Once Again: DVRs Not Killing TV, But Helping It
from the think-this-through-a-bit dept
It's becoming almost comical how often this happens: a new technology comes along for consuming/watching/listening/distributing some sort of entertainment content, and the industry freaks out. The technology is going to destroy the industry, and laws must be put in place, royalties must be paid, technology must be crippled, etc. And yet... the impending doomsday scenario never shows up. The player piano did not kill the sheet music market. The gramophone did not kill live concerts. The VCR did not kill the movie industry. And, here we are, with TV folks finally realizing that the DVR is not killing TV, but actually helping it. Basically, lots of people still watch ads, even if they're watching a time-delayed program. What's funny is that throughout the article you have execs insisting that this was a shock to everyone and no one could have predicted it. Except, of course, we wrote about the same basic thing three and a half years ago. But no one listens to us.The article doesn't even mention the biggest benefit to DVRs -- even beyond the fact that people watching them still watch commercials: that it allows people to become more connected to certain shows, since they're less likely to ever miss an episode. That makes them more likely to watch those shows regularly (with or without the commercials). If someone can't keep up otherwise, they'll just let the show go entirely.
The other amusing finding in the article is that NBC's attempt to "DVR-proof" itself by moving Jay Leno to 10pm (on the theory that more people would watch it live when they couldn't fast forward through the ads) has totally backfired. That's because it also means that if people miss the show, they don't go back and watch it days later (who wants to watch stale jokes?) -- so fewer ads get watched in the long run (compared to a show that would be recorded and watched later). Oops. In the meantime, can we go back to those TV execs who were threatening to sue TiVo just a few years ago, and ask for an apology for wasting everyone's time?
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Filed Under: commercials, dvr, tv
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Considering the MPAA has not acknowledged that its members have greatly benefited from the VCR, I think you're in for a long wait.
The first rule of the copyright maximalist is to never concede any point. No matter how much evidence there is to the contrary.
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Put that in a TV exec's spreadsheet.
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Define "works". To me, these GEICO commercials remind me of those brats who scream at the checkout line for a candy bar. Sure, it "works" because volume is impossible to ignore.
Plop, plop. Fizz, fizz. See? I'm sure many will know what this refers to, but those who weren't bombarded with these "one showing per every 10 minutes" ads will have no clue.
The DVR's greatest asset is the fast forward button, when watching an entertaining ad once or twice is now boring and we'll quickly skip it for the next shiny one, if at all.
I'm still waiting for someone to tell me that last Kia ad was the best ever made. *yawn* And how many car commercials do we get per night? Couldn't tell you. I skip them. And *lots* of them.
Maybe it's about time these businesses focus in spending their money on something the majority of us aren't going to skip.
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Well, yes I know what it refers to, but I don't think it's what YOU'RE talking about...
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If you asked me personally what insurance I would recommend, it would be the one I use. The local one that doesn't bombard me with a thousand advertisements per day. Funny how that works.
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I'd almost certainly watch more if I had a DVR, since there's a lot of stuff I'd actually like to watch and for various reasons it's just not convenient to watch it at the time it's broadcast. And TVNZ's on-demand site is basically horrible, can't download so the quality is limited to what can stream, and they force you to watch ads (I'm sure more fewquently than the broadcast ones) plus I pay for bandwidth so it's not 'free' for me at all. Basically it sucks on every level.
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DVRs Saving TV
http://seanreadsthenews.typepad.com/seanreadsthenews/2009/11/dvrs-help-ratings-nyt- finds.html
Sean Dougherty
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Does anyone know .....
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Only if it was used during commercials, then they called it "stealing".
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Tactics
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First thing I did when I got a PVR was learn how to jump commercials. Heck, even now, if I want to watch an hour long show "live", I start it records and then show up 15 minutes later to start watching. So then I only have to spend 45 minutes to watch an hour, commercial free.
Depending on learned behavior is pretty much a losing battle.
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yup, we all know how much the computer destroyed calculator sales.
And the TV destroyed theater sales
And the Radio destroyed CD sales
and of course the internet destroyed ALL SALES
These companies are just paranoid and un-inventive when it comes to business models
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Flashforward has an interesting premise and looks like a show I'd like. I haven't watched a single episode of it. Why? Because I know they'll end the season on a big cliffhanger, then the network will keep fans hanging for 2-3 months until they finally announce that it's been cancelled.
Why bother?
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I don't watch that crap either.
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Commercials as Content
The nice thing about watching a recorded program on your DVR is that you can skip past the ANNOYING commercials. I think its recognition that most commercials are crap and network execs know this when they complain that no one will watch commercials.
When there are good commercials, advertisements for something I'm interested in or anything of value, I do watch those commercials. Even to the point that I'll rewind them to watch them again.
Who wants to watch crappy commercials? Or the same commercials every commercial break? Am I going to skip over these? Of course! This is a no brainer.
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Some channels flat-out lie about show timing. Comedy Central started broadcasting Futurama delayed by about 4 minutes, so that it might start at 4:04 and end at 4:34. But the published time is 4:00-4:30, so my Tivo records all but the ending of the show. I've tried to think of a benign reason why they do this, but it doesn't really matter, because the result in my case is that I no longer watch Futurama on Comedy Central.
At least in the 31- or 61-minute case, the extra minute is typically a silly scene that's not essential to the plot. But when the syndicating network ham-handedly chops off a good chunk of the show, you're better off not watching any of it.
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I've tried to think of a benign reason why they do this, but it doesn't really matter, because the result in my case is that I no longer watch Futurama on Comedy Central.
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Unless you've found a different channel to watch Futurama on, I'd say this is kinda drastic. Tivo has options to allow for both pre- and post- recording of up to 5 minutes or so of the actual scheduled time. No biggie.
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Fighting DVRs
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