Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

[oshunluvr]

Re: Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

Heh. I'm not so worried about that. It's the subsequent apt-get install family-tv-new-behavior that I worry might be incompatible with my existing downstream

Yeah, we did an apt-get install reading in our eight-year this year and run it at least an hour a night so the purge of the Disney channel is improving her performance while reducing her audio static.

[Telengard]

Re: Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

In my reply I was lumping cable tv and satellite/direct tv in with broadcast. I pretty much hate all of it. I actually have satellite/direct tv, but I only watch it maybe once or twice per month. As the contract for this service is expensive, I consider the whole thing a huge waste of money. There isn't any programming on tv to make it worth me paying a premium and putting up with the commercials. There's nothing I need to see so badly that I have to catch it when it first airs. I can wait and stream it for free.

It seems to me that paying a premium to get the channels you want from cable/direct tv ought to mean zero advertising, or at least a reduction in advertising. That may have even been the case in the earliest days of cable tv, but it isn't the case anymore. Nowadays you get just as much advertising, but you pay for it. They even embed advertising banners inside the menu!

Advertising on legitimate streaming sites is very limited and mostly tolerable. Usually you don't get more than one commercial interruption per 10 minutes. The interruptions are shorter than tv ads, most no more than a few seconds, and some of them may be skipped by clicking a button. Netflix streams have zero commercials.

[oshunluvr]

Re: Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

Even HuluPlus streaming has commercials, but way less than broadcast. And if you're good with your hosts file you don't have to watch the commercials - just a message that your internet connection has an issue.

I suppose the correct terminology is Pay TV vs. Over-The-Air TV.

The benefit/cost of Pay TV no longer works IMO opinion, unless you're in an area without OTA reception.

My wife missed Home and Garden TV for a month or two, but has discovered enough substitutes that she no longer notices. On top of that the DVR helps with the commercials issues a lot. Simply start a show, hit Pause, go grab a snack or glass of wine (usually wine in our house ), return to TV, hit Play - Fast Forward - Play repeat as necessary... 8)

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

The only times I ever had problems with DirecTV picture quality was when I lived in Dallas.

What? Geez, I hope the job (or whatever) was worth it

It's a long and boring story, but it boils down to being a TOTAL fish out of water. My husband and I had great jobs, we bought a beautiful house in a North Dallas suburb, but it just never felt like HOME.

Actually, I live in Long Beach (give it up for SoCali, yayyy-ahhh)

Yes indeed! I'm in Arcadia. Funny, I HATED Arcadia when I was a teenager (too many snobs and--although this will undoubtedly date me--a VERY non-integrated school system; when I was at Arcadia High we had TWO black students, out of 3,000+, a few Hispanics and the rest white), but now that I'm back I love it.

so my DirectTV signal was fine, but FIOS (which we had for a year) and OTA provides a better image. At least on my HD equipment - YMMV.

I really meant that my picture quality is very good; I have no complaints about it at all.

I've never heard of it, but it sounds interesting. Do you happen to know if it's Linux based, as TiVo is?

It is linux based, but not open source unfortunately. I wanted a DVR and my family room has a 50" Plasma monitor (as in no tuner) and the TViX has a dual ATCS/QAM tuner. It's far from a perfect device so I wouldn't recommend it without caveat. But at $269 in a field of little choice it was the only real option (a decent stand alone tuner costs at least $100). They are actively improving the product so I'm hopeful my issues will get resolved. The main bonus is besides the dual tuners and DVR functions is it's SAMBA/NFS enabled so I can watch it's recordings elsewhere and play media from my server on it. All-in-all worth the price admission.

Very interesting.

You know what irks me the most? Infomercials! The ones that are all over the program guide during the night, on channels I'm paying for. Ugh.

This is what ultimately drove me away from DirectTV. I would spend a half hour deleting the infomercial channels and then once a month DirectTV would re-arraign them - thus forcing them back into the channel listing. I don't make a religion out of avoiding bad corporate behavior, but this drove me over the edge with them.

Honestly, I haven't found that to be much of an issue. I periodically go through and purge new, annoying channels from my favorites list, but I really don't find that to be too annoying. Getting rid of the stupid shopping channels is one thing, but seeing infomercial after infomercial in the guide--on channels that are NOT shopping channels and, therefore, I haven't purged--is what gets me!

[SteveRiley]

Re: Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

TViX

That is one kick-ass product name, given its intended competition!

forcing them back into the channel listing

You aren't the only person who's complained about unwanted program recurrence on television recording devices (certainly not new, but hey, it's still funny!)

Yeah, we did an[i] apt-get install reading

Always an important package to have installed, and one in frequent use here since unit #1 popped out in 1996.

purge of the Disney channel

Dontcha wish you could reinstall what that channel's parent company purged from your wallet over the years? I certainly do.

[oshunluvr]

Re: Do you watch commercials? (Or, how DVRs have changed things)

That's an entertaining article. I am usually entertained by the recommendations of those sort of "services" as well. In my household, we share the same amazon account. More correctly, they shop, I pay (never give your spouse your password) but I do occasionally purchase out of need. Imagine the combined recommendations of an 8-year old girl (read "Princess"), a women into cooking, decorating, and reading, and a techno geek!

If there was a digital cookbook available in fancy frame in pink, I'd have to buy it just to get Amazon off my back!