[mythtv-users] Data Direct Subscription Expires?

Brad Templeton brad+myth at templetons.com
Tue Jan 4 16:36:01 EST 2005


On Tue, Jan 04, 2005 at 09:13:43AM -0500, David Levine wrote:
> The thing is that non-PVR users can go to the Zap2It or TVGuide
> websites just as well as PVR users, and still want to look up when
> their shows are on (via a webbrowser instead of DataDirect, I
> suppose).  It's just not really feasible to know who is doing what. 

Actually, I would guess that the number of people looking up listings
on the web is still a tiny minority that doesn't affect the equation
one way or another.   Just as the number of PVR users is a tiny
minority right now (but growing fast) and the number of datadirect
users is probably really, really tiny.


> The stations want viewers to know when their shows are on.  Granted,
> what they really want is to be able to tell how many people watch
> their shows, but that's what Neilsen ratings are for, not listing
> services.

Actually, we can go a lot deeper.  Advertisers really want to know
where the most effective places to advertise are.   If they could pay
for that data, that is what they would buy.   Right now they can't
get that so they use Neilsen ratings as a proxy.   Already however,
they are learning more, and soon they will get really accurate data.

When they do, I can assure you they will start putting their ad money
where the accurate data says to put it.

And their suppliers, the TV stations, will act to get the most share
of that money.

If, for example, the numbers tell the advertisers not to count PVR
users (or to count them as 5% equivalent of live viewers), then that's
what they will do, and stations will ask themselves, "How can we
fix this?"  They will ask how to make money from PVR users, how to
convert them to live, how to focus on the live, etc.

The PVR is giving us a temporary free lunch, and it's great.  I love
watching hour shows in 43 minutes.  Once you do it you can't go
back.  But it is a free lunch, and in the long run, there is no
free lunch.

> 
> Besides, even if stations had some way of easily knowing when viewers
> who skip commercials were requesting scheduling data, the stations
> would STILL want them to watch their shows because (I think) ratings
> data doesn't currently take into account who watches commercials and
> who doesn't.  The stations want the advertisers to see the highest

Correct, to some extent.  They are working on this problem.  Tivo is
even selling them data to convince them that some ads do get watched,
at least on Tivo which doesn't have 30 second skip by default,
or auto-skip at all.


> numbers possible.  And even if advertisers know commercials are being
> skipped, many shows now have product placement within the shows
> themselves, separate from the commercials (and this will only increase
> in the future).

Yup.   This is one of the many adaptations underway, and you are correct
that this one (if it's enough) provides an incentive to give listing
data to PVR users.
> 
> providers).  But if you wanted to get the raw data from each station
> yourself, you could.

You could, and I could, but we don't matter.  What matters is only
what a large majority of people can and will do.

Even the current datadirect process is too much for a large block
of users.

Remember this startling fact -- a large body of users consider the
Tivo too hard to set up!


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