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A: they’re betting most people will accept it, and they’re right. The same thing happened in the early 80s when cable television advertised themselves as the pay-for-ad-free service, then started sneaking ads in. People complained, sure, but we all saw the outcome. They got away with it.
B: Greed, capitalism, and fuck you.
Yes. Remember when Netflix put a stop to password sharing and the internet went aflame with people declaring that Netflix had shot itself in the foot? Netflix subscriber counts went up.
The average person will put up with so much more of this nonsense than techie people will.
It's why I highly recommend Fmovies, sudo-lol, and others. The barrier to entry is literally a browser and ublock origin and you can watch just about anything.
You can send someone a link to an episode and they can watch it. No sign ups, no ads (with ad block), and pretty decent service. No explaining what a torrent is. No VPN (though I recommend it of course).
Just pure content.
I already wasn't using them by then. I couldn't stop harder.
Subscriber counts went down in the affected areas.
It's time to start shaming people who think like this
Hey now, I don't think like this, but sometimes it's just not worth the effort to think unlike this.
i haven't had cable, or even a tv, in many years. stayed at a hotel the other day and flicked on the tv because the internet was out (helene), and was flabbergasted that for every 2 minutes of programming, there was at least 5 minutes of the same commercials over and over. people fucking watch this shit? on purpose?
When my wife and I stay at a hotel we watch cable and put on like QVC shopping channels.
It’s fun to overreact and be like “this is 100 genuine silver painted lead.” Some of the channels will have like changing infographics that flash and explode every second as the price keeps dropping so we make wooshing sounds as it keeps falling to a new low.
Cable television never advertised that. Cable TV started as a “community antenna” system that served people in valleys with existing off-the-air broadcast channels (which had ads); the existence of those systems created a market for satellite-fed channels like HBO (which was always a separate subscription and ad-free) and TBS/CNN (which always carried ads). Other than the premium channels like HBO/Showtime/Cinemax, cable channels have had ads from the beginning.
Once the small cable systems and the media publishers both got consolidated, we started seeing content licensing deals and higher costs to the subscriber to pay for it - but the channels (MTV, Nickelodeon, etc) always carried ads.
It definitely did. I remember it vividly (I was alive back then). And I’m talking about the premium services, specifically (e: which was the point of my comparison: the premium paid services back then advertised no-ad service, then included ads, just like the premium streaming services are doing today).
Here’s an article from the NYT in 1981 on the topic:
WILL CABLE TV BE INVADED BY COMMERCIALS?
e: a quote:
Literally the first sentence of that article:
The premium services mentioned in your quote (HBO, Showtime) also still do not run ads even today.
Yes and no. Networks had ads but cable began inserting their own ads in addition to the network ads. When I ran a company I did large media buys with cable companies. I would buy ads from the regional cable company which would air in between the national ads of Comedy Central, Discovery, etc.
Ye ol bait and switch