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Android TV Users are Seeing Ads after Latest Update

posted by martyb on Friday April 05 2019, @12:57PM   Printer-friendly
from the how-many-are-seeing-red? dept.

NotSanguine writes:

According to Doug Lynch at xda-developers.com:

Android TV owners recently received an update across multiple platforms that have started to display sponsored content with a "Promotional Channels' title in the launcher of the Android TV software. We're currently seeing reports that it has shown up in Sony smart TVs, the Mi Box 3 from Xiaomi, NVIDIA Shield TV, and others. This has been an incredibly off-putting change for a lot of Android TV users. What makes matters worse is people were unable to disable the ads at first, but Reddit user Felisens seems to have figured out how to disable them.

[...] Update: Google's response

A Google spokesperson gave us the following statement:

Android TV is committed to optimizing and personalizing the entertainment experience at home. As we explore new opportunities to engage the user community, we're running a pilot program to surface sponsored content on the Android TV home screen.

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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 05 2019, @06:02PM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 05 2019, @06:02PM (#825039)

    I'm old enough to remember when cable TV first started being rolled out widely across the US. One of the main selling points to get people to pay for TV was the cry of "no ads!" Of course, after enough people were signed up, they started putting ads in, even on the supposedly "pay only" channels.

    The reason that cable TV has ads is to make more profit. There was a time when a lot of cable channels didn't have ads. That time is gone.

    Apple TVs will have ads eventually. Because they can.

    Starting Score:    0  points
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  • (Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday April 05 2019, @06:18PM

    by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us (6553) on Friday April 05 2019, @06:18PM (#825054) Journal

    Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winnah! who remembers history.

    --
    This sig for rent.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 05 2019, @10:29PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 05 2019, @10:29PM (#825159)

    I'm old enough to remember when cable TV first started being rolled out widely across the US. One of the main selling points to get people to pay for TV was the cry of "no ads!"

    You speak the truth. All those cable channels with ads on them now, well, what few there were back in the very early days (grand total channels amounted to something like 28) they actually had no ads. The ads snuck in later, after they had convinced you to pay for what you used to get for almost free (broadcast, but you had to suffer ads, so it wasn't truly free).

    • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Saturday April 06 2019, @12:59AM

      by bob_super (1357) on Saturday April 06 2019, @12:59AM (#825215)

      Even worse, those 42-minutes show (18 minutes of ads per hour) get compressed/sped-up down to 37 minutes (23 minutes of ads per hour) during reruns.

      How (older) Americans got lobotomized into accepting this as normal rather than flat-out cut the cord is always amazing me.
      But then again, they do also watch a 4-hour broadcast with 11 minutes of actual plays in it, so they can comment on the ads the next day...