Rich Fiscus
25 Feb 2008 21:55
ABC executives have managed to convince themselves that viewers really don't care about fast forwarding, or at least that's the official company line, as voiced by Anne Sweeney, the president of the Disney-ABC television group. She was speaking about a new Video On Demand venture the Disney owned network is initiating with the cooperation of affiliate stations and cable carrier Cox Communications which will disable the fast forward capabilities normally associated with on demand offerings.
Sweeney told the New York Times “You don’t need TiVo if you have fast-forward-disabled video on demand. It gives you the same opportunity to catch up to your favorite shows.” Perhaps no one has told her that Americans would prefer to spend the 25% - 30% of each show's running time that's devoted to commercials doing something more interesting than watching the same commercials over and over.
The cluelessness of the executives who made this decision was summed up well by Ray Cole. He's the president of Citadel Communications, owner of three ABC affiliates, who said “As network and affiliates, we both have an interest in slowing down the explosive growth of DVRs.”
What's even more interesting than the position of ABC and their affiliates is that of Cox. If this new offering doesn't appeal to viewers they'll almost certainly bear the brunt of customer dissatisfaction. If you don't like their cable service you're likely to have other options, such as satellite. If you want to watch the latest episode of 'Desparate Housewives' or 'Ugly Betty' it will still be coming from ABC.