Google TV to enforce ad viewing

Posted on 27 May 2010 at 10:24

The announcement that Google would be launching a TV set top box - in partnership with companies such as Logitech and Sony - got plenty of people excited with the possibilities, but the company may have missed one of the fundamentals customers expect from a set-top box: ad skipping.

Despite it being a bane to advertisers, there's no getting away from the truth that people - given the option - will use their digital video recorders to skip ad breaks in their favourite programmes. As a company which makes its not inconsiderable profits via advertising, Google doesn't want to be seen to encourage that sort of behavior - and according to Pocket-lint will be enforcing the ad breaks on its users of Google TV.

Google TV product manager Rishi Chandra apparently confirmed this during an interview at the Google I/O conference in Sydney, stating that "it's much harder with an on-demand system for users to skip the ads because they are being streamed in real time," claiming that "we can [...] also ensure the ads are being played."

While Chandra's comments don't point to a lock-out of break skipping on the DVR functionality said to be included in the Google TV set top boxes, it certainly looks as though providers of on-demand content through Google's service will have the option to enforce ad views - which could prove hard for consumers to swallow.

Author: Gareth Halfacree

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