Signs that people are scared about tifauxes

Posted by Kyle May 9th, 2006 at 05:41pm In News

Wow. Here's an idea that really sucks. My new friends at Philips are working on more than just increasing your optical inches. According to the New York Times they recently filed a patent for a television technology that "would uphold the right to avoid commercials, but only for those who paid a fee. Those disinclined to pay would be prevented from changing channels during commercials. If the viewer tried to circumvent the system by recording the program and skipping the ads during playback, the new, improved recorder would detect when a commercial segment was being displayed and disable the fast-forward button for the duration."

What? How could anyone think that's a good idea? In their defense the people at Philips say it wasn't their original concept, and they aren't actively developing products using the technology, but I guess they didn't want to be caught without a patent in case all the other TV manufacturers go crazy. Because it would only work if Sony, Toshiba, Samsung, Daewoo, Magnavox, Insignia, RCA, Sharp, and the Wal-mart store brand all agree to force their customers into it. And why would they? This is all in the broadcaster's interest, not the TV makers. The NYT article says it's is a "possibility that could be realized in a new technical standard — M.H.P., for multimedia home standard — that the television industry is contemplating for the future."

Somehow I think that M.H.P. does not in fact stand for Multimedia Home Standard.

Ok, I can see the desire to prevent fast-forwarding during commercials. They do it on DVDs to make sure you fully appreciate Interpol's strongly worded faxes regarding movie piracy, but the really dopey idea is preventing channel surfing during commercials. What happens if you're just flipping though trying to find something to watch? (not that I do that much anymore thanks to my handy tifaux) If you land on a commercial are you forced to watch it? If I'm done watching 24 but I don't want to see Channel 5 plug their Fox shill story of the night ("Up next, how Jack Bauer could save your family from the Bird Flu Pandemic") am I stuck? The show's over, but there's still the credits and "next time on 24" to come. When does the TV give back control?

I don't know why I'm even writing about this. If it ever happens you can be sure I'll build a computer system in the living room to get around it.