Google Patent Proposes $2 Fee To Skip Commercials 434
theodp writes "A day after Google debuted its new Google TV website, the USPTO issued U.S. Patent No. 7,806,329 to the search giant for its Targeted Video Advertising invention. Among other things, the patent proposes having viewers take 5-10 minutes to 'fill out a consumer survey and perhaps to provide additional information such as a mailing address survey before starting the program' to avoid having to watch 10 minutes of commercials. 'As another alternative,' the patent continues, 'the broadcaster may offer the users an option to pay $2 (such as through a micro-payment system, such as GBuy) to exchange for skipping all commercials.' More from the patent: 'The system may allow a user to skip all of the promotions that they want to skip, but may also require the user to fully watch at least four promotions before the program will continue. Likewise, the system may require the user to follow activities that generate a certain amount of advertising revenue or advertising points (e.g., that may correspond directly or indirectly to advertising revenues) before the program will continue.'"
Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
To me, at this point, commercials are greed. We already pay subscription (cable or otherwise), and most movies/TV shows use product placement among other things to supplement the cost. What really gets me is that now movies have 10 minutes of commercials before them. Did I really just pay $10 to watch 10 minutes of commercials before the 15 minutes of movie trailers? It's odd that only a few years ago, the movie/theatre business made a nice profit without having these commercials, yet now they cannot live without them.
I hope in time commercial-less media is the norm.
Well, there goes my "Fast Forward" button (Score:5, Insightful)
Before everyone gets crazy... (Score:4, Insightful)
We can still go grab a beer and fix a sandwich up during commercials. Don't freak out. Just do something else.
Better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Google is the "king" of targeted ads...so why not do the same thing with Google TV? If I'm watching an episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, I obviously will not give a shit about life insurance...but a video game? Sure. I'll sit through an advertisement for that. Unless it's one of those lame Gamestop machinima commercials...
This seems like a strange direction for Google to take...what with their algorithms used for serving up ads online, one would think they would utilize something similar for their TV service...I despise advertisements, but I'll tolerate them if it's relevant to what I'm watching.
OMG (Score:3, Insightful)
If there was ever a situation that deserved writing scripts that control a video player, this is it.
Script #1: Fill in the customer survery with bogus-but-valid-looking info.
Script #2: During commercials, cut off the video player's access to the screen and audio output, and instead have the computer present either silence or some alternative form of entertainment (music, etc.)
Just an Example Amount (Score:5, Insightful)
The real question is: how is this any different than someone forking over a couple bucks to watch the latest Futurama episode on iTunes?
You can call it "skipping commercials" or you can call it "selling the right to view content once" or whatever the hell you want. But it all comes down to you reimbursing the broadcasters for their content--which has traditionally been done through advertising. I'm surprised this is invoking so much ire from the Slashdot crowd.
Re:Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
What really gets me is that now movies have 10 minutes of commercials before them. Did I really just pay $10 to watch 10 minutes of commercials before the 15 minutes of movie trailers?
Go somewhere else then, seriously. Most often it's the small, independent, or even budget theaters that actual treat their patrons nicely. Even in the relatively small town I live in there is at least one budget theater that promises no commercials, less than 10 minutes of previews, and (as they love to point out as often as possible) real butter on the popcorn. And the manager actually knows the regulars, gives out free tickets and popcorn before the start of many movies, apologizes in person if something is wrong, and actually tries to make the whole experience enjoyable. And all for less than half the price of going to one of the big name theaters. Ok, sure, you won't get to see new releases opening weekend, but how often can you really not wait an extra month or two before you see a movie?
Re:Greed (Score:4, Insightful)
do they want me to get things from bit torrent?
I haven't had cable television in over a year. I got tired of all the infomercial crap.
I don't think that I will be paying for a show with comercials.
I think that it will be a cold day in hell that I pay $2 extra for one without.
Just how much do they think that television is worth?
Not gonna do it. no thanks.
now you will have to excuse me, I have some Dexter to watch...
Patent? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Absolutely Evil. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, no kidding. Fill out a survey before I can watch TV? Pay them for the privilege to not watch commercials? Generate a certain amount of ad revenue?
My PVR already allows me to do this for free. I can guarantee that as soon as my TV watching will enforce that I watch commercials or pay to skip them, I will simply cancel my TV subscription and stop watching it altogether. I will occasionally rewind to see a commercial which catches my eye, but I'm not generally interested in being advertised to.
Google is in the middle of the worst possible scenario of monetization of my viewing time. None of these "features" would do anything other than drive me away. I don't give a tinkers damn about their advertising revenue, and if they make advertising more intrusive than it already is, I will deny them any more. Give me what I want without making the experience suck more, and maybe.
Everything described in this patent removes value from TV, and makes cost of watching TV (both monetary and time) not worth it.
Tell you what, pay me to watch commercials instead of forcing me to watch them or paying to skip them -- I refuse to be obligated by your advertising contracts. Until then, your business model is between you and your advertiser. My TV watching is between me and my remote, and ends at the point where I say to hell with it, and turn off the TV.
Re:Why, on Earth, is anyone complaining? (Score:3, Insightful)
Cable was invented to be commercial free. That was why people originally paid the premium for all those commercial free channels.
Then came the premium cable channels like HBO, Showtime, etc. For the most part those are commercial free, but if you watch Showtimes "Big Brother" they have commercials through-out that. I can only imagine this will get worse and worse and eventually these premium commercial free channels are littered with them. It's bad enough we get to watch a bunch of movie stars in Entourage drink a brand of beer no one in their right mind would ever think about drinking unless they're 50 and sitting in their underwear watching infomercials all night long.
Re:Nothing is free (Score:3, Insightful)
But we already pay for cable/satellite TV... commercials on public airwaves I understand.
Re:$2 (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Well Sure, If That Covers the Costs (Score:4, Insightful)
i worry you'll sit through commercials AFTER paying for the book, just like cable.
Re:Greed (Score:1, Insightful)
Wow. You're not too bright are you? The subscription fees you pay do nothing to cover the cost of the actual content. I'm sure if all that was available to watch was YouTube quality TV shows, the subscription fees might cover the bill. But any show with created by more than a dude with a video recorder requires actors, writers, producers, crew, et all to be paid. Where do you think that money comes from?
Yep. Commercials.
Re:Greed (Score:2, Insightful)
There are plenty of commercials on PBS, they just happen to be between programs, rather than interrupting them.
Re:Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
I think at this point, society is seriously messed up. If we have to pay to avoid being monitored and hit with sales pitches, then the world of advertising must be either so desparate or so avaricious, that it's lost all reason. It's tantamount to a protection racket where people pay not to be hassled. And you'd think that if you were an advertiser, your target audience would be the ones that could afford not to see your ads, no?
I don't think it's even the advertising companies that are to blame. Well they are, because they pay for all this, but ultimately they're just driven by the investors with quarterly whips to increase profits higher and higher. It's the market analysts (or whatever they're called these days) who keep offering them this magic ticket whereby the wonderful technique of stripping everyone of the last dregs of their privacy, will connect each seller with an untapped market of people who desparately want their product. They mine every last drop of data they can from us and then try to flog their services to the product manufacturers saying "look - we know who'll buy your goods. Pay ussssss."
Advertising long since stopped being about companies trying to make money off the public. Advertising is now about advertisers trying to make money off the companies.
Re:Nothing is free (Score:2, Insightful)
Nothing is free? Bullshit. The thing most important to your life is free, the one thing you can't survive two minutes without -- air. Sunsets and sunrises are free, if beauty is worthless why do people pay millions for paintings? Linux is free, Open Office is free, FOSS is free, public domain literature is free, GPL books are free, my journals are free, rain will water your grass for free, unsecured wifi is free, most music is free, and most of all... America is the land of the free!
Money is simply a tool. Only a fool worships his tools, fool. Now go take your MBA and get the hell off this nerd site and go to Business Week or some other site that caters to your religion, because greedheads like you really piss me off.
My simple life (Score:3, Insightful)
I hate the logos that TV stations put in the corner of the screen throughout shows. So I stopped watching TV three years ago.
The high number of adverts in each show was becoming a problem, but the logos annoyed me more. Now, since I've stopped watching TV because of the logos, the adverts don't bother me. Funny that.
When it gets to the point that hour-long shows have half-an-hour of interactive adverts that you MUST watch or they play again, that won't bother me. Because I still won't be watching TV.
I have so much more time to be productive since I quit the tube.
Re:Why, on Earth, is anyone complaining? (Score:4, Insightful)
"Cable was invented to be commercial free."
As much as I share your sentiment, that statement is not true. Cable TV (CATV) was invented to distribute regular broadcasts to areas where private antennas are not feasible.
Re:Greed (Score:3, Insightful)
I think at this point, society is seriously messed up.
lol how do you know when your life is too good? When you think advertising before you get entertained means society is seriously messed up.
Seriously, this is messed up society [indiatalkies.com], and so is this [bilerico.com], but having your entertainment delayed is not.
Re:Greed (Score:2, Insightful)
I do. Advertisers have arrogated to themselves the right to pollute every single surface visible by humans with their inane excreta, and NOBODY is doing a damn thing to stop them.
Re:Absolutely Evil. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Greed (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't watch TV (aaarhhh!), I use adblock, and most of the stuff I subsribe to comes with only a few ads. My phone is not listed for telemarketers. And on my mailbox, there's a "no advertising, please" sticker.
Life is good. At least in that respect.
(I still get hassled a bit by pushy salespeople in the streets, though. I'm just waiting for the Norwegian law enforcement to become so inefficent that I can punch them without risking getting hassled by the Man. And the public space is filled with advertising.)
Re:Greed (Score:3, Insightful)
Nothing like a self-righteous lecture to make you feel better, huh?