Slashdot Mirror
Google Patent Proposes $2 Fee To Skip Commercials
theodp writes "A day after Google debuted its new Google TV website, the USPTO issued U.S. Patent No. 7,806,329 to the search giant for its Targeted Video Advertising invention. Among other things, the patent proposes having viewers take 5-10 minutes to 'fill out a consumer survey and perhaps to provide additional information such as a mailing address survey before starting the program' to avoid having to watch 10 minutes of commercials. 'As another alternative,' the patent continues, 'the broadcaster may offer the users an option to pay $2 (such as through a micro-payment system, such as GBuy) to exchange for skipping all commercials.' More from the patent: 'The system may allow a user to skip all of the promotions that they want to skip, but may also require the user to fully watch at least four promotions before the program will continue. Likewise, the system may require the user to follow activities that generate a certain amount of advertising revenue or advertising points (e.g., that may correspond directly or indirectly to advertising revenues) before the program will continue.'"
To me, at this point, commercials are greed. We already pay subscription (cable or otherwise), and most movies/TV shows use product placement among other things to supplement the cost. What really gets me is that now movies have 10 minutes of commercials before them. Did I really just pay $10 to watch 10 minutes of commercials before the 15 minutes of movie trailers? It's odd that only a few years ago, the movie/theatre business made a nice profit without having these commercials, yet now they cannot live without them.
I hope in time commercial-less media is the norm.
The fast forward button on my DVR was one of the last bits of freedom I had, to skip some guy screaming at me about some car/cereal/appliance that I just *HAVE* to buy. I guess Google TV will forgo "Fast Forward" for a "Pay Us Money Not To Have To Watch These Annoying Commercials" button. Ain't technological progress grand?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Remember...
We can still go grab a beer and fix a sandwich up during commercials. Don't freak out. Just do something else.
Google is the "king" of targeted ads...so why not do the same thing with Google TV? If I'm watching an episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, I obviously will not give a shit about life insurance...but a video game? Sure. I'll sit through an advertisement for that. Unless it's one of those lame Gamestop machinima commercials...
This seems like a strange direction for Google to take...what with their algorithms used for serving up ads online, one would think they would utilize something similar for their TV service...I despise advertisements, but I'll tolerate them if it's relevant to what I'm watching.
Living With a Nerd
From reading the paragraph in context, it seems like Google was just showing an example of how a broadcaster or content provider could become indifferent to how their broadcasting revenue is generated. The patent gives three examples for making up $1-$2 of advertising revenue on a one hour program for each viewer. It could be done through commercials as traditionally is done, by survey or even at a direct charge to the viewer. I think it's important to note that the $2 figure doesn't seem to be set in stone, it's more an example of how a broadcaster who demands $2 in advertising revenue per viewer could recoup or mitigate those costs.
The real question is: how is this any different than someone forking over a couple bucks to watch the latest Futurama episode on iTunes?
You can call it "skipping commercials" or you can call it "selling the right to view content once" or whatever the hell you want. But it all comes down to you reimbursing the broadcasters for their content--which has traditionally been done through advertising. I'm surprised this is invoking so much ire from the Slashdot crowd.
My work here is dung.
I'm not sure why a strategy is considered an invention... moreover, a strategy that has been used for a while by FOX.
I looked at current advertising costs to see whether $2/episode is justified. Right now advertisers pay about 3.3 cents to put an ad in the face of a 25-54 year-old adult during a prime-time show. In an hour-long show, there are about sixteen minutes of non-program material, though some of that is promotions for other shows and local advertising. Let's say that ten minutes of every prime-time hour includes national advertising. That means advertisers are willing pay about thirty cents per show; two dollars seems like gouging in comparison.
Case in point: The Alamo Drafthouse. They play first run movies (as well as cult films and other such), serve food and alcohol, and have actual pre-show video entertainment (not commercials). If a movie isn't playing at the Drafthouse, I generally don't bother going. It's not worth putting up with general obnoxiousness of the large corporate theater chains like Cinemark.
i worry you'll sit through commercials AFTER paying for the book, just like cable.
"Cable was invented to be commercial free."
As much as I share your sentiment, that statement is not true. Cable TV (CATV) was invented to distribute regular broadcasts to areas where private antennas are not feasible.
Yeah, I sure hope none of the websites I frequent would ever have a system by which I could give them some money to have the advertising removed. That would be awful!