Disney Says, You WILL Watch the Ads

smooth wombat writes "ABC and ESPN, both owned by Disney, have struck a deal with cable operator Cox Communications to offer hit shows and football games on demand, but with the condition that Cox disable the fast-forward feature that allows viewers to skip ads. This is the first agreement of its kind. It only applies to Cox's video-on-demand service and will not affect viewers using DVRs to fast-forward through ads. The companies will also test technology that will place ads in shows based on ZIP Codes and geographic area, and 'freshen' the ads with new ones every few days."

Sounds good to me

[Grishnakh]

I just won't be signing up for this idiotic service. As the other poster said, MythTV for me.

huh

[stoolpigeon]

One of the things that I really like about the on-demand stuff I get from brighthouse is that there are no commercials at all - other than sometimes before the program begins. Like Anime on demand will often have a short commercial, then the show with no commercials. It's nice too when my kids want to watch Avatar or something because they get to see the whole episode but takes less time.

I hope they're careful

[cfulmer]

Every rewind backwards by 10 minutes so you could compare what you just watched with what happened earlier? If they disable fast-forward, you'll have to watch those 10 minutes over again.

I wonder if it will be possible to reinstate the fast-forward button by running the on-demand movie through a DVR.

Doesn't change a thing

[tarlos25]

On the rare occasion that I actually watch TV, I change channels or get up and go do something else when a commercial comes on. Commercials are one of the primary reasons I stopped watching TV. If I want to see ads, I'll watch them on my own time.

You know...

[VE3OGG]

TV, like magazines, newspapers, and radio are financed through ads and sponsors. While I realize that it is convenient and preferable to not have to watch all those damned "Mr. Clean, Mr. Clean, do dah dah do dah dah" ads, sometimes back to back, in between sections of your favourite show, that is what finances your show.

Besides, I have a feeling that with the popularity of DVD sets being what it is, cable TV will likely start to dwindle and the box sets will be released at the beginning of each season. This way people can choose what shows they absolutely want to watch with no commercials, and which ones aren't really that important.

Kinda free-market at work there.

Then again, I haven't watched TV in several years so I don't know, maybe I missed something vital here...

skip VOD

[not_anne]

VOD is just a rehash of shows are already on the channels anyway. Just DVR the show that's on VOD and skip the ads.

Re:Good...

[rainman_bc]

As a TV commercial producer, this makes me very happy ;)

And what's next? Prevent people from changing channels while a commercial is on? Colluding with other networks to ensure all commercials are run at the same time?

Really, you can ram it down our throats, and we can backlash.

Cover my TV with ads, I'll switch to an on-demand service like Apple-TV instead of cable.

TV can push, but we consumers can push back too.

Re:Pay Per Ad

[CowTipperGore]

I guess the general public is not paying enough for their service to be ad-free. I would like to know, for once, how much money each cable subscriber would have to pay for their TV service if it paid for all the advertisement that would normally be there?

I had free television for years with fewer advertisements than what you see today. Cable television gets monthly subscriptions from all viewers (with rates that seem to double every five years), more advertising money than over-the-air ever dreamed of, and kick-backs from all the home shopping channels that they won't let you remove because it subsidizes the cost of your television service.

I can promise you that any number claimed to be adequate to eliminate advertising would be a die roll with a bunch of zeros on the end. And, it would be so large that most wouldn't consider it. Yet, the same folks will accept their annual cable bill increases while getting more ads per hour.

So glad I gave up on TV years ago

[grasshoppa]

Between crap like this and the crap they subject you to in the name of "entertainment", I'm so glad I gave up on TV years ago.

Disney, and any other oppressive media company out there, can blow me if they think they are getting a single dime outta me.

Re:hehe: try to parse this sentence from TFA

[Lemmy Caution]

They have 2 types of customer, one of them being their advertisers. They are in the business of selling their other customers to these customers.

Perhaps the future is this: as consumers all gain the ability to circumvent ads and the value of advertising on cable declines, that the charges for cable service increase by at least double, since cable providers wouldn't be able to get any money from advertisers. (Ideally, this would be accompanied by a decrease in the cost of other goods, but I suspect that advertisers would simply keep the same marketing budgets and look elsewhere.)

One wonder what things like ratings would mean in a truly post-advertising world. Why spend millions more on a show just because it gets better ratings, if ad revenues don't exist? Would all cable become like the Discovery channel? Or will pay-per-view become universal?

This is fine by me...

[drgroove]

For the sake of underwriting "free" television, I'm OK with broadcasters putting ads that can't be skipped, but that are refreshed occasionally in shows that I record. Additionally, if a show has non-removable advertisements, that removes the ability for a broadcaster to prevent me from re-distributing the show on P2P networks or video sharing sites. The show's original broadcaster and advertiser information is now bundled with the show, so no material harm occurs to those parties if I redistribute the material - in fact, they benefit from the additional exposure.

For shows that I purchase, however, I want them ad-free. If I purchase a show, that means I am subsidizing it (at least, a very very small portion of it), and don't want to deal with ads as a bonus to purchasing it. I would also be willing to waive my right to re-distribute the material, but not willing to waive my right to create copies of the material for my own backup & archival purposes.

I think that's a fair arrangement. In fact, I'd be willing to have my representative sign legislation to this effect.

Re:Well, then

[russ1337]

If you continue to insist on stealing our content, and engaging in piracy, we're left with no choice but to replace your computer with a DRM-enabled appliance. Please, let us know if our customer service department can be of further assistance ;-)

Funny you say that. It was this very morning one of my colleagues called me a Pirate (Aarrr) just because I use Open Source software.

I said "so to not be a pirate I have to use Windows?" His answer: "Yep, If you use free software you must be pirating something."

Re:Next they will eliminate the third-party DVRs

[businessnerd]

The big killer will be in a few years when cable providers have everyone on digital cable

My hope is that we can have some legislation in place that in the event a cable company decides to stop offering their analogue service, that they are forced to send the signal unencrypted, so that all that is necessary to watch the digital tv is a digital tuner. For most this still means a set-top box, but it will also open the door for "Digital Cable Ready" TV's. HD becomes the new digital with the encrypted feed. The original reason for digital cable being encrypted in the first place was to make sure that you couldn't watch digital tv without paying for the service. Since it comes down the pipe as long as you have an active connection, someone paying for analog service could watch digital tv if they went out and bought a digital tuner without paying for a digital subscription. They also get to "rent" you a set top box (grrr).

However, the way things are changing, I don't think it will even be necessary. Verizon is changing the way people think about TV and the Internet with their FiOS TV. What I really want is to pay Verizon (or some other ISP) for my fiber optic connection, and then subscribe separately to my othe r services like TV and Phone. Then the real competition begins between television content providers, and also VOIP providers have a fair chance.

Re:Neither is it "content"

[MBraynard]

You are right - to an extent - that some people do things just for kicks or publicity or because they seek some other kind of psychological trilogy.

However, there would be no Battletar Galactica or The Office or 300 without paying. And in the case of The Office, the program is ad supported. There is a causal relationship between creative works - real or intellectaul - and most of the times that relationship is financial.

Here's a thought - Dickenson's poems might not have exited had a publisher not been able to profit by publishing/printing them. This was before the internet.

Re:TV? Why?

[Deagol]

How true. My family has been w/o broadcast TV for about 5 years now. It's great. We watch DVDs, but that's it. It's amazing how much free time one actually has when no TV to be a slave to (I'm sure DVR users can vouch for this), and without all the blipverts tweaking my brain, I actually sleep a lot better than the days with TV. It's amazing the anxiety television watching actually creates. It's weird.

Why should we watch Disney content anyway?

[secPM_MS]

And the studio's wonder why TV viewership is declining? After trying for a year, I dropped my cable subscription -- I don't think what is on the networks is particularily good for my young kids. I get movies / video's from my public library, which is quite good. I truly despise the 10 minutes of adds for other video's that Disney puts in their headers, so only occasionally do I check out a Disney video for them to watch. My kids watch the occasional video, play outside, play some on the computer (I have done extensive filtering and if I see to much usage of a site such as neopets, I blacklist it), and read. Given few alternatives, even athletic kids will take to reading when they can't be outside with a ball. I have one TV in the house, a ~ 4 year old HDTV ready CRT. If the content suppliers think that I will replace my system to get DRM-protected content, they are sorely mistaken. I would rather read. With Google's book scanning project (books.google.com) and the Gutenberg project, there is a mass of older books that are free to complement what you find in your library and bookstore.

Re:Well, then

[Darby]

As a cheap shot, I'll assume you dont have one because if you did she'd be bitching about it. Trust me, MythTV has an almost subzero WAF...

It's through the roof in my house. The wife gets all of her British shows off of UKNova, podcasts, etc etc etc and they download right to the shared directory. Boom.

She just bought a used XBox to use as a frontend in the bedroom.

So given how solid MythTV is and has been for some time now, your argument is both wrong and sadly out of date.

Re:Well, then

[d3ac0n]

Cable labs approved doesn't mean squat as long as cable companies are using a burned-in MAC to provision the cards.

It's the same thing with Cable modems. As long as they are Docsis compatible, the low-wage tech on the other end of the line has NO CLUE that your Motorola SB5102 that you are calling in to provision is actually from cablemodemhack.com and has the blackcat mod chip on it.

(not that I endorse uncapping your modem, or doing anything blatantly illegal, of course.)

Re:Well, then

[mcb]

i just set up a mythtv box for the first time on friday and had it working and recording shows within 5 hours or so. i've never tried it before but it's pretty solid in its current form.

Or...

[Gription]

Then you'll have to manually select and run all the on demand shows individually so the MythTV box can record them.

Or you could simply start your "on demand" show feeding into your DVR, go to the bathroom, make a snack, let the dog out, and then start watching your show and then skip past the commercials with the time buffer that has built up. (You will have to live with the stigma of knowing that you could have seen you show 5 minutes earlier...)

I wonder how many years it will be before we are required to have our eyelids mechanically clamped open with our heads aimed at the screen, to enable the 'premium' content from our entertainment provider.

(I feel a patent coming on!!!)

Re:Neither is it "content"

[Nevyn]

It's not forced - if you don't have a TV tuner, you don't have to pay it. It's not a tax (not collected by government, and the BBC is not a government organisation), it's a license fee, and if you don't watch TV, you don't have to pay. (never mind the slightly overzealous collection department).

Speaking as an ex-English person living in the US, it's 100% forced. And it is a Tax, it is collected by the government and given to the BBC (which is only accountable to the government). If you want a TV+DVD combo. just to watch movies, you are legally required to pay the Tax (which could not possibly be argued to have benifited from). I've lived without Cable in the US for significant amounts of time, getting DVDs from the local library etc. ... I wanted to do the same in the UK, but that was not possible (I couldn't afford the TV tax).

All Britons who pay the TV license benefit from the BBC, whether they watch it or not.

This is obviously not true.

The quality is higher (anecdotally, from every American I've ever heard comment on the relative quality of TV in each country)

If you compare everything on US TV with the small subset of UK TV we import ... then, sure. Just as if you compare everything on UK TV to the small subset of US TV you import, the averge easily swings back (but, of course in the later case you are forced to pay for the BBC anyway).

Execs on the commercial channels are not empowered to take the risks the BBC can, but they reap all the benefits

Sure, not being accountable to those people you can force to pay you money is a big help in many lines of business (esp. if that is practically everyone) ... I believe the RIAA know a song about that.