[mythtv-users] Is skipping ads really a good idea?

[Peter Schachte]

Wes Hardaker wrote:

> Really there is no way around product placement.  We've been heading
> there for a while.  Fast forward in VCR's was step one.  FF on DVRs was
> step 2.  And auto-commercial skip (which I love) is going to be the
> final nail.  It only leaves 4 solutions:
> 
> 1) make skipping commercials illegal and technically
>    challenging/impossible for closed system devices through DRM.
> 2) increase in-show commercials (no OTA and we go to all subscription
>    cable/etc likely through encrypted systems).
> 3) user-pays-all-fees for no commercial channels
> 4) all TV content goes away and we're down to pay-per-use kind of
>    architecture only.

I expect broadcasters will try #1 and #2.  If neither works and the advertisers
abandon TV in droves, I guess we'll get #4.  But there may be a few other
possibilities:

5)  Publicly financed broadcasters, funded either out of general revenue or a
UK-style "TV license."
6)  Advertisers will start making commercials viewers *want* to watch.

At the extreme, #6 really turns into #2:  commercials get longer and more
interesting, with plot development and characters you care about, and
eventually become TV programs.  At that point TV programming will have come
full circle, back to the way it was in the 1950s.

-- 
Peter Schachte              Just as a man would not cherish living in a body
schachte at cs.mu.OZ.AU        other than his own, so do nations not like to
www.cs.mu.oz.au/~schachte/  live under other nations, however noble and
Phone: +61 3 8344 1338      great the latter may be. -- Mahatma Gandhi