Post by dkennedy on Dec 1, 2005 6:26:48 GMT -5
Skip ads and satisfy viewers
November 30, 2005
By David Lazarus, San Francisco Chronicle
Advertisers hate TiVo, and here's why:
Select Play Select 30 Select.
That's the sequence of buttons discovered by hackers that will program TiVo remotes to skip ahead through recorded TV programs at 30-second intervals, thus wiping out commercials far more effectively than merely fast forwarding.
(Tip: To do the hack, you have to be pointing your remote at the TV while a recorded program is playing. You'll hear three dings if you do it successfully. Now the Advance button that normally jumps to the end of a show can be used for 30-second skips.)
TiVo responded this week to advertisers' complaints by introducing a service that the Alviso company believes will put their fears to rest: commercials on demand.
The service, premiering next spring, will allow TiVo users to enter keyword searches into their boxes. The box will then seek out and record relevant commercials (thus eating up storage capacity), and the user will be able to watch the commercials as many times as he or she pleases.
It is, in other words, something many TiVo subscribers will see as a laughable idea.
"Who would want to search for commercials?" asked Ivan Feinseth, managing director of Matrix USA, a New York financial-services firm. "People like TiVo because it's a way of getting rid of commercials.
"If you wanted information on a company's products, you wouldn't search for a commercial," he observed. "You would go to Google."
Yet TiVo, which on Tuesday reported a quarterly net loss of $14.2 million, is depicting the new service as a genuine benefit for its more than 4 million customers.
"TiVo is once again introducing to the TV landscape a new and innovative advertising solution that is intended to deliver an even better viewing experience for subscribers," Tom Rogers, the company's chief exec, said in a statement.
Davina Kent, TiVo's vice president of national advertising sales, is spearheading development of commercials on demand. She told me that TiVo in effect wants to be the Google of TV commercials.
"Even if it's something that an advertiser is creating, it's still information about a product or service," Kent said. "People will seek out an ad if it's relevant."
While TiVo says it has data showing that some subscribers have interest in viewing corporate promotions, it seems a stretch (to say the least) to think that consumers in general will embrace an ad-skipping technology to watch commercials at their leisure.
"It's a nice way to appease advertisers," said Frederick Moran, managing director of the Stanford Group, a Florida financial-services firm. "But it's highly doubtful that TiVo users will seek out information via television commercials."
Like all analysts I spoke with who follow TiVo, he said one of the main attractions of the technology is its ability to bypass ads.
"I can watch a one-hour show in 45 minutes, essentially commercial-free," Moran noted. "Most people want to avoid commercials, not request them."
It's changed how I watch
I can attest to that. I've had TiVo in my home for the past few years, and it's literally changed how I watch TV. In particular, I no longer watch anything live. Everything's recorded, and thus everything can be viewed without commercials.
My son and I recently watched "Monsters, Inc.," which I'd TiVoed from the ad-heavy Disney Channel. My son insisted on being the one who got to hit the 30-second skip button a few times every time a commercial break came up.
TiVo may be spinning commercials on demand as a boon for consumers, but the reality is that it's intended to both mollify advertisers and generate new revenue for the company.
TiVo's Kent said she expects advertisers to pay a premium for their commercials to be included in downloads. Thus, General Motors would pay a little something extra to ensure that commercials for its sport-utility vehicles are made available if a TiVo user does a search for SUVs.
At the national level, that extra money would go straight to TiVo. Locally, it would go to cable giant Comcast, which Kent said has worked closely with TiVo in developing the new service and which in turn will be responsible for commercials-on-demand sales in individual cities.
Available by mid-2006
TiVo will be providing its digital video recording software for Comcast set-top boxes by the middle of next year.
The majority of TiVo subscribers now get the service via satellite provider DirecTV, but DirecTV is moving toward introduction of its own DVR technology. Kent said DirecTV played no role in development of TiVo's commercials-on-demand feature.
"Advertisers are overcoming their TiVo trepidation," said Paul Woidke, vice president of technology for Comcast Spotlight, the cable company's advertising division.
"The ability to put interesting, relevant information on a set-top box is exactly where we see things going," he said. "You can watch TV programs when you want to, or you can go to a screen and see things that interest you."
Woidke said Comcast envisions this technology prompting advertisers to craft longer commercials -- perhaps running three minutes or more -- specifically for downloading to TiVo users' boxes.
"To me, they're not commercials," Woidke said. "They're information."
Be that as it may, David Miller, an analyst in the Los Angeles office of investment firm Sanders Morris Harris, said he isn't sure consumers are clamoring for information of this sort. Just the opposite, in fact.
"The majority of DVR users skip the ads," Miller said. "That's one reason they have a DVR."
It's simple, really.
Select Play Select 30 Select.
November 30, 2005
By David Lazarus, San Francisco Chronicle
Advertisers hate TiVo, and here's why:
Select Play Select 30 Select.
That's the sequence of buttons discovered by hackers that will program TiVo remotes to skip ahead through recorded TV programs at 30-second intervals, thus wiping out commercials far more effectively than merely fast forwarding.
(Tip: To do the hack, you have to be pointing your remote at the TV while a recorded program is playing. You'll hear three dings if you do it successfully. Now the Advance button that normally jumps to the end of a show can be used for 30-second skips.)
TiVo responded this week to advertisers' complaints by introducing a service that the Alviso company believes will put their fears to rest: commercials on demand.
The service, premiering next spring, will allow TiVo users to enter keyword searches into their boxes. The box will then seek out and record relevant commercials (thus eating up storage capacity), and the user will be able to watch the commercials as many times as he or she pleases.
It is, in other words, something many TiVo subscribers will see as a laughable idea.
"Who would want to search for commercials?" asked Ivan Feinseth, managing director of Matrix USA, a New York financial-services firm. "People like TiVo because it's a way of getting rid of commercials.
"If you wanted information on a company's products, you wouldn't search for a commercial," he observed. "You would go to Google."
Yet TiVo, which on Tuesday reported a quarterly net loss of $14.2 million, is depicting the new service as a genuine benefit for its more than 4 million customers.
"TiVo is once again introducing to the TV landscape a new and innovative advertising solution that is intended to deliver an even better viewing experience for subscribers," Tom Rogers, the company's chief exec, said in a statement.
Davina Kent, TiVo's vice president of national advertising sales, is spearheading development of commercials on demand. She told me that TiVo in effect wants to be the Google of TV commercials.
"Even if it's something that an advertiser is creating, it's still information about a product or service," Kent said. "People will seek out an ad if it's relevant."
While TiVo says it has data showing that some subscribers have interest in viewing corporate promotions, it seems a stretch (to say the least) to think that consumers in general will embrace an ad-skipping technology to watch commercials at their leisure.
"It's a nice way to appease advertisers," said Frederick Moran, managing director of the Stanford Group, a Florida financial-services firm. "But it's highly doubtful that TiVo users will seek out information via television commercials."
Like all analysts I spoke with who follow TiVo, he said one of the main attractions of the technology is its ability to bypass ads.
"I can watch a one-hour show in 45 minutes, essentially commercial-free," Moran noted. "Most people want to avoid commercials, not request them."
It's changed how I watch
I can attest to that. I've had TiVo in my home for the past few years, and it's literally changed how I watch TV. In particular, I no longer watch anything live. Everything's recorded, and thus everything can be viewed without commercials.
My son and I recently watched "Monsters, Inc.," which I'd TiVoed from the ad-heavy Disney Channel. My son insisted on being the one who got to hit the 30-second skip button a few times every time a commercial break came up.
TiVo may be spinning commercials on demand as a boon for consumers, but the reality is that it's intended to both mollify advertisers and generate new revenue for the company.
TiVo's Kent said she expects advertisers to pay a premium for their commercials to be included in downloads. Thus, General Motors would pay a little something extra to ensure that commercials for its sport-utility vehicles are made available if a TiVo user does a search for SUVs.
At the national level, that extra money would go straight to TiVo. Locally, it would go to cable giant Comcast, which Kent said has worked closely with TiVo in developing the new service and which in turn will be responsible for commercials-on-demand sales in individual cities.
Available by mid-2006
TiVo will be providing its digital video recording software for Comcast set-top boxes by the middle of next year.
The majority of TiVo subscribers now get the service via satellite provider DirecTV, but DirecTV is moving toward introduction of its own DVR technology. Kent said DirecTV played no role in development of TiVo's commercials-on-demand feature.
"Advertisers are overcoming their TiVo trepidation," said Paul Woidke, vice president of technology for Comcast Spotlight, the cable company's advertising division.
"The ability to put interesting, relevant information on a set-top box is exactly where we see things going," he said. "You can watch TV programs when you want to, or you can go to a screen and see things that interest you."
Woidke said Comcast envisions this technology prompting advertisers to craft longer commercials -- perhaps running three minutes or more -- specifically for downloading to TiVo users' boxes.
"To me, they're not commercials," Woidke said. "They're information."
Be that as it may, David Miller, an analyst in the Los Angeles office of investment firm Sanders Morris Harris, said he isn't sure consumers are clamoring for information of this sort. Just the opposite, in fact.
"The majority of DVR users skip the ads," Miller said. "That's one reason they have a DVR."
It's simple, really.
Select Play Select 30 Select.