TV Network Execs Contemplate Going To Court To Say Skipping Commercials Is Illegal
from the that-won't-go-over-well dept
Late last week Charlie Ergen and the folks at Dish Networks presented the TV networks with a bit of a conundrum. You see, the company decided to actually give consumers what they want: setting up a special DVR system, called Auto Hop, that would let viewers not just automatically DVR the entire primetime lineup of all the major networks with the single push of a button -- but also to automatically skip commercials when watching the playback, as long as it wasn't the same day the shows aired. This is something that consumers clearly want -- which Dish execs were pretty upfront about:“Viewers love to skip commercials,” Vivek Khemka, vice president of DISH Product Management, said in a statementBut, of course, who is a consumer in this market gets complicated pretty fast. The TV networks, of course, make a fair bit of money from advertising on these shows, and they're not happy about any idea that means people might skip commercials. Those of you who have been around for a bit may recall a few relevant stories. First, there was Jamie Kellner, the former chair of Turner Broadcast Systems, who once claimed that walking away from your TV while commercials aired was a form of theft. Then, of course, there was the famous ReplayTV case. If you don't recall, ReplayTV was an early competitor to TiVo, and in many regards a better product. Among its features, it took an already considered legal feature from VCRs called "commercial skip" and added it to DVRs. The industry sued, in large part because of this feature, which they considered to be breaking the law.
Of course, the expense of the lawsuit resulted in Replay's parent company SonicBlue declaring bankruptcy. It then sold off the remains to D&M, who tried relaunching a version of the product without all the cool features people liked, and it went nowhere. Eventually, DirecTV bought the remnants. However, the basic lawsuit died out with the bankruptcy. A bunch of ReplayTV users, led by Craig Newmark from Craigslist, actually tried to continue the case on their own, to have those features declared legal, but after the networks promised not to sue those users for using the features, the judge tossed the case.
Left unresolved, of course, is whether or not features like commercial skip are actually legal.
As some are pointing out, the TV networks may have missed a golden opportunity by not continuing the fight against Craig and the other users, since they wouldn't be able to afford the bigtime lawyers that Ergen and Dish can easily toss out here. So the TV networks basically have to make the decision if this is really a battle worth fighting.
It does seem clear that the anti-consumer folks who run the TV networks would certainly like to slap Dish around for this move:
"I think this is an attack on our eco-system," said NBC Broadcasting chairman Ted Harbert on a conference call Monday. "I'm not for it."Isn't it just like NBC to think that a tool that the public actually finds useful is an "attack" on their ecosystem? At some point, in the way, way distant future, perhaps we'll live in an age where companies like NBC Universal recognize that, when things are more efficient and easier for consumers, it is a good thing, rather than something to freak out about and declare evil?
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Filed Under: charlie ergen, commercials, dvr, vivek khemka
Companies: dish networks, nbc, replaytv, sonicblue, tivo, turner broadcast systems
Reader Comments
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This isn't about time shifting. It's about commercial skipping. Not quite the same thing.
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Plenty of time to watch commercials when I'm dead.
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Plenty of time to watch commercials when I'm dead.
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To which the creative response would be to run commercials for undertakers.
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Re: skipping commercials?
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Although the porn websites already discovered the magic of GIF ads that bypass known adblockers LoL
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There skipped it for you..
Yes I'm a dirty dirty ad thief.. I have stolen them and will sell them at the local bar/pub for a tidy sum..
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Re: TV execs aren't scared, it's Marketing people
It's not TV people who lie to companies, it's Marketing people lying to their bosses.
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Someone needs to lose their job in the worst kind of way.
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They don't care about credibility, they care about money.
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Real quality TV with science or education, or an actual plot, or good documentary, or hard news without talking heads, or anything that makes you think is getting pretty hard to find.
They want advertising dollars. But they seem to want, or maybe their advertisers seem to want only the eyeballs of the stupidest part of the population.
Give us real news like Cynthia Torqueman of Interstellar Network News (ISN). :-(
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Many executives seem to believe that money buys credibility.
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Was it that or more hookers and blow? They have expensive tastes, expensive wives, and expensive houses to maintain, and that leaves less for hookers and blow, so they need to make up the difference somehow.
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Re: Content is Content
TV Execs: Either stop putting on stupid/annoying commercials, regress to the good ol 2 second "this show brought to you by:" spot, or stop bitching...
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Next up...
If you choose not to purchase a cable or satellite tv package, you will be penalized by the IRS.
How much programming you watch will be determined by an always active iris scanner that works closely with the Microsoft Kinect system which you will also be required to purchase.
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Re: Next up...
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Re: Next up...
If you don't pay up, you can't hear nor see anything.
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I pay for cable. Extra for on-demand services. More for HD. More for internet...how many times am I supposed to pay these fuckers for the same damn thing?!
Seriously - what law is being broken by skipping commercials?! Is it imaginary law? I think it's imaginary law.
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WTF ABOUT THE PROGRAMMING I PAID FOR!?
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I'd rather watch "funny comertials" on youtube, where "funny" is everything and anything that can make me laugh.
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It's all about the Double Dipping
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Also, it's cases like this that make me wonder if the pro-IP people are TRYING to burn all their bridges and screw themselves over long term by destroying any good will people may have towards them?
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NBC / Comcast
Comcast makes a TON of money on the DVR boxes and charge for the DVR service, and now an NBC exec comes out and criticizes skipping commercials?
Seems to me comcast could easily restrict the fast forward function of the DVR.
Of course they might lose some customers, but they could solve a big part of their own problem without legislation.
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\sarc
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But you're right, because I use the library to check some stuff out first, yeah, I guess I'm a "pirate."
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In the eyes of the MAFIAA, you are a pirate because you exist and you are not them. Just listen to the shills here. We say over and over again that we buy their product and they still accuse us of torrenting (I torrent all the time, linux distros and other open source/legal and even some quasi-legal stuff) their stuff. I get the feeling that they would prefer a system where we get taxed part of our paycheck, which goes to them, whether or not they produce anything.
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Remember The Weather Channel? A place you could get the weather all the time without commercials? Somewhere along the line that changed. It became a bundled broadcast along with commercials.
All the broadcasters want you to buy into the idea that without commercials, it's gonna cost you more. Yet no one but the broadcasters like commercials. Like Anonymous Coward posted, I haven't seen a commercial on the net in years. Not planning on seeing them either.
With the problems that show up from time to time with Google Adsense, with infected iFrames passing out malware, it's as much a matter of personal computer safety as it is eliminating annoyances.
Despite all the pitches to sell the commercial as a necessary and needful thing, people flat out don't like them. They are as bad as spam; a pest industry.
Thank you but no thank you. Commercials and ads are something I will joyfully pass up.
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The funny thing is that one of the main reasons that I rarely watch TV (and don't subscribe to cable TV at all) is the commercials. For many shows, I would gladly pay a reasonable fee to watch them if commercials were omitted. Oh wait, I already do: it's called Netflix.
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I have no need for TV anymore, because everything on it is already on the internet, sometimes minutes after the first airing.
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The car "commercials" are the worst offenders.
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> the Microsoft ones.
No, their absolute worst one was also a Subway product placement. They were in the middle of a time-sensitive murder investigation, but the characters actually took the time to stop at the beach where the big fat guy who runs the shrimp truck told them all about how delicious his Subway sandwich was.
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Not like you still cant hear them
Ohhh I might miss a dozen or so:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=56750
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Solutions
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Re: Solutions
And those overlay ads are the worst possible option.
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Re: Re: Solutions
For example: the actors are sitting around a table having breakfast, they show a breakfast cereal being poured into the bowls, with some juice on table. Both are specific brand names.
What you don't realise is those boxes, products are actually coloured green or blue (like blue/green screen technology) and that the actual product design is computer generated dependant on who pays, and what market/region the show is being sold into.
That's the new product advertising and can be carried across to online streaming as well.
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The future is going to be realtime placement of anything sadly that include ads.
Motion tracking is evolving and being used in other areas besides special effects.
This is why marketeers should be throwing themselves at the feet of Google so the Google Glass takes off, imagine what they could superimpose on those.
On another matter it is full to update the special effects of old public domain movies.
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Re: Re: Solutions
There was a repeat of a tv show and in the background was a poster for a movie not even being made when the show was originally shot.
I find it amazing they find a way to sell the slot in the show for characters to drink soft drink x and then sell commercial slots to soft drink y.
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Re: Re: Re: Solutions
I haven't seen it, but I hate the very idea. If I'm watching an old show, it's as much for nostalgia as anything else. I don't want anything about it to be altered.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Solutions
You have no sense of adventure, what new effects you can add to the House on Haunted Hill to update it, I like that movie in the original, but I also like to defile the old public domain ones to create new versions.
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Are you telling me that making skipping of commercials illegal is indicative of loss of intelligence for our species, to the point where you'd like to leave?
What about pollution? What about our governments or corporate greed or basic lack of humanity and respect for one another, let alone other species or the planet in general?
There's so much to be embarrassed about with regards to the things humans have and continue to do, we should have built that ship and left a LONG LONG time ago!
"Everybody knows, that the world is full of stupid people, so meet me at the mission at midnight.."
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The things that actually motivate me to action, I find curiouser and curiouser every day.
Personally, I blame Tesla for the fact that we're all still here with "them". What I wouldn't give for a delorean!
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Very Relevant
SMBC on commercials
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Dear content industry: please stop shooting yourself in the foot because you didn't think of it first. ~Kthx, no longer a customer
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So sue me, assholes - go a head and try.
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Once upon a time...
These days you pay a provider to bring you what used to be free content. Not only that but you still end up having to put up with MORE ads per content volume than you ever used to! So now the system is paid from both sides; companies paying for ads and consumers paying for content. Isn't it wonderful to have a system like that? NOT! There are of course workarounds but they're not generally consumer friendly and the system tries to shut them down / make them more difficult to implement so that there isn't an "out" that one can actually use.
As a consumer if I cannot skip the ads in shows I'm actually paying money to see every month then I'll simply stop paying for that content. The advertisers lose out AND the providers lose out AND the content creators lose out. On the other hand I end up with extra cash in my wallet to go buy a few movies or a series which I can then rip to my media PC conveniently without ANY commercials or ads. That puts cash back into the pockets of the creators while still leaving the advertisers and providers out.
It may be old school relatively speaking but if that's what they want to drive their own market to I don't have an issue with it at all. After all, does anyone really like ad garbage? And hey, if that is suddenly illegal as well then why bother with their content at all? Get outside, pick up a new hobby, learn a language, start gardening, do something more productive than sitting in front of the idiot box. *shrug*
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Re: Once upon a time...
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Cut the cord on your cable... then your fast food, soda, plastics, oil...
If we all did it, this world would change for the better, methinks
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Plastics and oil are a whole different ball game.
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But I feel that people think they will live forever (at least that the human race will, not talking about the delusional folks). And oil/plastic is of finite amount. Therefore... it will happen, just how. Better to quit the stuff before you run out and need to go cold turkey.
We are addicted, like a heroin addict. If we stopped for one day... imagine the withdrawls this dependent society would feel.
Oil has allowed for ~7 billion people to live on this earth. Take it away tomorrow and the number would likley crash below 1 billion in fairly short order. I suppose the earth could live with over 7 billion people, just not in the current fashion, nor is there an easily solution to transform into this reality.
The choices made in the past, along with those made today, can't be undone. Everything you do has an impact whether you decide to convince yourself otherwise or not.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Once upon a time...
The problem is, we're dependent. Out current setup doesn't give good alternatives. I heat my house with natural gas (finite & contributing to greenhouse), but heating it with wood or coal isn't any better. I drive my car on oil, but electric cars get electricity somewhere, and our current battery systems in high efficiency cars are poorly developed and don't last all that long. (I like to keep a car for 10-15 years, because that's a big hunk of metal and plastic to throw out any sooner than than.) I ride my bike, but I've been almost hit several times, and the weather's terrible here most of the year.
Many problems can be fixed or mitigated on a personal level, but some really need a society-wide or technological fix.
(My favorite intermediate steps: composting, setting A/C-heat gaps of at least 10 degrees, and not putting junk all over my garden and yard to run off into the water system.)
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Re: Once upon a time...
Sure you could. It's called leaving the room and making a sandwich, taking a whiz, reading a book, or throwing a ball for the dog.
We had all sorts of ways of skipping commercials in those pre-VCR days.
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Just to clarify....
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Also if you've got the Motorola DVR with the gray or silver remote you can program a button (I use the A button) to do a 30 second skip. Makes breezing through commercials a cinch. Skip skip skip skip skip skip oops, too far, jump back 10 seconds and there we go.
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Eat a fat dick.
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In an earlier comment, I mentioned how there were some shows that I thought were well done, but the product placement is so annoying that I can't watch them. Bones is the #1 example of this.
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I'm still out on product placement. Overall, I agree with you, but I remember watching this fantastic movie once with Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton about an indestructible red Chevy truck. And it had a scientist saying "That's no moon, that's a space station." But that is all I really remember about that movie. I thought it was very good product placement at the time, but then I went out and bought a Dodge, so apparently it wasn't all that effective. (At the time, though, I did have a Chevy.)
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I watch Bones, but when they started injecting those ads into the show, I almost quit watching. They did that a number of times last season. Theres product placement and then there are full blown commercials, and thats what they were doing. So yeah, any show that puts a 15 to 30 second ad right into the show, I'll just stop watching.
You were right, it was clunky and forced and had nothing to do with the show in most cases.
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I used to laugh on '24' when they had Jack Bauer chasing terrorists around L.A. in a Ford Focus.
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Wake up
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Re: Wake up
Just had to get that out of my system.
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I wouldn't be surprised to see Dish having another major battle with content providers and losing/cutting off several channels (Disney alone could cripple them if they pull ESPN, ABC, ABC Family, Disney channels, etc).
Sorta like they are in the process of doing now with AMC, only ten times worse.
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Or they could behave like grownups and work out a better system than trying to keep something for the dawn of television as the system we "have" to use.
Like the MPAA/RIAA... they are clinging to hard to the old models, that should be a textbook example to the TV execs that trying to do the same things is a stupid idea.
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There's a reason Disney gets away with charging 5+ dollars per subsciber for ESPN and has the power to demand it be included in the lowest tier the MPVD offers so that ALL subscribers have to pay for it, regardless of whether they watch it or not. They get that same treatment from every MVPD, Dish, comcast, Directv, Time-Warner etc. The Multichannel video distributors would be far more hurt by Disney cutting off the signal to all their networks than Disney would be.
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typical move by the deep pocketed industries. them winning is inevitable simply because they have more money. being right is NOT then the issue!
what right has anyone got to tell a person they have to watch a single advert? how is anyone going to be monitored? what punishment is going to be handed out to non-conformists? statutory $150,000 damages and jail time per infringement? will the next thing be that people are forced to buy a magazine that contains nothing but adverts and are then monitored reading them all? which thick fucking senator is going to champion a bill to get this into law? and the next invasion of privacy is going to be...........??????????????
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Consumers can't do what the technology in front of them won't allow.
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Remember when:
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My VCR!
I use Media Center now to record OTA HD programs sometimes. I also have it setup to skip Commercials. It kind of works the same way, just without a tape. It's not 100% perfect, but it works pretty darn good.
Even my HD Comcast Cable box, It's not Automatic, but I can FF at the correct speed, and count just right, and stop it before the program starts again about 80% of the time. Generally if I'm off, it's because the commercials happen to be running longer them normal.
What's really bad, charging $1.99 per TV Episode. What a Rip-Off!!!
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Re: My VCR!
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australia pay tv
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Re: australia pay tv
I haven't bothered with Foxtel. I have a PVR and rarely watch live TV and skip through ads. I've noticed I tend to watch non-commercial stations (ABC) anyway, the programming is better.
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The first reason was the programming was so subpar, I felt like an idiot watching it. I got more entertainment out of watching other people watch it than the show that was on.
The second reason I quit tv, was the commercial. The programs are made around them. It's the excuse to give you the commercial, not the other way around.
This thing with compressing the sound so they can jack the signal level up and keep it under peaks, has gotten totally out of hand. So much so, they lost me as a viewer. I no longer have a tv, don't want a tv, and sure not going to pay for broadcasting.
So how is idiot going to sue me for skipping commercials I don't receive, since I have no interest in his broadcast products?
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I remember when Disney would show their cartoons and other shows, without commercial interruption, until the show was over, then play all the commercials at the end of the episode before the next show would start up.
I'd run to the bathroom because I was so enraptured with the show, I held off for over 26 minutes.
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Dish vs Hulu - Diff Standards
It fills the hard disk with a weeks worth of ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox. If viewed the next day it removes (most) of the commercials.
Compare this to Hulu
If we view any of programs from these stations that stream through Hulu the local commercials aren't there, new ones are that Hulu added, and even those are shorter in duration and come with a banner telling us how long we have to raid the fridge or use the restroom before the program resumes.
Why one set of standards for streaming and another for Dish, at least Dish keeps all the commercials when viewed live, something Hulu doesn't even attempt and it's subsidized by the media giants to begin with...
P.S. the Dish Hopper rocks, here we have 4 TVs watching 4 different programs (3 live) and even connects to DNLA devices to view our own homemade content.
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Re: Dish vs Hulu - Diff Standards
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cut it now!
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I went off all forms of broadcast video years ago...
Before TV elected to cease to exist for me, I had not watched a real-time show for years. My primary use of the VCR was commercial-skipping. I would tape shows, then blow past the ads when watching them.
Every now and then I'll be visiting friends and see the horrible cesspit that TV has become. I expect that my current tube-display TV will never die because it gets so little use. The only reason I have a digital broadcast converter is for news and weather emergencies. I think I used it once last june when my U-Verse went out for an hour due to severe weather and I wanted to see how bad things were.
I simply do not put up with ads any more. I stopped listening to radio and now burn CDs for my car CD player (no easy way to interface an MP3 player, but the book lied when it said burned discs wouldn't work). I've let my various magazine subscriptions lapse. I've got Trueblock Plus installed (Adblock Plus went to the dark side in allowing "unobtrusive" ads, {no such thing} while you can change this, it is reset with each update, at least it was when I gave up on it), and I even have an ad-blocker installed on my Android phone.
I don't put up with the rubbish on DVDs, either. After some tinkering, I can skip anything, no matter what the disc wants.
Make things annoying and I'll work around the annoyance. Make it too hard to avoid the annoyance and I just stop dealing with the things entirely.
If you want my money, make it worth my while. I can always find somewhere else to spend it, or I can not spend at all in some categories.
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Re: I went off all forms of broadcast video years ago...
Do you not have an AUX input in your car audio device?
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Really TV execs?
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Really TV execs?
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The overly broad ownership rules allow for high production costs to continue increasing. Oligopic businesses own the majority of "free" distribution channels and use these artificial limits to push costs higher and force competitors out of the market by looking like 3rd rate productions.
After 30 plus years why are there still only 3 to 5 free channels in every market? Just wait till technology allows for high quality production values to allow everyday web bloggers to compete with Disney and Comcast. At that point the only way to compete is to sue everyone for infringement and reduce P2P communication transfer.
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Your comment implies the companies in question are actually thinking 10-15 years down the line and already adopting the necessary model to counteract free/open source entertainment.... I just don't think they're that prescient or give us peons that much credit.
I think the way the oligopolists will compete is by finding those business models that work and suing anyone using them on any slim pretext until the new companies declare bankruptcy. It also helps to attack any individual or group developing new platforms on which such material could be centrally organized and distributed, preferably using the excuse that the platform might possibly be used by some people to infringe on copyrights the company might possibly have some claim to if the courts don't look too closely at the papers.
...Oh wait.
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So? There's nothing wrong with a pay model.
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You don't see that purty [sic] picture cycling thru your subconsciousness
Every bit of the screen is 'Sponsored by' some brand. Bottom popups cover 1/3 of my TV when watching sports; 10 sec is a long time. Network self promotion? I won't go there. Top of the screen is reserved for more advertising in the guise of 'who is winning the game'.
That brings me to 4:3 side bars. In time that space will look like a bad layout in google ad space. I think the reason it is not done yet is due to fear of backlash; in time web site layout will come to TV screens.
Back to ad skipping: It is all about margins. The insurance lizard contracts x amount of time. The end result is we get to see it 4 times an hour. If insurance lizard knows the ad will be skipped it demands a better price; lower. And increase the cycle rate. This goes for Flo insurance, broken dick Rx, telecomm and all that snake oil advertising.
Mute buttons will be next.
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Confused
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Re: Confused
I hate clueless and/or shrewd legal people.
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Re: Confused
Anyway, it's similar in difference to the way that digital is different from analog. In a lot of cases, it's more desirable so the studios want more control/limitations placed on it(digital copying, DRM), but they have to put up with the old method because there's laws already in place to allow for it (analog copying, analog loophole).
FF button is an established feature that has been around for decades now. Auto-skip on the other hand is still up in the air, legally speaking.
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> for decades now. Auto-skip on the other hand is still up
> in the air, legally speaking.
Actually, it's not. LEGALLY speaking, neither one violates any actual law. This isn't even a copyright issue. This is an entirely new and separate right being asserted-- the right to force people to watch advertising-- and no such law exists. And even if there were such a law, if the auto-skip violated it, so would the FFW button.
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Re: Re: Re: Confused
They can't force you to sit in front of the TV and watch commercials. Nothing is preventing you from getting up and leaving the room, turning the channel, etc.
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> watch commercials.
They also can't legally force Dish or any other company to remove an auto-skip feature from their devices.
Once again, it's important to to note that there's NO LAW against enabling consumers to avoid viewing advertising. As draconian as copyright law has become, this is not even a copyright issue. Avoiding commercials is not a copyright violation.
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Reality is an attack on Television's eco system. As well as every other business that depends on copyright to make money. They better start thinking outside the box. (see what I did there?)
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whats this?
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Outdated Business models make consumers angry
We pay for the internet connection
We pay for the video connection (Dish/Cable)
We pay providers for streaming (Dish/Hulu/Netflix)
We pay for premium content (rentals/on-demand/premium stations)
We're the ones having to buy the receivers, the smart device, the Televisions and even the power bill.
How about the consumer getting a break for a change. It's not asking for much to skip commercials for products we have no interest in. The business models don't let us Opt Out and for potential revenue they don't ask us to Opt In to select which "ad" genres or categories we would be interested in.
Media companies are abysmal, to be sneered at with contempt - not only for the low quality programming but for not adapting to this era and changing the way they do business - to align with what we the viewers want. Their heads are so far up their own reality programming that they've abandoned actual reality in favor of self deception.
There's many reports showing that treating the consumer with respect earns their business. How about some?
Entertainment isn't when we're bombarded with ads. When they cut open a show to place advertising, I for one am not pleased and the commercial that comes up is likely to receive my scorn and not my dollars for interrupting my show as opposed to advertisers that sponsor limited commercial shows - they earn my praise.
Point being there are other ways to advertise than breaking into shows. Those other methods get more "product" respect. Don't ask us --AGAIN-- to change our behavior to fit outdated business models. Media companies need to come up to speed on their era, our way of thinking if they want our business.
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Horrible
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Let's Be Honest
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A Solution
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I avoid _ALL_ this
Works like a charm.
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Why don�t CBS, FOX, and NBC execs want consumers to enjoy commercial-free TV?
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