11 ms·
Will cable TV be invaded by commercials? (1981)
- dtech 8y agoApparently, Betteridge's law of headlines doesn't always hold up. On a more serious note, it will be interesting to see if currently, ad-free on-demand services will undergo the same transition.
- radicaldreamer 8y agoI could see a dual tier approach like Hulu. The ad supported tier is only $5 a month
- pacala 8y agoOf course they will.
- wnevets 8y agoNetflix is rumored to start advertising between episodes https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/22/how-to-opt-out-of-new-ad-tests-on-netflix.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/22/how-to-opt-out-of-new-ad-tes...
- endorphone 8y agoThey are pushing their own programming (trying to encourage consumption of the programming that you already have access to and already paid for). I don't think it's fair to the conversation to compare it with the umbrella of commercial endorsements.
- maxerickson 8y agoIf you can't opt out of it it's pretty damn fair to make the comparison.
- seanalltogether 8y agoIt might be more fair to compare to public broadcasting stations. BBC doesn't have paid commercials but they do advertise their own programming between shows.
- endorphone 8y agoIgnoring that you can opt out, if you can't understand the difference between information and advertising that is your own failing.
- p1necone 8y agoSure I understand the difference, but that doesn't make one better than the other. Netflix interrupting what I chose to watch with something that I did not chose to watch is (in my subjective experience) pretty much equally bad whether it's information about other Netflix shows or an advert for breakfast cereal. (Also is there an actual "I don't want to see these any more, permanently" option? Or are you just talking about the ability to skip each individual one manually?) (Edit 2: also how is it not advertising? Just because it's advertising their own product doesn't mean it isn't advertising.)
- endorphone 8y ago>Netflix interrupting what I chose to watch Well no, they didn't. They put it between auto-play episodes. Auto-play, as an aside, is pushing an additional episode that you did not choose to watch. A preview of the next episode is a preview that you did not choose to watch. Both are about engagement. >also how is it not advertising? Just because it's advertising their own product doesn't mean it isn't advertising Their own product that you already have paid for and can watch at no additional cost, and at no additional incremental revenue for Netflix. Yes, they are trying to make sure that you enjoy the product and continue subscribing, but it's a world different from trying to sell you a chocolate bar or laundry soap. These discussions on HN turn absurd because people like to engage in absurd rhetoric to engage in an emotional plea to exaggerate something. It's boring.
- wnevets 8y agoIsn't how cable networks started and people made that exact same argument on why it was ok?
- endorphone 8y agoI have no idea. I do know that the "something followed this path, therefore anything on that path is evil" argument is, and has always been, specious and a dead end.
- giancarlostoro 8y agoIt's not a rumor, they already do this. At least when you watch their original programs you see ads for more of their original programs. Thankfully you can skip them, they just try to show a trailer for one of their own shows / movies basically. Edit: I usually see it during the phase where Netflix is about to autoplay another episode, it tries to show it through then, I usually skip it cause it's stupid, I don't want to be fed the same trailer 500 times...
- jwatte 8y agoI think there is a difference between "house ads" for other content, versus Nike trying to sell me sneakers. However, I think that difference is smaller than most in house placement marketers think -- those I have talked to are genuinely surprised that I'd object to their own "programming." For me, anything that tries to force me to take an action or spend (waste) my time or attention is an "ad" and is inherently bad.
- p1necone 8y agoAs far as I'm concerned they're exactly the same. I pay netflix so I can watch shows of my choice, if you interrupt the show of my choice with something that is not the show of my choice I don't really care what the interruption was exactly, it's just bad.
- giancarlostoro 8y agoTo be fair they do it at the end of a show, while the countdown happens, I can't say it's not the best compromise because it's genius, the countdown to the next show is plain but ad-free otherwise, my issue is seeing the exact same ads overtime. If something might be interesting to me, that's what your front-page recommendations are for aka "suggested for you" maybe a new tier "Netflix Originals Suggested for You" wouldn't hurt. I'd happily opt for no ads period. Netflix should stick to advertising brands within their shows if anything, I don't mind in-show ads, as long as they're not too damn obvious. I was watching Bones once and they paused the whole premise to showcase a self-parking parallel parking car... Really?
- chipperyman573 8y agoPossibly, Hulu already does this and Netflix is rumored to start doing it soon. However, an important difference between old TV and current-day streaming is that it is much easier to pirate shows that are streaming. There is an (ad-)free alternative to Hulu and Netflix that is becoming easier to use. At some point, streaming services may have to compete by not including ads.
- jlg23 8y ago> However, an important difference between old TV and current-day streaming is that it is much easier to pirate shows that are streaming. As someone who grew up recording (and distributing to friends) one-to-many streams (a.k.a. terrestrial TV), I wonder how it got easier. Just because nobody is using personalized watermarks to prove copyright infringement yet, does not mean a redistributor today ain't going to get sued tomorrow.
- icebraining 8y agoYou can create an account with gift cards paid in cash, so I wish them good luck.
- jlg23 8y agoIn the US. Good luck in other countries[1]. [1] I've been to much more countries where the currency of choice is top-up cards for mobile phones. Master- and VISA-cards issued by local banks are usually only usable for national transactions - not to speak of gift cards, which just don't exist.
- p1necone 8y agoIn New Zealand you can buy prepaid credit cards with cash (and no personal information) that work anywhere visa/mastercard is accepted afaik.
- icebraining 8y agoI'm not talking about Master/VISA gift cards, I'm talking about Netflix gift cards. I'm not in the US, yet they are readily available. According to [1], they seem to be available at least in the US, Canada, Australia, many European countries, Brazil, Malaysia and Japan. That's far from the whole world, but quite enough as a source of potential pirates. [1] https://help.netflix.com/en/node/32950/br https://help.netflix.com/en/node/32950/br
- codezero 8y agoAmazon Prime includes “ads” for their own shows. I call them ads because they are on before the show I’m watching and I don’t want to watch them. Luckily, for now, I can still skip them.
- mbrumlow 8y agoYes.
- yuhong 8y agoThe entire debt-based economy is based on extracting more money from consumers. Worth mentioning is this is not long after stagflation occurred in the late 1970s. As a side note, I have a strong feeling that in large corporations like Google expenses always tends to increase with revenue. One example would be housing and salaries, but there are probably others.
- al_chemist 8y agoWhat does "debt-based" have to do with extracting money?
- yuhong 8y agoThe current economy allow creation of an almost infinite amount of debt and has since at least 1971 I think. It should be obvious how such an economy incentivize extraction, one of the most obvious being credit cards.
- walrus01 8y agohttps://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/21/consumer-debt-is-set-to-reach-4-trillion-by-the-end-of-2018.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/21/consumer-debt-is-set-to-reac... https://www.creditkarma.com/studies/i/average-debt-american-household-on-rise/ https://www.creditkarma.com/studies/i/average-debt-american-...
- hammock 8y agoWhen money is easy, the incentives switch to increasing consumption, rather than investment in increasing productivity. Why spend time and money inventing a better mousetrap when you could just buy ten more of them? The principle applies at every level of the economy (individual, corporate, government etc)
- yuhong 8y agoAnd thinking about it, when something like the ad bubble drive up housing prices for example, other companies may have to participate too in order to pay competitive salaries.
- jimmaswell 8y agoThis is strange. I've consistently heard that it was a total myth cable was ever ad-free.
- jasone 8y agoI distinctly recall the ad-free experience of my cousin's cable service circa 1980, in stark contrast with the broadcast reception my family had. I can't definitively say that there were no commercials on the channels we didn't bother with, but in essence it was certainly a commercial-free viewing experience. This was in the Denver area. By the early 90s things like home shopping network channels and infomercials were increasingly common, and we eventually ended up with common disruptive commercials. Perhaps your "myth" sources are too young to have actually experienced the early days of cable.
- mixmastamyk 8y agoAround that time we had the Showtime channel and there was not (and still no third-party advertising?). Of course when the "basic cable" started a few years later, for example MTV, those channels always had commercials.
- gitgud 8y agoAustralian cable (Foxtel) was ad-free until 2000-ish if anyone can remember?
- MetallicCloud 8y agoI had Austar around that time, and it was kind of ad free. They advertised other shows on that channel, and sometimes other channels, but there wasn't any ads for products. But I remember around the early 2000's that started to change.
- guidoism 8y agoNot the US, but in Bolivia in the late 90s cable was essentially ad free. My favorite channel was "The Sony Channel", they had stuff like Dawson's Creek (don't judge!) and Seinfeld ad free. Because those shows had spots for commercial breaks they stuck music videos in between. Ok, maybe that isn't completely ad free, the music videos were essentially ads for Sony's music artists, but it was better than regular commercials.
- jdofaz 8y agoMy gym has guideless basic cable on the cardio machines. Anytime I channel surf I would estimate more than 50% of the 70ish channels are running commercials. Same when i stay at a hotel with cable. I’m surprised anyone is still willing pay for this. Thankfully the new machines at my gym have Netflix.
- lozaning 8y agoDo you have to have your own netflix to use that or does it use the gym's login?
- BoorishBears 8y agoWhen I heard Netflix was cracking down on household accounts, I didn't realize they were going to go this far into the weeds ;)
- jdofaz 8y agoYou use your own, you have the option to make an account with precor and tie the streaming services to it so they work on whatever machine you grab.
- plaguuuuuu 8y agoYou really have a TV on each machine at your gym? This is peak America
- sildur 8y agoIt is common in pretty much any developed country.
- ip26 8y agoProbably small, couple inches? Normally I'm there with you, we stuff way too many TV's everywhere as some kind of sign of success & progress. But in the case of the dreadmill, I can understand. Nobody has figured out how to make those livable.
- rconti 8y ago
- fisherjeff 8y agoQ: Will X be invaded by ads? A: Almost definitely. Even some major automakers seem to assume that the car of the future will include ads.[0] Amazing that car companies could’ve survived all these decades without them! [0] https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/10/15947784/audi-25th-hour-autonomous-car-driving-work-time https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/10/15947784/audi-25th-hour-a...
- orev 8y agoPretty much the entire history of broadcast TV is driven by the auto industry release/advertising schedule, so they’ve been pretty involved in ads for a while now, just not inside the vehicles. It’s merely the final frontier for them.
- makecheck 8y agoI thought I’d seen it all until gas pumps started having loud auto-playing videos. I consider it one of the benefits of an electric car that I no longer see gas pump ads. And this stuff always seems to hit “lowest common denominator” quickly. Once consumer-hostile methods prove some kind of worth, everyone seems to follow suit to compete (or just be as greedy).
- cglace 8y agoI actually don't mind videos playing at the pump. There really isn't anything else do to.
- mikeash 8y agoI’d rather be alone with my thoughts. Most TV has negative value for me.
- oliveshell 8y agoSame. I know it’s a bad cognitive habit to let it get to me, but the asinine content on those “PumpTV” feeds just makes me angry. I’ve never once learned anything new from it, so I mute the speaker with my wallet while imagining it’s playing the voiceover from the PumpTV Superego sketch [1]: “You’re watching PumpTV... fuck you!” [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CmwrphX9kE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CmwrphX9kE
- itry2develop 8y agoYouTube is becoming unwatchable due to ads.
- jwatte 8y agoOh, my sweet, summer child...
- 0x8BADF00D 8y agoWait until BCIs like Neuralink come out. Then there will be no way to escape ads.
- TomMckenny 8y ago>Although cable television was never conceived of as television without commercial interruption, there has been a widespread impression... Cable companies, even though they now act as ISPs, where never conceived to track you browsing history and do with it what they will. And somehow there's a wide spread assumption that they won't.
- rconti 8y ago> To date, the actual revenues from cable advertising, which totaled about $45 million last year, are minuscule compared with the $11 billion for over-the-air television networks and stations. But scores of big companies, including General Foods, American Express, Procter & Gamble and Pepsico, are already cable advertisers, along with innumerable used-car dealers and other local businesses that can afford cable's relatively low rates. By 1990, according to Paul Kagan, publisher of several cable industry newsletters, cable advertising could exceed $2 billion. Stunning. We didn't have cable until the late 90s, and I don't have pay TV anymore, largely for this reason. "Premium" things are always dumbed down. First comes the ads, then the censorship. I'm not willing to pay for ad-laden, censored content, full stop. I happily pay for Spotify, but I won't pay for cable TV or XM.
- flatline 8y agoXM was an interesting note there at the end. I realize they are still subject to FCC regulation but they seem mostly add free and uncensored.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- jrrrr 8y agoThe existence of cable ads is useful to me when my ISP tries to upsell me on television service. "Cable? I haven't had that for about fifteen years. Does it still have ads?" "Yes, sir." "No thanks, then!"
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- HocusLocus 8y agoWill bears sell toilet paper in the woods?
- EADGBE 8y agoThis is one of the wittiest replies I've seen here. Downvotes must have been because they didn't get it.