 dolphinsClean Up Our OceansPremium
join:2001-08-22
Westville, NJ
kudos:2
 ·Comcast
| [Rant] On Demand and Commercials Wow, are you freakin' kidding me. I was going to watch a TV show that I had missed earlier in the week. I found it in the On Demand menu and much to my disgust there was a disclaimer at the beginning that stated, the fast forward feature is disabled on these programs. I did not watch the TV show because I was so disgusted at the greed of Comcast, the advertising industry and the entertainment industry.
If there wasn't others here in my house that watch a lot of TV, I would have cancelled cable TV immediately.
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Stop The Mindless Killings Stop Over Fishing |
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| I was shocked as well as to how many commercials there were for On Demand shows. It's like double that of regular TV channels.
I find the convenience of On Demand worth having to put up with the commercials though. |
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dolphinsClean Up Our OceansPremium
join:2001-08-22
Westville, NJ
kudos:2 | Yes, but to disable the FF feature is the straw that broke my back. |
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 bohratomGood Ol Jersey
join:2011-07-07
Red Bank NJ | reply to dolphins
Don't blame comcast as they are just following the terms and conditions of the broadcaster. All on demand material is maintained by, updated by and managed by the broadcaster. FOX is one broadcaster that disables FF for many if not all of its on demand. |
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| said by bohratom:Don't blame comcast as they are just following the terms and conditions of the broadcaster. All on demand material is maintained by, updated by and managed by the broadcaster. FOX is one broadcaster that disables FF for many if not all of its on demand.
I agree. This is out of Comcast's control. |
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dolphinsClean Up Our OceansPremium
join:2001-08-22
Westville, NJ
kudos:2 | reply to bohratom
So your telling me all the On Demand programs are maintained on the original broadcaster's servers and not on Comcast servers?
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bohratomGood Ol Jersey
join:2011-07-07
Red Bank NJ | said by dolphins:So your telling me all the On Demand programs are maintained on the original broadcaster's servers and not on Comcast servers?
Storage could be by the provider but management and rules for the media are done by the broadcaster. |
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dolphinsClean Up Our OceansPremium
join:2001-08-22
Westville, NJ
kudos:2 Reviews:
·Comcast
| No, there's something more involved here, most likely greed. I could DVR the shows and the FF feature would work because it's downloaded to the HDD in my receiver. So the media rules/regulations become null.
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Stop The Mindless Killings Stop Over Fishing |
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yhp
join:2006-12-27
Philadelphia, PA | reply to dolphins
quote:
Yes, but to disable the FF feature is the straw that broke my back.
Be careful what you wish for. When I had OnDemand (and maybe it's been fixed since then.... oh, who am I kidding?), FFWD worked, but in one and exactly one speed (unlike DVR or live TV with DVR service, which has several speeds), and it wasn't all that speedy or responsive.
I soon discovered that when I was trying to FFWD past ads, I was spending more fixed attention on the ad I was trying to skip than the advertiser could have possibly dreamed, because stopping and starting in the right place with OnDemand FFWD was such a delicate operation demanding a different set of skills than navigating normal DVR recordings.
I "lost" OnDemand when I switched to Digital Economy, but I had stopped using the POS long before that. |
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CH101
join:2010-04-28
Cherry Hill, NJ | reply to dolphins
The disabled FF is one of the terms that the broadcaster(s) dictated as part of the agreement to let their recent content be available through ondemand. If Comcast said no to it, then the broadcasters wouldn't let their recent content be available through ondemand. See this news story that mentions FF being disabled: »ondemandweekly.com/blog/article/···_demand/
I personally rather deal with the no FF and have shows available ondemand just a few hours after their broadcast, rather than having to go through the hassle of watching them online. Especially since FOX now makes you wait a week after broadcast to watch their shows unless you are a DN subscriber. |
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The Q
join:2008-06-26
Collegeville, PA | reply to dolphins
said by dolphins:No, there's something more involved here, most likely greed. I could DVR the shows and the FF feature would work because it's downloaded to the HDD in my receiver. So the media rules/regulations become null.
There are likely different rules and agreements governing what you record yourself (like on a DVR) compared to what a company (like comcast) records for you and where the content physically resides.
The commercials pay for the content. That is how the content is made available. |
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 beerbumobscurum per obscuriusPremium
join:2000-05-06
Eastern PA | reply to voipnpots
said by voipnpots:I was shocked as well as to how many commercials there were for On Demand shows. It's like double that of regular TV channels.
It seems that the network and type/popularity of show determine the number of commercials.. for example CBS and NBC for their hour long drama shows, they have the normal commercial breaks in On Demand, but in general there is only one maybe two very short commercials and it's back to the show..
now AMC and ScyFi - they piss me off completely.. On Demand for one of their popular series they will run 7-9 full length commercials at each and every commercial break.. TBS and TNT will do that too sometimes plus they shut off the fast-forward feature.. |
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dolphinsClean Up Our OceansPremium
join:2001-08-22
Westville, NJ
kudos:2 Reviews:
·Comcast
| Yes, some channels are worse than others. It's to the point now that your basically watching a nonstop stream of commercials with bits and pieces of TV shows and movies thrown in as a buffer. Replayed movies are edited for commercial time allotment to the point of being unwatchable.
A few years ago I actually time a movie replayed on the Spike channel and posted the results here.
»Commercialized Television
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said by dolphins: I could DVR the shows and the FF feature would work because it's downloaded to the HDD in my receiver.
There's your solution - DVR instead of On Demand.
I've noticed that for some shows (TBS On Demand is one example) a screen at the beginning says "FF may be disabled..." but it isn't - works just fine.
In any case, the owner of the content sets the rules. |
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 gar187erI do this for a living
join:2006-06-24
Dover, DE
kudos:1 | reply to dolphins
its the broadcasters....thats why until a year or two ago you couldnt find all the major networks on ondemand....then to sign them onboard they demanded that they put ads and disable skipping of them, cause they were afriad of losing out on ad revenue.
why do people always blame the provider?
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yhp
join:2006-12-27
Philadelphia, PA | quote:
why do people always blame the provider?
Because it's a shitty deal for customers, and the provider signed it?
Because "Hey - better than nothing" is no longer good enough for even a company of Comcast's mediocrity? |
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1 edit | So how is it a shitty deal for the customer? You can at least watch the content now.
How about this, why doesn't comcast just drop all channels that show commercials. Then you would have about six channels to watch.
Three years ago it was watermarking on the screen. Why does Comcast allow watermarking. It distracts me! Why don't they tell they broadcasters to stop it? Because Comcast doesn't control the content.
Lately it has been the little pop up stuff for upcoming program. Complainers think this is Comcasts fault. Again the broadcaster puts that in not Comcast.
Lets take it another step. I watch a pay per view movie. why can't I record it on my DVR? Because the owner of the program dictates how many times or how long the customer can watch it. Comcast doesn't determine that, the owner of the program does. And the owner of the program tells comcast if you want my program on On Demand you can't let customers record it.
If you don't want to watch commercials don't push the on-demand button.
IMO, this is not a big deal. |
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 owlynPremium,MVM
join:2004-06-05
Newtown, PA | reply to dolphins
Re: [Rant] On Demand and Commercials The FF is disabled, but the skip ahead 5 minutes is not. Do what I do- skip ahead 5 mins, and then rewind. Problem solved (for the most part). But what I mostly do is make sure I DVR FOX and ABC shows so I don't have to watch via On Demand. |
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dolphinsClean Up Our OceansPremium
join:2001-08-22
Westville, NJ
kudos:2 Reviews:
·Comcast
| reply to dolphins
OK, just so there is no misunderstanding. I'm not singling out Comcast it just so happens that Comcast is my current provider is all. In my OP I mentioned the advertising industry, the entertainment industry along with my current provider because all 3 have a say in what I'm able to view.
So let's not turn this into an argument.
The topic is about how commercials are being forced on those of us who pay for TV service.
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