Get one of these and park it in front of the idiot box:
Posted on 05/02/2002 6:45:29 AM PDT by Grig
It was inevitable. The broadcast industry is now describing people who skip over commercials as thieves! And with new technology like HDTV and insane laws such as the DMCA, they may very well make it stick in the future.
Jamie Kellner is the chairman and CEO of Turner Broadcasting, which encompasses everything from CNN to TNT and is a part of AOL Time Warner. On Monday, an interview with Kellner appeared in CableWorld.
In response to a question on why personal video recorders (PVR's) were bad for the industry, Kellner responded: "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."
While most programming on American TV is so insultingly bad that nobody would ever need to steal it in the first place, there is great danger in permitting this line of reasoning to become accepted. If this is seen as a "problem," expect legislation forbidding any device that allows consumers to skip the sacred commercial. Kellner, however, is not completely unreasonable. When asked if he considers people who go to the bathroom during a commercial to be thieves, he responded: "I guess there's a certain amount of tolerance for going to the bathroom. But if you formalize it and you create a device that skips certain second increments, you've got that only for one reason, unless you go to the bathroom for 30 seconds. They've done that just to make it easy for someone to skip a commercial." Heaven forbid.
The text of the entire interview can be found at http://www.inside.com/product/product.asp?entity=CableWorld&pf_ID=7A2ACA71-FAAD-41FC-A100-0B8A11C30373.
And I'm still going to go to the can or fridge when I feel like it. The DMCA has got to go. This is just nuts.
Am I guilty of theft when I get up to take a piss during commercials or go to the fridge to get a drink?
Am I guilty of grand larceny when I change channels during commericals in an attempt to watch 3, 4, or 5 shows at once?
Focus man!!
Do not get confused!
A targeting error can have high collateral damage.
SHEESH, so when I hop into the shower during commercials I'm also stealing?? These network people are sheer idiots.
I almost hope they make a case out of this, it'd make me read more which is something I should be doing anyway.
Now, go explain to your advertisers what a dumba$$, arrogant jerk you are.
LOL...mighty white of him to "allow" me to go to the bathroom during the commercial break.
Now: when they can create and enforce a law which will prevent me from jumping up and checking on supper, checking/filling the woodstove, or continuing with reading whatever book I'm reading (the only way to watch TV, as far as I'm concerned, is with a good book) THEN they might also be able to prevent me from not watching hundreds of simpleminded commercials for Viagra, hemorrhoid preperations, yeast infection cures and tampon commercials a day.
Not bloody likely, though.
This post at least deserves a wry humor BUMP
I only did that once, dammit, and that was a long time ago, so lay off, alright?
;)
According to Ted the commie Turner you are! Have you read about the laws that hollyweird are trying to ram through the Congress with the help of Sinator Hollings? It would ruin the computer and hardware market. These jerks want to make it so you can never own any music or movie, just rent it and pay for it each and every time you watch or listen to it, forever!
Get one of these and park it in front of the idiot box:
Shoot, commericials are so much louder than regular programming, I bet you can still hear them while taking a, er um, can out the fridge.
Brytani, you're in deep doodoo !
fofl
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