Oh boy. Roku has an… Interesting new patent. Thought you could avoid the ads infesting every “smart” TV you buy now by using external devices through HDMI?
Disclosed herein are system, apparatus, article of manufacture, method and/or computer program product embodiments, and/or combinations and sub-combinations thereof, for ad insertion by a display device coupled to a media device via a high-definition media interface (HDMI) connection, where the media device provides media content and/or a control signal. When the media device pauses the media content, the display device can determine that a pause event has occurred and insert an ad shown on the display device. Further, some embodiments include determining the context and/or content of the media content that is paused, and determining an ad that is customized to the determined context and/or content to be displayed on the display device. In some embodiments, the display device can determine additional information from the control signal that may also be used to determine the ad to be displayed on the display device.
Some bullshit patent for a bullshit ‘invention’
My eyes are bleeding. I require medical assistance.
On the bright side… Now, no one else will be able to do this, right? Right?!
Nah, they’ll license the patent and then serve even more ads to compensate.
kurkosdr,
That’s one option, another is others will just implement their own version of it and take their chances in court. These days being granted a patent by the patent office doesn’t automatically mean the patent is legally valid & enforceable. The patent office is understaffed and this responsibility has fallen onto the courts after the fact (at great expense mind you). Those involved will have to serve even more ads to cover all the lawyer fees on top of royalties.
I’m very glad that we have a Commercial TV (50% off on cyber monday) which is connected only over HDMI, and that Ethernet-over-HDMI withered on the vine in favour of HDMI Audio Return Channel using those pins instead.
No ads now and no ads ever.
Television doesn’t need ads, the propaganda and mind control is built into the shows themselves. Watching television and complaining about ads is like voting for mainstream politicians and then complaining about constant budget deficits. That’s their entire reason for existing. Any benefit you derive from either one is purely accidental and certainly won’t be intentionally repeated.
Haha…
Race to the bottom continues, where this will quickly be copied by Google TV (which comes built in with many devices, hence don’t even need the HDMI shenanigans, to do their own shenanigans). Not sure about Amazon, but once “premium” nvidia Shield might not be too far behind.
That is the pessimistic outlook.
The optimistic outlook is, Roku users will start disabling HDMI-CEC, or even return their devices, and it will be a valuable lesson to other wannabe villains in this area.
HELL NO! Hope everyone leaves roku.
This is bullshit, it YOU own the product outright YOU should have the option to opt out of this shit. I. understand if you get a discount on the tv in exchange for watching ads and You agree to it. BUT if you bought it full price then NAH, It’s YOURS and Exempt from that shit. This is why people are tired of watching TV the Constant Commercials and FEES. This is also why people watch Alternative ways*(Cough-Cough) to get content. Big MIddle Finger..
iluvcrap2000,
The irony of your name being what it is and you saying this made me chuckle.
Companies patent all kinds of crazy garbage, we have to see if this turns into an actual product. But yeah I agree and I feel the same way when companies try to force their control on our own hardware. Roku already has a history of owner restrictions so I wouldn’t be all that surprised if this gets forced on owners.
Advertisers won’t be happy until absolutely every digital surface becomes an advertising hellscape.
It doesn’t stop at TV, computer monitors could be next. On top of ads in the OS….turning on/off the monitor, here’s an unblockable ad. Screen activity drops below some threshold = more opportunity to show ads. Heck they could even even use AI to display contextual ads in screen whitespace. Manufacturers could partner with cellular carriers to deliver ads even when you haven’t enabled networking. Welcome to the future where user experience.gets dismissed and our engineering resources go towards maximizing advertiser revenue.
It’s sickening what people tolerate from companies who are hell-bent on shoving ads down your throat at every fathomable opportunity. I mentioned the movie Idiocracy in another post… Our society is insistent on turning it from a farcical comedy into a documentary.
friedchicken,
I loved that movie.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqQ6D0Bu-a8
You’re right, it was only supposed to be a comedy.
Imagine the return of something like PUSH technology, Active Desktop, etc pushing ads on the monitor native standby screensaver.