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Broadcast Industry Wades In On Dish Network's Hopper
gollum123 writes "As with past technological threats, network executives are closing ranks against a Dish Network device that undermines the broadcast business model. The disruptive technology at hand is an ad-eraser, embedded in new digital video recorders sold by Charles W. Ergen's Dish Network, one of the nation's top distributors of TV programming. Turn it on, and all the ads recorded on most prime-time network shows are automatically skipped, no channel-flipping or fast-forwarding necessary. Some reviewers have already called the feature, called the Auto Hop, a dream come true for consumers. But for broadcasters and advertisers, it is an attack on an entrenched television business model, and it must be strangled, lest it spread elsewhere."
If you skip ads, you stand with the child pornographers.
- Carl Sagan, Contact, 1985.
Wish you could have been here to see it, Dr. Sagan.
I'm from Europe, but aren't you paying for receiving Dish?
From my standpoint: Either pay or ads, but never both.
The pay-TV in Europe is ad-free (well, at least during the show), pay-TV companies are treating their customers like dirt. Free-TV is rich, has many consumers, but is continuously degrading in quality (both the kind of content, and amount of ads) since 15 years.
Local broadcasts are free. Well sort of. You can still get over the air local channels most places but maybe 80-90%+ of people receive their local channels through cable tv, satellite, fios, whatever.
These companies can't just tap into the local airwaves and rebroadcast these channels. They have to pay for it and ever year or so there's a major issue with the contract of some channel holding out for more money.
Which just illustrates the extreme level of greed in the TV industry. The old days of free TV supported entirely by commercials is gone. All of the cable and satellite companies must pay many millions of dollars a year to every network if they want to carry their programming. Add it all up and it easily runs into many billions of dollars. The fact is, you could completely eliminate commercials from TV and the networks would still make an enormous amount of money from broadcast fees, syndication, dvd sales, etc.
Of course, in Hollywood, no amount of money is ever enough.
I was at last weeks Dish retailer conference when this was announced. Dish is well aware of the controversy they are creating. Every one with a DVR already skips over commercials, this is just making it easier. The Commercials are not removed, someone at Dish actually has to go in and manually ad triggers at the start and stop of every commercial in every show. That takes a bit of time which is part of the reason you can't auto skip (auto hop) commercials until the next day.
It will be interesting to see what happens next, but as was stated previously, I think the current advertising structure is dying.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
Business model tired, worn out?
Unable or too lazy to come up with new ideas?
Loaded down with cash from when consumers had to take it your way or hit the highway?
If this describes you, call 1-800-BUYCONGRESS.
We'll do ALL we can to screw over you customers and keep your worn-out way of thinking in the public eye.
Cause everyone else is obviously a pirate or a terrorist!
BUY A CONGRESSMAN TODAY!
True, but I've noticed that over time, the ads have gotten longer and longer. When I started watching Hulu way back when, most ads were only 15 seconds long. Now, it's quite common to get 1:00 ad breaks, and I've had some go as long as 2:00 (and I'm not talking about the ones that sometimes pop up at the beginning of shows that let you watch the rest ad-free, these are in mid-show). Plus, they've started playing around with stuff that requires you to interact with the ad, such as the "Which ad experience would you prefer?" (I don't CARE, it's all just noise to me.) Or the "Which of these movies have you seen in the past seven days?" interstitials.
It's not surprising, since Hulu is owned by the broadcasters. Still, I was hoping that they would keep the ads short and really be revolutionary. When they were, I actually diligently tuned in to all of them because 1) I felt kind of obligated to since they were providing a valuable service, 2) they were MUCH less obtrusive, and 3) with a 15-second ad, you really don't have much time to do anything else. Now, though, I regularly walk away from the computer for a few minutes, then backtrack to where the show picks back up, kind of like how when ads come on "regular" television (which I hardly ever watch), I would get up and get a drink or go to the bathroom.
Oh well, just goes to prove yet again that there is little that is cool that Hollywood can't screw up royally.
This the same DISH that drops channels all the time will they end dropping one of the big 4? over this?
I have to call you on this. When Dish (or DirecTV or Comcast-it has happen to all of them) "drops a channel" it isn't because they are trying to screw the customer. It is because the channel is trying to raise what it charges Dish for rebroadcast rights. Dish is saying no, trying to keep your rates down. If it ends in a stalemate, then the channel comes down. Everyone blames Dish/DTV/comcast, They know they will loose customers over this but it is the right thing to do. This does happen to dish more then the others, because they more aggressively try to keep rates down.
As for the locals ("the big 4"), they are supposed to be free tv, but they are trying to charge like they are a cable channel. They are really the most greedy.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
Most people who pay for satellite or digital cable don't realize that most of the money that you pay goes straight to the television channels and not the cable/satellite provider. When you pay your $100 cable bill, a couple of dollars goes straight to Disney/ABC/ESPN. I think just for ESPN alone some cable companies are on the hook for five dollars a month per subscriber. So you are paying to watch channels with advertisements.
On top of the money that goes directly to those channels they also bombard you with advertisements and commercial interruptions. And while for many channels advertisements allows them breaks to reorganize, which can be critical for news and sports programming, there aren't too many reasons other than simply making more money for running commercials during the middle of a sitcom or drama. I don't mind when an NFL or MLB game goes to commercials when the players are running on and off the field. But I stopped watching South Park on its premier night years ago because the commercial breaks were too frequent and killed the momentum of the show. It's one thing when the sport has stopped and then the cut to advertisements. It would be another if they cut to commercials right when a guy delivered a pitch or the ball was snapped. "Stay tuned to see if the Patriots scored after these commercials".
Unfortunately that is how most shows are. "Will this character die...? Find out after we assault your senses with a dozen commercials". Not to mention that most advertisements are BLASTED AT FULL VOLUME compared to the show that is on at the time. It ruins the flow of the show. This is why I almost only watch sports and HBO.
HBO figured out decades ago that people would be willing to pay for premium content delivered to them commercial free. With no advertisers to answer to they could put on shows like The Wire, Sopranos, Game of Thrones, Band of Brothers, and Curb Your Enthusiasm. They don't have to worry about advertisers pulling out of shows. They don't have to censor anything because of the FCC either. And they can write dramas and comedy shows that are purely art and not meant to sell products or have commercial breaks written into them. Considering the extreme popularity of Game of Thrones right now it is quite evident that people want to pay a premium for high level programming that is free of advertising and doesn't have to answer to sponsors or the FCC. Also HBO has a policy where product placement is forbidden. When you see a real life product on Sopranos or Treme or whatever it is there for realism and not as an in show paid advertisement.
Unfortunately most of these other companies haven't figured out that people will pay money to bypass advertisements. This is essentially what people do when they buy a show on DVD or Blu-Ray anyways. People will also pay extra when it improves the quality of programming. Major League Baseball's internet package that allows you to watch all out of market games online is commercial free. Lots of companies are putting their shows up on I-Tunes or the Playstation Network the day after commercial free and you pay for each episode individually.
Years ago ReplayTV tried the same thing with the same response from broadcasters. Instead of giving in, Replay took the battle to court and lost and that pretty much bankrupted the company. I dont see how Dish thinks its going to turn out any better for them.
ReplayTV had a DVR many years ago with this exact feature, and they got their asses sued off by Hollywood for it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReplayTV). The suit was never decided. It even had a feature that did the reverse, playing *only* the commercials (aka "Superbowl Mode").
But even *that* was based on earlier technology patented back in 1993 (http://www.google.com/patents/US5333091) and used in VHS machines dating about 10 years ago, maybe longer.
As a DISH subscriber, I'm happy they are finally implementing this, but they ARE going to have a fight on their hands.
Now, if only someone can invent technology to get rid of those awful graphic overlays advertising other shows/movies. And the ridiculous "OMG IT'S TOTALLY RAINING OR SOMEONE GOT ELECTED DOGCATCHER" crawls from the local news.