TiVo sells your fast-forward button to advertisers

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Larry Tesler <tesler () pobox com>
Date: November 18, 2004 11:47:34 AM EST
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Re: TiVo sells your fast-forward button to advertisers

Dave,

For IP.

I wonder if anyone has done a study of TiVo viewers' impressions from 
commercial messages.

If a DVR owner uses a DVR "ad skip" button with perfect skill, it skips 
30 seconds at a time, and he doesn't see much in the way of commercial 
messages. On ReplayTV, as I understand it, the ad skip button is 
standard. On TiVo, it is not.

On TiVo, there is a way to reprogram a certain standard button to skip 
30 seconds. But doing so makes you give up what I have found to be two 
essential functions: going directly to the beginning or end of a show, 
and accelerating rewinds and fast forwards.

So, with my TiVo, when the commercials come on, I fast forward. If an 
ad looks amusing or funny, and I haven't watched it before, I often go 
back and view it. I am fascinated by well-designed ads and find them 
entertaining to see once. I may never watch that ad at normal speed 
again. But, because I have chosen to watch it, and because it is not 
competing for a place in my memory with numerous other commercials that 
I didn't watch at normal speed, I think its message is more likely to 
stick.

Even when I fast forward through a commercial, I would conjecture that 
my "impression" of it is not much less than that of a viewer with no 
DVR. Maybe more. Before I had a TiVo, when an ad came on, I would 
usually mute the sound, look away, and think. Or talk with a companion. 
Or leave the room for a carefully timed break. When fast-forwarding a 
TiVo, I have to hold down a button and glue my eyes to the screen to 
avoid going too far. I can't hear the ads. But I can't help but see the 
images. Sometimes, these images are enough to get the message in my 
head, especially if it is one of those ads that I have watched at 
normal speed once.

I can't imagine that a banner ad or popup message with no entertainment 
value would work better than that.

But maybe it's just me.

Larry

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