I want to. For now, formula of "online TV" works so well for me that I will probably never again buy cable or satellite TV so long as online television remains at least as good as it is now.
Seriously, when you get used to watching what you want, when you want, without knowing in advance what you want, with the ability to "catch up" when you discover something new, "normal" cable just seems... stale. Why bother?
I don't have a DTV converter box, and I have no interest in one. My Mac Mini + big screen have done everything I care to have.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
The only reason we have cable at all is because it is only $10 more per month to have cable WITH internet then without it.
I hardly ever watch TV. It's internet or netflix.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
I'm going to have to call bulllllllllllllshit.
Show me a listing with episode description.
Did you see it on your local Fox affiliate, or on FX/etc?
It looks like Fox is showing it again, but edited.
Counteroffer: Show me a website, any website, that archives the airing information of their syndicated programming 2-6 months after the fact and I'll look it up for you. I didn't snap a photo or anything, I said, "huh. Haven't seen this one in a few years," and did my best to enjoy it.
Just because you think the entire country is still psycho-obsessed with 9/11 doesn't make it so.
TV Guide?
Google will usually find it.
It turns out that it IS being aired again, but with several lame edits. And yes, it's lame edits to appease the people who are obsessed with 9/11.
Oh, I don't think it's the entire country, I think it's the typical small fraction who will whine and bitch and try to sue for no damned reason.
I don't have a listing, but I've seen the episode twice in the past year or two. KDNL-30 in Saint Louis plays 2-4 simpsons episodes a day, and the showing includes the part with the two guys in towers arguing, that wikipedia claims is edited out.
We've already learned that it IS being shown, but with a bunch of lame edits...