Too Busy For Words - the PaulWay Blog

Reading the actual article on the Phillips patent for a device to stop people changing channels when there's advertising on, I came up with another group who should be worried about this invention.

Program Producers.

Think about it: if people can't change channels during an ad break, then when can they change channels? During the show. Ratings will be homogenised, because the way the ratings organisation measure watching is if you tuned in to any part of the program, so as everyone frantically skips around hoping not to be locked into an ad that's showing on the channel they're surfing to every program gets flagged as having been watched. And ratings is what makes programs popular; it's hard to get more money from your show if everyone else's show seems to be as popular.

But the main people won't care: TV manufacturers will bang it all in regardless if Phillips gets smart and starts offering all-in-one digital TV chips which obey their program coding, and TV broadcasters don't care one whit about the sanity or interest of their audience. As I said in my other post, they'll probably find ways to abuse the flag so that you can't change at all, anytime, ever.