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NBC's New Peacock Streaming Service Is Just One Big Ad-Injection Machine (digitaltrends.com) 114

Posted by BeauHD from the ad-loaded-trap dept.
Comcast's NBCUniversal is launching a new streaming service in April called Peacock. With three pricing tiers from free to $10 per month, Comcast wants Peacock "to be an ad delivery system to destroy all others in its path," writes Ryan Waniata via Digital Trends. From the report: In a shockingly long investor call, NBC revealed its big new strategy for delivering its many intellectual property spoils online, which will be offered in a multi-tiered plan (with both ad-based and ad-free versions) rolling up a content hodge-podge, including NBCUniversal TV classics and films on-demand, a handful of new exclusive shows, and live content, from NBC News to the Tokyo Olympics. Peacock's ad-based service -- which rolls out first to the company's Xfinity and Flex cable customers from within their cable box -- will arrive in at least some form for zero dollars per month. A $5 monthly charge will get you more content (but still carry ads), while a $10 fee will get you ad-free viewing and the whole kit-and-caboodle. But here's the thing: The execs at Comcast don't even want you to buy that service. It's an also-ran. A red herring.

NBCUniversal Chairman of Advertising & Partnerships Linda Yaccarino spoke vociferously to the crowd of investors, saying, "Peacock will define the future of advertising. The future of free." To hook viewers into their ad-loaded trap, NBC execs have leveraged Peacock to offer "the lightest ad load in the industry," with just 5 minutes of ads per hour. To be fair, that ad-to-content ratio would be quite light these days in TV talk. But, Yaccarino continued, these would be revolutionary new ad innovations for Peacock, including ads that won't be as repeated over and over. Ads that will look "as good as the content" they accompany (whatever that means). Solo ads where "brands become the hero" and offer a TV show brought to you by a single advertiser. Ads. Ads. And more ads.
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NBC's New Peacock Streaming Service Is Just One Big Ad-Injection Machine More

NBC's New Peacock Streaming Service Is Just One Big Ad-Injection Machine

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  • Sounds alright though. Better than cable.

    • Sounds alright though. Better than cable.

      God, that's a bit damning it with faint praise. There must be some better example you can come up with? To me it sounds better than being slowly burnt to death over hours with an underpowered blowtorch. Your turn.

      • Its described as closer to being slowly burnt to death over hours with an underpowered blowtorch that runs for just 5 minutes out of every hours. IT only runs 5 minutes and hour and still I think I'd pick the blowtorch over the peacock.

    • Yeah, I'm not giving CBS $10/month to watch their shows ad free or not. I would consider using Peacock with 5min/hour of commercials for free.

  • duh! (Score:5, Informative)

    by banbeans ( 122547 ) on Saturday January 18, 2020 @02:05AM (#59632078)

    If your not paying for it, then you are the product being sold.

    • Re:duh! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Rick Schumann ( 4662797 ) on Saturday January 18, 2020 @02:22AM (#59632098) Journal
      Even if you are paying for it, you're still a product to be sold.

    • If your not paying for it, then you are the product being sold.

      For free, I will tolerate ads. There's always something else to do that takes a few minutes. The trouble is that for $10/month I want absolutely no ads, and I have a feeling they won't deliver that.

      On the other hand, I'm fairly certain I have as much interest in Peacock as I do CBS's bullshit, which is to say none at all. They can all just go fuck off and die for all I care, I've got more to watch elsewhere than I have hours to spend.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by guruevi ( 827432 )

        From what I understand, $10 is ad-free but they really don't want you to buy it so there will be no added value between the free tier and the $5 or $10 tiers.

        Given that interstitials sell for anywhere from $0.50 to $50 per impression, it makes sense that they want you to see ads, even if it's just 1 per hour, that's still easily making them more per account per month.

      • They might well deliver content without interstitial ads. But they definitely won't take the embedded advertising out of their shows, period. No matter what, there will be advertising, even if every thirty commercial and even bumper is removed. So you still always have to be wondering whether what you're seeing was considered interesting by the writers, or is paid product placement, even when something is being criticised.

  • I think they're about a century late to this particular market.

  • This sounds like a marketing departments wet dream. Advertise to people without them noticing.

    I'm sure this sounds great in the board room and on dreamy calls like this. In reality they will have zero control over the people making ads to catch peoples attention. Advertisers will still do their best to grab your attention.

    --
    All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them. - Walt Disney

    • I am a type D purchaser. One who has to be convinced I am paying the lowest price BEFORE I buy. Call me Jewish / Scottish whatever. Another way to loose a sale is display no prices, or make me jump hurdle with promo codes. Without family - so 2 for 1 offers don't work either - in fact they piss me off. I can't remember the last commercial that had me reaching for my wallet. This another scam to trick skeptical advertisers win more type A purchasers - or rather the 2nd hand crumbs left after Apple, Google

      • I try to note which commercials are annoying and not buy those products.

        • I try to note which commercials are annoying and not buy those products.

          This is often my primary go/no go decision maker too. Unless it's something I simply cannot get anywhere else, I'll avoid anything that's marketed with truly annoying commercials.

          The idea behind deliberately annoying commercials is to annoy you so much that the brand sticks in your head, gradually building familiarity.

          For me it works the other way- it makes me ever more determined not to buy that product.

          • Exactly, such as X10 home network devices, the first major sponsor of popup ads I remember seeing.

            They were permanently added to my shitlist as a result of that.

            • Exactly, such as X10 home network devices,

              Yep, that annoyed the hell out of me, and I was an X10 user before I ever saw one of their popups.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MrKaos ( 858439 )

      This sounds like a marketing departments wet dream. Advertise to people without them noticing.

      That's how product placement in movies works. Robert Cialdini masterfully disassembles the advertising industry in Pre-Suasion [amazon.com] and his previous book Influence . In tests the advertising that was barely noticeable were the most successful advertising product placements of all tested.

      The sheer amount of money that the advertising spends on using psychological techniques to manipulate our emotions into buying stuff leaves little doubt why there are so many mental health issues in the world today. My wel

  • WTF did you expect from Comcast? (Score:3)

    by Rick Schumann ( 4662797 ) on Saturday January 18, 2020 @02:22AM (#59632100) Journal
    Of course they'd do this.
  • No thanks, no thanks, and no thanks.

  • The lowest-tier free service has ads. The highest-tier $10 service is ad-free. ...
    (time passes) ...
    The lowest-tier $10 service has ads and shows nothing but Kardashian reruns. The highest-tier $50 service also has ads, but actually streams the shows you want to watch.

    Back in the day we called that Cable TV.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gtall ( 79522 )

      This sounds a like the Stockholm syndrome in a weird way. You must pay your torturers to stop torturing you.

  • ... a $10 fee will get you ad-free viewing and the whole kit-and-caboodle. But here's the thing: The execs at Comcast don't even want you to buy that service. It's an also-ran. A red herring.

    NBCUniversal Chairman of Advertising & Partnerships Linda Yaccarino spoke vociferously to the crowd of investors, saying, "Peacock will define the future of advertising. The future of free." To hook viewers into their ad-loaded trap, NBC execs have leveraged Peacock to offer "the lightest ad load in the industry," with just 5 minutes of ads per hour. To be fair, that ad-to-content ratio would be quite light these days in TV talk. But, Yaccarino continued, these would be revolutionary new ad innovations for Peacock, including ads that won't be as repeated over and over. Ads that will look "as good as the content" they accompany (whatever that means). Solo ads where "brands become the hero" and offer a TV show brought to you by a single advertiser. Ads. Ads. And more ads.

    They are seriously overestimating the extent to which people enjoy watching ads.

  • Like Microsoft, they offer what everyone is already offering.
    The only difference, is that most people use Microsoft products, at least at work
    When in the last 15 years has NBC been relevant in any way?
    They're iconic, sure. But they are not relevant, and waited so long...
    No one is buying.


    For instance Sears is shutting down, all over the country.
    Their catalog, until a couple decades ago was pure Americana
    Kodak is another example.
    Both should have owned the markets they founded.
    They waited too long,

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rossdee ( 243626 )

      "When in the last 15 years has NBC been relevant in any way?"

      Rachel had that interview with Lev Parnas the other night.

      • Oh do those YouTube videos come from a tv station?

      • "When in the last 15 years has NBC been relevant in any way?"

        Rachel had that interview with Lev Parnas the other night.

        Well, that's counting MSNBC. But point mostly taken. She's a good watch all the time. A human research engine.

        • Yeah, like her in-depth research on Russian PissGate. She's a partisan, just like all the other partisans.

          • Yeah, like her in-depth research on Russian PissGate. She's a partisan, just like all the other partisans.

            That's her job. You're partisan, and if there was a party for Goldwater Conservatives, I'd be partisan as well.

      • Parnas said, "Trump knew exactly what was going on", which may be the first time that's ever been said about him.

  • The point of adverts on TV (Score:5, Funny)

    by Alain Williams ( 2972 ) <addw@phcomp.co.uk> on Saturday January 18, 2020 @04:09AM (#59632212) Homepage

    I always thought that the point of adverts on TV was to give you a few minutes to go to the toilet or make a cup of tea without missing any of the film that you were watching.

    • That ad model started to die with VCRs - and the pause buttons on their remotes.

    • I always thought that the point of adverts on TV was to give you a few minutes to go to the toilet or make a cup of tea without missing any of the film that you were watching.

      It is 2020. This is what the pause button is for.

      If you pause long enough, you can usually fast forward through the commercials and watch 1 hour of "television" in 42 minutes.

    • Remember when that asshole Jamie Kellner, Chairman and CEO of Turner Broadcasting, was interviewed by Cable World and said that skipping or not watching ads was "stealing"?

      --------

      Jamie Kellner: Because of the ad skips.... It's theft. Your contract with the network when you get the show is you're going to watch the spots. Otherwise you couldn't get the show on an ad-supported basis. Any time you skip a commercial or watch the button you're actually stealing the programming.

      Cable World: What if you have to g

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by hawk ( 1151 )

        Going for Pepsi after a Coke commercial would violate the contract, too.

        And Heaven *forbid* that you drink a generic!!!

        hawk

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      Ads are the content.
      The TV show, news, movie is just filler around the ads.

  • Beclowned is a cool word (Score:3)

    by Impy the Impiuos Imp ( 442658 ) on Saturday January 18, 2020 @04:38AM (#59632240) Journal

    What an asinine clown the OP is, whining about ads while burying that it's only 5 minutes an hour.

    • .... [ads for ] only 5 minutes an hour.

      The way I read it (as in "a TV show brought to you by a single advertiser") was that ads would be baked into many of the shows, and the 5 minutes is additional to that. I hope I'm wrong.

    • 1 minute would be too much. Even on Youtube I couldn't stand the ads anymore and I sprung for the ad-free monthly subscription. Maybe watching TV has desensitized me to ads in the past, but after years of watching DVDs and ad-free streaming (and some pirated content) I'm not used to them anymore, and I've become kind of hypersensitive to seeing ads.

      Still, it's nice of them to offer an ad-supported free option... but the fact that they don't really want you to pay for ad-free viewing doesn't bode well f

      • Even on Youtube I couldn't stand the ads anymore and I sprung for the ad-free monthly subscription.

        Your browser, it no does accept extensions?

        • Ad blocker does work in the browser. However we watch a lot of YT stuff on the big screen using an Android TV device.
          Also I don't mind paying for something like this either, if the price is decent.
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • it adds up to 5 minutes per hour, it's actually every 12th frame.
  • I bet this will be U.S. only.
  • i dont know about you guys, but when facebook asks me to weigh in my opinion on a sponsors advertising campaign, FOR THE LIFE OF ME, I can *never* remember seeing an ad for that particular product, literally ever. So I must be immune, or something. What I do know is this, nobody I know buys anything from ads they see. Or if they do, they're not willing to admit it.
    • I have heard some form of your comment from pretty much every person I know. And yet, there's solid data showing upticks in purchasing directly correlated to ad views in basically all industries. Advertising does work, but I do wonder on who and why.

      • I'd wager it's a variant of the Dunning-Kruger effect: "I'm so smart, so clever, those sneaky ads don't make ME buy a product."

        Just because you don't immediately reach for your wallet after seeing an ad doesn't mean it wasn't effective on you. Ads don't really work that way. No one likes the idea that they can be psychologically manipulated, but if we're to be intellectually honest, ads probably DO work on most people to at least some extent.

        The sneaky part is that the ad is probably not in the forefront

      • Yeah most people say ads don't affect them. While they're drinking a Coke. Companies spend billions of dollars on ads because people DO buy brand name products.

        It's not that the moment you see a Nike commercial you jump up and go buy some shoes. It's when you need some shoes, you get to the store and see Nike on the shelf next to Futwear brand and you don't buy the btand you've never heard of. Guess WHY Coke, Mike, and McDonald's are famous brands? The yens of billions they spend on advertising their bra

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by guruevi ( 827432 )

          Yet, those are the brands I dislike the most. I won't buy anything Nike ever since they went all political but even before that, their competitors had far greater quality and comfortable products. I think I owned 1 Nike's in my entire life. Same goes for Coke - Pepsi with cane sugar is so much better than any Coke. McDonalds outright sucks, their fries, their burgers, everything is tasteless, I'd go for BK if I had no other choice, although I'm not a big fast food fan.

          The only places that advertising matter

  • I don’t care about tv shows any more.

  • Imagine no TeeVee (Score:4, Insightful)

    by AndyKron ( 937105 ) on Saturday January 18, 2020 @05:56AM (#59632372)
    Imagine what could be accomplished if people did something useful rather than watch teevee
  • Shows brought to you by a single advertiser? That was popular in the 1950s, when commercials were fewer and much less offensive. The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show comes to mind, brought to you by . . . . Ford, of course! Tennessee Ernie even did some of the commercials himself, explaining in detail Ford's innovative new suspension system for example.

    • Shows brought to you by a single advertiser? That was popular in the 1950s, when commercials were fewer and much less offensive. The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show comes to mind, brought to you by . . . . Ford, of course! Tennessee Ernie even did some of the commercials himself, explaining in detail Ford's innovative new suspension system for example.

      I've seen some of those. It's like ads for intelligent people. They tell you something about the product, and you have a strong tendency to watch/listen.

      Today's advertisements often have nothing to do with the product they are selling, and are repeated ad nauseum, like your demented uncle Earnie telling how he met President Roosevelt in a Turkish bath in 1970 for the 50th time.

      Coupled with the incessant lawyer ads pleading with you to sue someone, and the hygiene ads 9 (the takeaway from those is that

  • How long before this [youtube.com] becomes reality?

  • I donâ(TM)t get the objection to adverts. And the idea that you are the product when there are ads and not when you pay is wrong. You are being tracked no matter what.

    I donâ(TM)t care if NBC knows that I like these 10 programs and wants to recommend more. But I do hate paying for shows that are already offered OTA for free (with ads) . Now I can consume it all and only watch ads instead of ANOTHER monthly fee.

    If I really want an ad free movie, that is available too, and I will pay. But I am not

  • The things you stream, they end up owning you

  • Yes, on an investor call they're going to focus on the revenue generating method for the channel.

    And if they're going to produce high quality, non repetitive ads, isn't that a good thing? I was watching some shitty streaming services that had ads (I think it was Amazon) and it played the same ad 4 times in a row. It's idiotic...they can predict when I'm going to turn my head to the left, but they can't prevent the same ad replaying?

    The key for me is the 5 min of ads per hour...That's GREAT. It's less than

    • Thank you for typing out my thoughts exactly.

      Streaming ads are annoying for the exact reasons you specify. I don't mind a six or fifteen second preroll ad on YouTube, but I've gotten ads that were fifteen minutes long. No way in hell I'm watching that before the eight minute video I went to youtube to watch.

      Once time, Hulu insisted on showing twenty commercials during a 44-minute episode of a show, at least half of which were the exact same Progressive ad. It was annoying enough that it was about the same a

  • Ads (Score:4, Interesting)

    by markdavis ( 642305 ) on Saturday January 18, 2020 @08:24AM (#59632570)

    >"Comcast wants Peacock "to be an ad delivery system to destroy all others in its path,"

    I have been saying this for years- that streaming is NOT a total panacea. The providers will constantly want to inject more and more UNSKIPPABLE content (ads, promos, warnings, "public service", previews, overlays, etc). They simply can't resist. And the pressure increases as they gain more control.

    So I love how people dismiss DVRs as an obsolete technology. But they allow you to skip or zoom through ANY content you don't want to see. And unlike streaming, they have excellent/instant shuttle control, instant "start" of watching, no video quality scaling, no content that suddenly disappears (great fun when you are watching a series), don't rack up data against some cap, have a single UI for every "channel", and have no drop-outs and unexpected pauses.

    Of course, streaming has the huge advantage of "immediacy", as long as the content is still available when you want to watch it. In any case, the providers will likely discover there is a segment out there, like me, who absolutely HATE forced content, have not been subjected to it for decades, and will reject any attempts to be forced to do so.

    • The providers will constantly want to inject more and more UNSKIPPABLE content ... as they gain more control.

      The horror. Providers exerting control over their own content. Don't watch.

      • >"The horror. Providers exerting control over their own content."

        Yeah, until there are no choices left.

        >"Don't watch."

        Don't worry, I won't!

        • A lot of this stuff can be bought on Amazon Prime and contains no ads. I was watching a free w/ ads series on Amazon and I ended up buying it so I didn't have to sit through commercials.

          I don't watch tons of stuff, so paying 10 to 20 bucks here or there for a series I want to watch ends up being about like having Netflix w/ the tons of stuff I'll never watch.

          So pay and no commercials, or free (or pay less) w/ commercials. I don't really see that changing any time soon.

    • Something similar could be said of the nonfree (user-subjugating, proprietary) software which is required to use virtually any of the subscription media services. So you could end up paying with control over your computer (which likely holds sensitive data you don't want to hand over to the service) as well because you don't know what that service software does when it runs. No matter how technically skilled and willing you are to make it better (by your definition of better) you aren't allowed to inspect t

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by WallyL ( 4154209 )

        I love my home dvd and ripped-from-dvd collection. I tell you what though, the still-on-dvd collection has some weak points: Any dvds published by Disney. They can't just get to the movie or even the menu upon being placed in the player. You have to skip (if that's an option) a number of times through previews and adverts for other dvds, before you can finally get to the reason you put the dvd in. Sometimes the gulf is better than even the stinkin' dvd!

    • I think "the people" who would most like to dismiss DVRs are those who make money from advertising. The DVR makes it painfully obvious that the ad to content ratio continues to tilt toward ads.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Solo ads where "brands become the hero" and offer a TV show brought to you by a single advertiser.

    Yeah, they used to do that in the 50's. Apparently the new revolution is the same as the old revolution, just in 8K.

  • Solution. Don't, don't, and don't watch. Jeez, people are such freebie weenies.

    • Jeez, people are such freebie weenies.

      Opposing too many ads =/= wanting no ads, and not liking any ads - one can easily not mind ads without liking too many, and remain logically consistent.

  • It's getting to the point where every single content creator is going to have their own streaming service for... no prizes... A FEE. Consumers will end up paying a lot more than they were with cable or satellite to pick and choose the content that they want because it's not all in one convenient place. What's worse in this case is that you'll be paying a fee for ads. That's just rude.

  • I donâ(TM)t pay for things that include ads.

  • I never knew NBC had any shows or anything interesting to watch in the first place. SNL and Late Night shows haven't been interesting since independent YouTube comedy and news channels more than outperform them in quality and content.

  • "Comcast's NBCUniversal is launching a new streaming service in April called Peacock"

    And guess who's never ever going to subscribe or use a service billed as "an ad delivery system to destroy all others in its path"?

    Yup, that'd be me. I have better things to do with my time than watch ads.

  • I like the five minutes per hour of ads. I can live with that using my Roku. If they increase it, I'll stream onto my laptop with uBlock and NoScript to block all of the annoying ads. Let's see how long they can keep up the five minutes per hour ad limit. Broadcast TV took a few decades to go from five minutes per hour to eighteen to twenty, which is absurd.

  • I hate that idea so much.

  • ... at least they are offering choice.

    You can
    - not use the service
    - pay $0 and use the service with ads
    - pay $5 for more content with ads
    - pay $10 ad free.

    What more do you want? It is an optimal range of product.

  • I don't think advertisers understand how pointless impressions and views really are. Anything my brain can't automatically filter from my consciousness prompts a channel change or closing of a browser tab, depending on the platform. Often I miss the end of a show because an ad break came up and I found another distraction. At this point if it has ads and its not live news I can't watch it, so it doesn't matter how free it is. There's no point in paying for content with ads because I'll never be able to co

  • Or other popu-adblocks for that matter?

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