Nielsen Ratings in the Age of the Internet 176
alphadogg writes "If everyone started watching '24' or 'CSI' on video iPods or streamed over the Internet — instead of on TV in their living rooms — these top-rated shows would probably go the way of 'Cop Rock.' This is because Nielsen Media Research cannot collect data about what people watch on handheld video-viewing gadgets or from PCs streaming network TV shows. While Nielsen estimates around 90% of TV viewing still happens in homes, it's this burgeoning 10% that TV networks and advertisers are desperate to delve into." Note that this story is obnoxiously spanning 6 pages. For a publication named "Network World" you'd think they'd know better.
Um... (Score:3, Insightful)
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Once everyone takes downloads into account, there are still issues. How many downloads make up for the lost advertising revenue (this is important, because advertising has contractual elements that
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This raises the big question for me (that's only loosely connected): how will downloads change the business model of television shows. In the normal broadcast model, there is a sort of scarcity of bandwidth. For each station, there are a limited number of time slots, and a ve
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What you're saying makes some sense, but how does HBO make money on the Sopranos? HBO doesn't have advertising, so it's a relatively small number of people spending $15 a month, and I'd imagine that only a small portion of that goes towards funding any one of their original series. Is it DVD sales? How would DVD revenue compare with iTMS? Or is it syndication? I guess Sex in the City probably makes a pretty penny in syndication, but I'm not aware of the Sopranos being syndicated anywhere.
That said, ev
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However, it's true that the producers will have actual numbers (instead of Nielsen's statistical analysis) to figure out whether the show is popular or not, and that scares Nielsen the most.
I don't believe that for a second - If Neilsen's statistical analysis wasn't accurate in the first place they wouldn't be listened to the way they are.
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BT? (Score:2)
*snerk*
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Nielsen ratings useless (Score:4, Interesting)
I've talked to a few people who've been involved in Nielsen ratings, and these were hardly normal people. One family basically only ever watched Charmed on TNT, and then an occasional news broadcast. They really need to start pulling more automated information.
In my home, I have Dish Network, with a dual-tuner DVR. So, I often end up watching two shows from the same timeslot. Yeah, I probably skip through commercials, but I doubt they are getting ratings for both shows at the same time.
The other thing with Nielsen is a failure to get really good demographics. I mean, if Nielsen had a clue, they wouldn't have yanked Family Guy and have to bring it back. They always look at numbers for total viewers, instead of demographics and loyalty. Some of the smaller shows that get yanked could actually charge more for better targetted advertising.
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Exactly my point. The Nielsen ratings have been next to useless a long time before the internet got big.
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Wouldn't it be logical that if there sales go up then the advertising works?
Of course that will favor shows with less sophisticated audiences. You know the ones that don't use PVRs and don't skip commercials.
Franky that is probably one of the reasons that Slashdot isn't worth millions of dollars like Myspace is.
What percentage of Slashdot users block ads?
Nielsen is to ratings... (Score:2)
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Of course I'm not going to buy a Ford Focus because of an ad, but I'm in a demographic that wouldn't buy a Ford Focus in the first place. I'd be more inclined to buy a more upscale and environmentally friendly car. If Mitsubishi had turned their concept Eclipse hybrid into a production vehicle, or someone came up with something equally cool, well, that would speak to me, and the ad would be worthwhile, whereas some of my associates who live in the middle of nowhere would find it awful (they also don't like
Wheres the adult swim stream? (Score:2)
HURRAH FOR ADULT SWIM'S NEILSON RATINGS!!!! And thanks for all the
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And most of [as] is turning into crap, too. How I long for the old days of Sealab 2021, ATHF, Home Movies, and SG:C2C instead of Squidbillies, Perfect Hair Forever, 12 Oz. Mouse, and Tom Goes to the Mayor. At least they started showing new Harvey Birdman episodes last
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1. Futurama
2. Family Guy
and #2 is actually questionable, even though I find the show hilarious. FG is incredibly funny, but relies too much on pop culture references and sheer repetition.
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-Eric
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-Eric
Nielsen set-top boxes (Score:3, Informative)
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Apparently (according to the brochure), you have to have every TV tuner in your house wired to a central Nielsen box. It connects to an internal, standard connector in your TV sets (won't work for me, I have an EyeTV 500), and the central box "phones home" periodically
It's progress. (Score:3, Insightful)
Piracy aside, producers have a pretty good idea how many DVDs they're selling, how many people are hitting up their authorized web streams, and how many digital video purchases are being made over iTunes and whatnot.
I just don't think we are going to be living in an age where the content providers have to pay Nielsen to sell their own statistics back to them for much longer.
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Content providers aren't the relevant customer for Nielson data. Advertisters are.
KFG
I-Tunes? (Score:2)
Real quick way to get viewing counts (Score:2)
Or go to that place we don't talk about and how what shows are being posted and requested. I don't recall seeing Dancing w/ The Stars on a.b.tv
Yes...this may be somewhat tilted, but then again, so are the mailings, etc... And if Neilsens are anything l
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Except that would be completely incorrect.
I straddle the high and the low tech in my day-to-day, and what I see -- totally anecdotal, of course -- is that the "high tech" guys, often a younger demographic, and not always the attractively younger demographic, are all about the torrent and pod. They just don't watch a lot of TV. The older demographic, the one in that advertisers' sweet spot, still for the most p
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It's about money. Pure and simple. Will revenue from iTunes downloads of The Office justify the loss of advertising revenue? If not, they shouldn't be counted (and the network is shooting itself in the foot by offering the downloads). If so, then those downloads should count in whatever equation they use to determine if a show should stay in
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http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/topnews/wpn-60-2 0060124Apple55CentsAndAdvertising.html [webpronews.com]
The network/production company makes $1.44 cents per $1.99 download for a tv show. This compares to an "estimated 57 cents in advertising revenue per user generated under the current model." They make over 2.5x as much per download as they do from television.
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Charlie Brown's teacher (Score:2)
WOH WAH WOH vested interest WAH WAAAH.
We might switch (Score:5, Insightful)
However, considering the cost increase at DirecTV, I'm now seriously considering completely pulling the plug on Satellite / Cable, and just downloading the shows we watch. They are usually available online within an hour or two of airtime. If the shows were available online for purchase, and if they were offered in a format that was conducive to what we want (ie no DRM), we would consider purchasing them. The total cost should still be less than our DirecTV.
Our kids watch more TV than we do, but I still download and burn shows for them to watch. For example, all the Invader Zim episodes, and just in the last few days they've really enjoyed the classic Bugs Bunny cartoons they've only just been introduced to.
So yeah, a change is coming, that's for sure. Right now this type of activity is limited to the more technical minded folks (for example, I download toons in DivX, and re-encode to MPEG1 VCD for the kids to view in the car - a pretty involved multi-step process to get the audio encoded in-synch). However, it won't be much longer until our parents will be doing this too. Recently I was surprised to visit my Aunt and Uncle (typical computer / www type users), to find them involved in an orgy of DVD burning. If they only knew of the availability of content on the net, and were instructed on how to get it to disc, they would certainly join in as well.
The moral is that the networks need to be as unlike the RIAA (and to some extent, the MPAA) as possible and get good (DRM-less), formal online access channels in place to their content ASAP before the general public switches to methods completely outside their control (aka no advertising or Nielsen tracking, etc).
Dan East
Re:We might switch (Score:4, Interesting)
And that's exactly where the content creators are failing.
At a charge of $1.99/episode, the 21 programs my wife and I watch in a week would cost $84/month. Instead, I pay for minimal basic cable, $15/month, which gives me DRM-free content (with skipable advertising). To be competative, the cost per episode would need to be 20 cents each. There is no way that the content providers would even consider that.
Part of the problem is the unrealistic cost of music. Because people are bad at math, and are willing to pay 99 cents a track instead of 10 cents - a more realistic value - TV content providers set the bar higher.
Until music is 10 cents and TV shows are 20 cents, this battle will continue. While the "horse and buggy" industries laments the changing business model, people will bypass the system (download illegally uploaded content), costing the content providers increasing lost revenue. At the same time, the loss of statistical data will cause the media providers to make bad decisions, hurting their revenue even more. The more they fight reality, the more it costs them.
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The difference with TV is that it's available much more cheaply through the old distribution channels. If all you care about is music, $10 for an album (or the ability to pick and choose what you purchase) might be worth it. With TV, a given episode will air between 2 and 4 times a year for new shows, and possibly more often for
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To make that statement, you have to know what percentage of downloads is being handled by iTunes. I would be very surprised to hear that even 2-3% of downloads are via services that charge $.99/track.
The difference with TV is that it's available much more cheaply through the old distribution channels. If all you care about is
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Last year, Apple had about 80% market share in legal, downloadable music distribution. Even now they're still considered the market leader http://www.cio.com/blog_view.html?CID=25572 [cio.com] and it seems unlikely that their market share has dropped down to your 2-3% in a single year.
Radio provides music much more chea
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They are. iTunes Music Store has all of those shows. Although they hadn't yet posted Season 3 premiere of Battlestar as of sunday morning.
if they were offered in a format that was conducive to what we want (ie no DRM)
Ah, so you're one of those Slashdot masses living in fantasy-land. No they are not DRM-free. Nor is any other TV show available now or in the future. Cope.
we would consider purchasing them.
Bullshit. You're just so happy that since they aren't
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I'm predicting the future by extrapolating from similar situations in the past. You're just giving me a bunch of wishful thinking. Do you have any evidence to support your belief? Or perhaps something to demonstrate that the copy protection in games is different-enough from DRM that the games industry doesn't make a good example?
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If I could burn iTMS shows to DVD and watch them in any DVD player or in Linux, I'd definitely buy them. I have no particular interest in "sharing" them with others, but I want to be able to exercise my fair use rights (and first sale) righ
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People argue "I pirate because the record companies don't sell online." When the record companies DO finally see the light, they argue, "well, now I pirate because $1.00 a track is too expensive." When you show them the millions of tracks Apple has sold at that price, then the argument becomes, "well, I pirate because those have DRM." When does it end?
If you're going to
They know perfectly well (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course it spans 6 pages. That way if you like the article - they get 6 ad views. Perfect for them
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Really it shows how broken the system is when people get paid per view instead of click.
paper and pencil -- am i missing something? (Score:2, Insightful)
"At 8pm I watched Deal or No Deal on TV. At 9pm, I downloaded and watched The Simpsons on my computer. At 9:30pm, I watched Bat
Doesn't ANYONE here know how the Neilsons work? (Score:5, Informative)
viewing diaries!
Boxes set up in people's homes cost money to make and money to install. It is far cheaper and easier to ask people to keep a simple diary of what they watch and then collect the diaries. I would'nt be surprised if the diaries are kept online now instead of in dead-tree editions in the home.
Hey, there's a great programming project!
Somebody hack Neilson to grab and distort the online diaries. >8^D Maybe we can get Star Trek: Enterprise back on the air. >8^P
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Much like many things on slashdot, this knee-jerk answer is false. Nielson does pull info from people's television sets.
Although I don't work for Nielson, I did interview at a local branch office a few months back. I guess I was too much 'software' for them, they seem to be looking for more low-level electronics guys (TV repair and the like). New hires apparently spend a couple months at in-depth training learning h
I used the wrong words. (Score:2)
I still think the majority of their data comes from diaries. I know a family that was using them in 2004 or early 2005.
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"cannot collect data" (Score:5, Insightful)
But my household was chosen to be a one-month Nielsen family a couple of months ago, and they sent us a journal in which were asked (and payed) to log each TV show we watched on TV.
We thought this was particularly silly to only ask us to log what TV shows we saw on TV, rather than log every source of video we watched, from going out to the movies, to silly 1-minute clips on YouTube, to Amazon Fishbowl, to bittorrented TV shows, to movies or TV shows on DVD we checked out of the library.
As it happens, we hardly watch any TV, and we had company that week, it was a hot summer week and we don't have air conditioning, and it was summer reruns. We never once turned on the television that week. Although I actually didn't need those qualifiers, it's not uncommon for us not to turn on the TV all week. Most of the TV shows we watch, we watch on our computer on DVD's we get from the library. Which they didn't ask us to write down.
But it would have been just as easy for them if they had. Perhaps they won't get as accurate information if they ask people to keep their own journals instead of logging things automatically. But if they pay people well, and maybe even send out some largely automated electronic devices that allow people easily search for and click on what they watched (when possible), they can certainly still get this data. There was a "commentary" section, in which we got an opportunity to give them a piece of our minds about canceling Firefly.
There was a "commentary" section, in which we told them that most of the video we watch, including TV shows, is not broadcast TV. We also took the opportunity to give them a piece of our minds about canceling Firefly.
I already do it (Score:2)
Printable page link (Score:2)
http://www.networkworld.com/cgi-bin/mailto/x.cgi [networkworld.com]
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We were a Neilsen family for a while... (Score:3, Funny)
The 4 main family members (age, sex) were keyed in permanently, but guests had to be entered in when they were over. I always enjoyed keying friends in as 85 year old women, 3 year olds, etc. Of course we'd get sick of it and just leave the TV on a channel and wonder off. I can't imagine what they thought of an 85 year old women watching a Sailor Moon marathon.
Neilsen is a dead horse (Score:3, Informative)
Tivo,Replay they both sell their demographics as higher-quality than nielsen data.
Nielsen data was not really relevant anymore when I was still working in advertising.. The sales people used the data from the CATV systems to sell ad's.
Telling a customer that this timeslot or show has X rating is crap compared to telling the customer that XXX,XXX local people were watching the TV channel at X:XXpm when your ad aired.
Nielsen can not give that kind of data.
Nielsen is highly unaccurate.... (Score:4, Informative)
Not only do they not measure internet viewing, but they don't measure dorm rooms where hundreds of thousands of college students live, or public viewing like sports bars which are packed full of people watching sports every weekend.
Not being able to measure viewing of downloaded shows isn't an entirely new problem, but just makes an existing problem worse.
My experience with Nielson.... (Score:3, Informative)
When I was growing up in the 70's and early 80's I regularly got disappointed in television. Not because of crappy programming, per se, but it happened with disturbing regularity that some network would get a new show that really piqued my interest, and I'd get right into the show and then it would be quickly cancelled, often after only half a season. Anyways, it was always on account of "poor ratings", and this happened to me so many times while I was growing up, I've completely lost count... but I'd figure probably between 15 to 20 times in my childhood alone. Anyways, I always figured that maybe there just weren't enough people with my tastes that were hooked up into the ratings system.
Then fast forward a couple of decades to 1999. I have my own family, with 4 kids of my own, so we had a really full house. One day someone came to our door who worked for Nielson, the ratings company. This person told us that our house had been selected to participate in the Nielson ratings and asked me if we'd like to participate.
I felt like I had freakin' won the lottery... I was flooded by memories of all those times I was growing up and having shows that I really liked cancelled due to poor ratings and thought that I'd _finally_ get a chance to have a voice... and my favorite shows would not be cancelled. I was extremely interested in the offer, and after talking with the rest of the family with it to see how they would feel about it, I said yes, we'd agree.
They proceeded to hook up their ratings equipment to every television, vcr, and video switch in the house... and connected that to our phone line. They told us it would collect data, and then use our phone line once every night or so to connect to their computer and inform them of our viewing habits. The system was designed so that it would only try to use our phone when it was not in use, and would automatically terminate if another phone was picked up, so it would not interefere with our regular phone use. The video equipment was fairly straightforward... there was one logging unit per television, which Nielson told us we needed to log into whenever we turned on the TV, regardless of what we were turning the TV on for... be it watching a DVD or video, watching regular television, or anything else that needed the TV, we had to log in. Each of us was assigned a single button on the device and all we had to do to log in was press that one button. To log out, we just neede to press the button again, and everybody would automatically be logged out if the television was turned off. The logging device would automatically examine what channel or input device the television was tuned to, as well as the settings of any external video switches to determine if we were watching television or just watching a movie or doing something else with the TV. It would also, regardless of whether the television was on or not, log what channels the VCR recorded... although it could not assign any particular household members to what the VCR did, so I guess the VCR was assigned a "general" category by their system. We didn't have to worry about it, at any rate.
So... what did we get out of this? Well, not a whole lot... we'd get a cash-back rebate on any new video equipment we purchased, regardless of the price (although the rebate was not much, it was still nice), and of course for me, I had a personal interest in participating in the Nielson ratings system... a chance to _finally_ make a difference in the ratings system, as we were told that each person in our household would represent several thousand actual viewers.
Okay... fast forward a few years again, to 2003. Television is utter tripe. We hardly watch any of it at all, because there's just so little of it that's any good. But then a show comes on UPN that looks intriguing. I watch the premiere, and I am instantly hooked. I tell my family about it and the following week we are all logged into the Nielson system watching the show. Everybody in the household love
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-Eric
Hey Nielson people (Score:2)
(it's a joke people).
how do they track tv? (Score:2)
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Re:How about 'network TV' (Score:4, Informative)
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What they can't detect (without some info from the remote device) is how many times the episode was watched. They definitely can't reliably(/automatically) detect is WHO watched it, thus demographics go out the window.
Of cou
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I'm not sure the cable companies' customers would appreciate that. The Nielsen stuff is voluntary, but I know I'm not comfortable with the idea of my cable company keeping records of what shows I watch.
Besides, that still doesn't give demographics, which means it wouldn't be useful for targeting advertising.
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Media company has difficulty getting information on media use in the age of the internet. [slashdot.org]
Re:No Nielsen data, but download numbers (Score:5, Insightful)
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or the guy buying the stuff having an account with that kind of information?
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This of course doesn't work for people who purchase different categories of stuff from different vendors (beyond the obvious "what's available") -- for instance, someone who buys only tech books on Amazon, but reads a ton of general fiction that they purchase at brick-and-
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I don't even know how reliable Nielsen's ratings are to begin with. How statistically valid are they? I don't know any family that's kept a log book, and certainly, they're not too meticulous about it when they do. Is there a bias in how the group is selected?
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Except... (Score:2)
Pretty much any show that's placed anywhere in primetime is aimed squarely at the 18-44 year old demographic.
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But what is "prime time" when the show is distributed via download-on-demand?
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Speaking of downloads, sure, there is no sense of primetime. However, I don't really see a primetime market declining until TV is no longer the primary means of delivery. And there's still a long way to go before that happens.
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Hell yeah.
The advertisers will only pay if they know thier advertisments are being watched. If a studio or ratings mechanism can not prove the statistics of the viewers beyond a reasonable doubt to the advertisers, the money stops. If the money stops coming in, the shows stop going out.
Re:What a load of... (Score:5, Insightful)
Think about it. Traditional TV is a indirect-funding system. Networks pay for TV shows to be made and sell advertising time during the airing of the shows. The typical viewer gets the show for "free" (modulo any cable/satellite costs). The expectation is that the advertising will translate into additional sales for the companies purchasing ads, thus justifying continued purchase of those ads.
Systems like the iTunes store provide a direct funding model between the consumer and the producer. Sure the sales aren't enough at this time to fund the show directly, but if they become great enough to pay the entire cost of the show, why should there be ads?
I think the true story is is Nielsen whining about *their* funding model going away. They make money by helping the networks set rates for their indirect-funding system. If that becomes irrelevant, Nielsen becomes irrelevant.
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Of course product placement wouldn't work on a show like LOST, since all the products say Dharma.
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There are many hurdles to ignoring traditional television though. Getting the initial audience is probably the biggest one. As it stands now, shows become "popular" by being in your face during or close to "prime time"
Youtube can become the next Nielsen (Score:3, Insightful)
Information is the commodity of the internet, it seems.
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1) buy TV equipment, put up with ads, or
2) buy TV equipment, put up with ads, and pay a monthly bill.
It doesn't take a genius to see that one of those options is probably pretty retarded for someone who watches as little as I do. My TV is primarily a Nintendo screen. After that, a movie screen. After that, a means to get The Tube. [thetubetv.com] After that, a means to get local weather forecasts and warnings (the area I live in has frequent storms of varying strength during spr
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You mean like the original reason they created cable? You would pay for the cable and not have ads?
Well... That didn't last too long.
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Attention is still the most valuable commodity on the Internet: the user's time is the limiting factor in everything you want to sell. TV shows are expensive, and they are only profitable if they get many, many viewers. Music can be made on the cheap, wit
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Because not many people will be willing to pay for something they used to watch for free. A few rich people will, but not most.
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If the TV stations thought they could, they would run ads 24/7. The shows are only there to get people to watch the ads.
Ads are the sole revenue stream for TV stations. They will NEVER go away. EVER.
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Kind of like if Microsoft actually fixes their OS so that virus protection isn't needed, those 3rd party virus companies aren't needed either.
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Re:Netflix gave me access to The Greatest Shows Ev (Score:2)