FTV Prima does not like that it potentially loses hundreds of millions of crowns a year due to the rewinding of commercials. It thus requires television service providers to limit ad skipping and increase fees. What will be the impact on the audience?
Pay-TV operators face growing fees that television groups charge for their content. Both sides must look for ways to get the viewer to consume the content with the ads, or pay for the removal of the ads. Some Telly and WatchTV services have already announced ad skip restrictions and the ability to activate the feature for an additional fee.
End of TV rewind and reduction of broadcast quality
It seems that only O2 TV has refused to accept the new conditions, as it would have to make its services to customers significantly more expensive. If nothing changes, all FTV Prima channels will disappear from its offer from March 1. However, negotiations are still ongoing and much may change by March. Vodafone and T-Mobile, as well as all other IPTV providers, have agreed to the new conditions.
Users will no longer be able to rotate ad units arbitrarily (similar to terrestrial broadcasting), or they will be able to pay for a package that will allow rewinding on FTP Prima channels. At the same time, from January 3, 2022, Prima reduced the quality of DVB-T2 broadcasting on most of its channels.
You do not need to change the set-top box when switching to DVB-T2: Internet TV offers many benefits. Foto: Pixabay
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Viewers will find their way
According to social media discussions, many users will be looking for alternative ways to access content. According to the comments, many viewers actively use the program of recording programs, which some televisions and smart boxes offer. After recording, the ads usually skip / rewind.
Similarly, a large number of Czech users still download content from the Internet, which is in the Czech Republic legal for personal purposes (distribution of copyrighted content is against the law). It is therefore uncertain whether Prima, by its step of preventing viewers from skipping commercials at all costs, will rather not support the increase in pirated downloads of its programs.
Not only FTV Prima will not have it easy in the future. The trend is among young viewers to watch content on so-called on-demand services such as Netflix and YouTube. The biggest target group of classic linear television are older viewers and seniors. In addition, already in 2015, the average TV viewer in the Czech Republic was over 50 years old. Ad skip skipping is probably the most it will mainly affect users of so-called pay-TV services such as Telly, SledováníTV, Kuky, etc.
Of course, whoever wants to pay to turn off ads will do so. How many such users will be is a question. FTV Prima’s steps in this direction were not met with great understanding, which is confirmed by a number of discussants on social networks and articles in the Czech media. It is often mentioned a large number of long advertising blocks, which according to many Czech users is the main reason why the mentioned television services pay for themselves. For example, the commentator’s comment reaped a big wave of support on the Lupa.cz portal.
„So good luck Primo with this model. (over) The content providers have probably signed their judgment that they have done so. Why should I pay for cable TV when I lose the basic functionality I paid for? This is mainly a precedent. If everyone refused to accept this as O2, Prima would logically have to withdraw from this requirement. And pay an additional fee? This is not the way to go, because by going through this, Nova and others will want this tomorrow, so it will pay off for them? Until a third of the airtime is made up of advertising, people will not need to skip it,“Mentions the anonymous author of the comment below the text.
TV Nova does not plan to join Prima in this regard. The distribution of the programs is said to remain the same for the foreseeable future as it has been so far.
Prima threatens journalists with a court for providing publicly known information
The whole situation about skipping ads is pointless. Although Prima mentioned that no one but O2 had a problem with the new model, the statement from Telly shows the opposite. Although TV operators did not like the conditions, they had to accept them and raise prices for their service.
„Above all, we would like to assure you that it is not true that we would not be fighting for you and not trying to keep the pricing conditions, as well as the unrestricted rewinding of the broadcast content on the Prima programs without changes. Throughout 2021, we intensively addressed the issue of broadcasting Prima TV programs and tried to negotiate the smallest possible price increase and the possibility of keeping the rewinding content unchanged. Unfortunately, we did not encounter a supportive or factual approach from Prima, and under the threat of turning off the signal of TV Prima programs (for which TV Prima really started to take concrete steps), we were finally forced to accept the required conditions…“Says Telly.cz representatives on the official website.
In addition, there are such absurdities as the threat of a lawsuit by the operator of the tvkompas.cz portal by FTV Prima. A text analyzing the current situation between pay-TV operators and FTV Prima was published on the mentioned website. In the article, the author draws attention, among other things, to the fact that In the Czech Republic, recording programs and skipping commercials is common for users, as well as downloading content from a variety of repositories.
Quote from the call for redress from FTV Prima’s lawyers: “With regard to all the above, we, as the author of the Article and the operator of the website and web portal TVkompas.cz, would like to point out that in the article The following passage is graphically highlighted: “The average viewer can find various other ways to get around advertising on TV. Prima can download programs from the Internet from “unofficial repositories” and watch them completely without ads. “, Which is further elaborated into the graphically highlighted passage (as follows) ads from “unofficial repositories”. They significantly interfere with the rights of my Client and the above passages of the Article are capable of causing damage to my Client. Your mention of the possibility of skipping advertising in your own copies may also lead to a similar result, as they are also inaccurate. “
It is also worth mentioning the answer of the author of the article to the call of the lawyer of FTV Prima: “The existence of “unofficial repositories” is a well-known fact, the existence of which, as you may have noticed, the article does not fight in any way. The fact that these repositories exist and that viewers download certain content from them is a simple fact that a balanced article must not overlook. If Prima feels threatened by the existence of these unofficial repositories, I would expect you to take legal action against them in particular, not to try to intimidate journalists who only report their existence,Juraj Koiš mentions in his answer. “If anything borders on the law and good manners, it is Prima’s attempt to intimidate and influence independent journalists with aggressive rhetoric and the threat of legal sanctions,“Adds Koiš.
Prima threatens the court with a journalist who wrote that after the ban on commercials, some of its viewers are likely to download programs from various Internet repositories or legally upload them to their own recorders. The lawyer is requesting that the article be deleted https://t.co/LyAGbBnX5u
– Filip Rožánek (@rozanek) February 4, 2022
Paying for ad-free content is common, for example, on services such as Spotify or YouTube. Prima offers its programs without ads for a fee on its website iPrima.cz. The question is whether pay-TV users will be willing to pay an additional fee only for the ad skipping feature for FTV Prima channels. We will keep you informed of further developments…
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