TiVo has responded, at least sort of, to the brewing controversy over their
plans to introduce banner ads when people fast forward
through commercials, with someone from TiVo's marketing department posting a message on the tivocommunity.com
bulletin board trying to explain a little bit more what's going on. A few people didn't seem to get that they're not
eliminating fast-forwarding altogether (but it's the Internet, what do you expect?), and the marketing person wants to
make it clear that the ads will not be full-screen and that they'll be similar to the "thumbs-up" you sometimes see
during commercials right now that'll ask you whether you want to record a TV show. Honestly, it's not that the whole
idea of ads that seem so bothersome, it's more the idea of buying something, paying a monthly fee for it, and still
having to deal with them popping in commercials everywhere (eliminate the monthly fees and we'd be a lot more receptive
the ads). It's like if we started having to listen to a little ad everytime we wanted to check the voicemail on our
cellphone—it'd be one thing if they were giving away the service for free, but we're paying for this, you know? Plus,
given how many other options there out there for digital video recorders, we worry that TiVo, a company we actually
like, is only going to hasten its demise with moves like these.
[Via Werblog]