Roku's New HDMI Tech Could Show Ads When You Pause Your Game (kotaku.com) 119
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Kotaku: A new patent recently filed by TV and streaming device manufacturer Roku hints toward a possible future where televisions could display ads when you pause a movie or game. For Roku, the time in which the TV is on but users aren't doing anything is valuable. The company has started leasing out ad space in its popular Roku City screensaver -- which appears when your TV is idle -- to companies like McDonald's and movies like Barbie. As tech newsletter Lowpass points out, Roku finds this idle time and its screensaver so valuable that it forbids app developers from overriding the screensaver with their own. But, if you plug in an Xbox or DVD player into the HDMI port on a Roku TV, you bypass the company's screensaver and other ads. And so, Roku has been figuring out a way to not let that happen.
As reported by Lowpass on April 4, Roku recently filed a patent for a technology that would let it inject ads into third-party content -- like an Xbox game or Netflix movie -- using an HDMI connection. The patent describes a situation where you are playing a video game and hit pause to go check your phone or grab some food. At this point, Roku would identify that you have paused the content and display a relevant ad until you unpaused the game. Roku's tech isn't designed to randomly inject ads as you are playing a game or watching a movie, it knows that would be going too far and anger people. Instead, the patent suggests several ways that Roku could spot when your TV is paused, like comparing frames, to make sure the user has actually paused the content. Roku might also use the HDMI's audio feed to search for extended moments of silence. The company also proposes using HDMI CEC -- a protocol designed to help devices communicate better -- to figure out when you pause and unpause content. Similarly, Roku's patent explains that it will use various methods to detect what people are playing or watching and try to display relevant ads. So if it sees you have an Xbox plugged in, it might try to serve you ads that it thinks an Xbox owner would be interested in.
As reported by Lowpass on April 4, Roku recently filed a patent for a technology that would let it inject ads into third-party content -- like an Xbox game or Netflix movie -- using an HDMI connection. The patent describes a situation where you are playing a video game and hit pause to go check your phone or grab some food. At this point, Roku would identify that you have paused the content and display a relevant ad until you unpaused the game. Roku's tech isn't designed to randomly inject ads as you are playing a game or watching a movie, it knows that would be going too far and anger people. Instead, the patent suggests several ways that Roku could spot when your TV is paused, like comparing frames, to make sure the user has actually paused the content. Roku might also use the HDMI's audio feed to search for extended moments of silence. The company also proposes using HDMI CEC -- a protocol designed to help devices communicate better -- to figure out when you pause and unpause content. Similarly, Roku's patent explains that it will use various methods to detect what people are playing or watching and try to display relevant ads. So if it sees you have an Xbox plugged in, it might try to serve you ads that it thinks an Xbox owner would be interested in.
Dumb (Score:4, Insightful)
What advertiser wants to pay for ads when the user is obviously pausing to go do something else and is very likely not even in the room?
Re:Dumb (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Dumb (Score:5, Interesting)
They will be using some sort of detection of the video stream and the screen is static.
The screen will be static when you're playing certain games where you click an item and it Shows a full page of text on the screen for you to read.
Many RPGs have parts of the game like this, for example.. Final Fantasy IV; dialog screens are frequent and the screen will be "static" for several minutes as the player reads the text. . Elder Scrolls Morrowind have 300 books in the game that you read through such a system. Genshin impact has these types of full-screen texts; Persona has a lot of reading, as well there are many many games like this.
This is not very distinguishable from a "Pause"; in fact... The player might read some of it, step out of the room for a few minutes, then come back and continue reading. I'd say that this would be very annoying to the player if their TV stops Displaying what is being presented for them to read and pops up a screen saver randomly; I mean, this would seem to be a defect in the product, even.
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Time to do a Keith Moon if that happens.
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I would prefer to do an Elvis [bestlifeonline.com]
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Hush! As long as they can do ads while they don't bother us, at least they don't bother us with them when we actually want to watch the screen.
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Oh, oops, shit, sorry!
My bad!
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Shhhh, you're spoiling my fun to watch the fallout from that dead-on-arrival idea.
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I'm sure Roku will discover that people hate this, this would be plan stage II: you only need to pay $5/mo to have NO ads.
Voila.
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Ads don't work even when users are in the room, so I don't see how this changes anything
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That would be the sensible thing to do... but I've worked closely with my company's ad sales team before. Sensible is not a word they've ever heard.
Video ads are worth waaaaaaay more than static ads. Which do you think will happen?
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The value wasn't made up. It's what ad buyers were paying. Video ads priced out "waaaaaay" higher than statics. I don't make the rules for the online ad business, just telling you how it worked when I was in it.
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The value wasn't made up. It's what ad buyers were paying.
The question is whether it was of the value on the price tag to the ad buyers themselves.
My wife's boss paid a lot for a half page ad in a trade magazine for years, so the value to the magazine was significant - it was what "ad buyers were paying". However, when wife looked into it she found it was bringing in zero extra trade, so the ad was of zero value to the company. I'm not saying that ads are never of any value to the advertiser, but they are very often vastly over-rated and the advertising indust
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I'd dare say any ads aren't actually worth anything
Well, according to the $766 billion dollar ad-industry, I'd wager to say that statement isn't accurate.
other than the made up value assigned to them
Companies wouldn't be spending that kind of money if advertising didn't work. I'm not saying I like it, or support expanding it, but you can't argue that advertising isn't effective.
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Companies wouldn't be spending that kind of money if advertising didn't work.
You vastly over-estimate the competence of most companies. They pay what they do for advertising because they are persuaded by advertising agencies that it is very effective. That's to be expected because, after all, advertising agencies are experts at er ... advertising.
Not saying that advertising is totally ineffective, but that it is not as effective as most people believe, certainly not so effective that it should be one of the largest industries in the world making some of the highest profile billio
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Users will be really annoyed if it is a video clip.
And we all know how much the advertising industry hates annoying us!
Re:Dumb (Score:5, Interesting)
How long before we get here
https://www.smbc-comics.com/?i... [smbc-comics.com]
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You know that this only opens up a market for third party products that simply trash the ads while pretending to watch them.
Hosted in countries that don't give half a fuck about your laws that ban this kind of product. But hey, if you want to fund countries and their companies that are hostile to you... Because your people certainly WILL because they hate you and your ads more than the country hostile to you.
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Users will be really annoyed if it is a video clip.
"Not annoying the users" isn't even a footnote of a footnote on the work instructions for this initiative. Example: The stupid ads on gas pumps that you can't pause, skip, or mute. You just get to stand there getting ear raped by Monster Energy. I'd be willing to bet they have conducted multiple studies trying to figure out how much they can annoy someone before they just shut the TV off.
Forgot about those (Score:3)
hadn't considered that not being harassed at the pump was another benefit to driving an EV.
Yes there are some EV chargers like Volta [voltacharging.com] which show ads, though they're free and you don't have to stand next to the car while it charges. I plug into them when I go to the mall on my lunch break and get a free charge while I'm eating in a restaurant.
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Just wait. Someone will figure out how to push ads to that big screen in your car. Maybe while not driving, but at red lights or any time your car is sitting still for an extended time and someone is in the seat.
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Just wait. Someone will figure out how to push ads to that big screen in your car.
The vehicle manufacturers already know how to do it, And have laid the groundwork to ensure they can.
The only reason it hasn't happened yet; they don't want to dissuade people from buying their new vehicles -- once the sufficient tech is pervasive in all cars, especially older models, and multiple manufacturers can do it together... they'll probably Flip the switch all at once, and then all of us start getting a choice o
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... and it's stuff like this that will make my generation start yelling about grass soon enough.
Right?
Wrong?
Who knows but damnit I miss windows 7 where the GUI didn't have build-in ads and every windows update didn't beg me 4 times to move my data to edge.
I don't use ROKU for pass-thru thankfully but products that decide to claim my 'quiet time' to shovel more ads my way get tossed off the roof immediately if possible and otherwise replaced/disabled as soon as practical. You can be certain I will not buy a
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OR root that fucker and just play porn instead.
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It is remarkable how much people don't understand what EV drivers do. I'm only next to the Level 2 long enough to wave my phone at it (to authenticate with Chargepoint), plug in, go to work.
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"Not annoying the users" isn't even a footnote of a footnote on the work instructions for this initiative. Example: The stupid ads on gas pumps that you can't pause, skip, or mute. You just get to stand there getting ear raped by Monster Energy. I'd be willing to bet they have conducted multiple studies trying to figure out how much they can annoy someone before they just shut the TV off.
There's exactly one gas station in my suburb which doesn't have ads at the pump, and I will, no kidding, drive out of my way to go to it. I also routinely drive out of my way to go to the supermarket that doesn't blast ads over the PA. I can't be the only customer who does this kind of thing. Wonder if they've conducted any studies on *that*.
I'm not sure what a Roku is, but I know I won't be buying one.
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Welcome to Roku, I love you.
Re: Dumb (Score:2)
The stupid ads on gas pumps that you can't pause, skip, or mute.
You don't have to stand there and hold the pump handle while your tank is filling. That's when I clean out the glove box trash. Just jam your gas cap in it.
1. Odds are 50-50 that I'd be standing on the wrong side of the car with a long hose anyway.
2. Advertisers are going to love EVs when someone invents a charging plug that you have to keep the trigger squeezed on.
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You don't have to stand there and hold the pump handle while your tank is filling.
Call me a prude if you want, but I don't screw around with gasoline. I'm staying within arms reach of the pump while it's filling. And as loud as the Holiday station next to me has their volume turned up, you can hear the shit from across the parking lot anyway.
Just jam your gas cap in it.
Not sure where you're located, but around here they have a little catch on the nozzle so you can just clip it and it'll pump till the tank is full.
Advertisers are going to love
Advertisers are going to love when they push us consumers hard enough that we push back and actually
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Just jam your gas cap in it.
Not sure where you're located, but around here they have a little catch on the nozzle so you can just clip it and it'll pump till the tank is full.
Those clips were banned in the UK as soon as self-service filling became a thing. And if the cashier in the office saw you doing anything other than standing with the hose in your hand while the pump was running they would hit their cut-off button.
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2. Advertisers are going to love EVs when someone invents a charging plug that you have to keep the trigger squeezed on.
I can just imagine a system where you get a "one minute charging speed boost!" when you choose to watch a video ad...
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I can just imagine a system where you get a "one minute charging speed boost!" when you choose to watch a video ad...
"Charging Paused.
Are you still watching?
You didn't tap to acknowledge the ad.
Tap OK to resume charging."
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Example: The stupid ads on gas pumps that you can't pause
Second button on the right side, I think, usually works for me. Just press them all when in a hurry while saying "shut the fuck up."
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Most of them have an unlabeled button next to the screen that will mute the ad, or turn it off.
If you can figure out which one.
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If four buttons on the left, and four on the right, it's the second one down on the right. Some of our local gas stations have kindly put a "mute" sticker next to it. On stations that haven't, the button still usually works to shut off the audio. I think I was at one gas station where none of the buttons muted the ads, and I stopped pumping and left.
But the audio is the only thing that's actually annoying about it.
As a side note, I would suggest that its very presence means that the ad industry is ready to
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If you punch that screen hard enough, it breaks and NOBODY has to watch the gas pump ads.
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Re: Dumb (Score:2)
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Somehow I get the feeling that Roku couldn't care less how much they annoy their customers..
Why on earth.... (Score:4, Insightful)
would I want this?
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Why on earth would you believe you get a say in it?
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Why on earth would you believe you get a say in it?
You do - just don't buy a Roku. Buy an AppleTV instead.
Returns (Score:5, Funny)
What a great way of increasing the rate at which your product is returned to stores.
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Whoops (Score:4, Insightful)
I feel bad for the poor IT guy who will inevitably buy one of these TVs for a conference room or something. User tries to show a powerpoint and the device detects the static image as "paused" and starts playing ads instead.
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Roku can record the users? Seriously? Holy shit....
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They come with microphones and video to measure things like presence for ads. It's not new and these days it is considered a 'feature' when the system turns on when you enter the room (and that doesn't work if the network is blocked, so obviously, it is sent out for processing)
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Thatâ(TM)s why you donâ(TM)t get consumer systems for professional outfits.
I will cheerfully wager that for applications like "conference room display" the ratio of consumer grade vs professional grade displays in the wild is 50:1 or higher.
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Yeah, the first one and then when they have to continuously call IT because the screen won't turn on or other various quality issues, then it changes rather quickly. the $5k delta doesn't matter much when it doesn't work when the board is in the room.
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Thatâ(TM)s why you donâ(TM)t get consumer systems for professional outfits. I know people do it, but Roku is blocked on my networks because it records audio and video through their smart tvs.
Tell that to Windows 10/11 - whose various enterprise editions have been preloaded with things like Minecraft and Xbox software, MSNBC accidental-mouseover popups, clickbait-drenched Edge tab defaults, ad-notification widgets, and other anti-productivity ADHD-gauntlet features that should never be anywhere close to a professional workplace OS.
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Thatâ(TM)s why you donâ(TM)t get consumer systems for professional outfits.
Cough... bullshit. 100% Businesses just buy standard consumer Televisions for their needs.
Unless they're particularly high-value displays or a large number of them, in which case it would be under a supplier contract from a company such as Dell, etc, just like other hardware.
In any case, you research your purchases. In most outfits; the Conference room display probably won't even get a network connection, though, a
Commode maker Kohler wants to show you ads too (Score:5, Funny)
Commode maker Kohler also wants to play ads while you are taking a dump. They have recently filed a patent to detect when you are seated but not really squeezing. They intend to lease this time to companies such as laxative, fast food chains etc. to play relevant ads.
Soon we will be seeing ads in our dreams.
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Lightspeed Briefs!
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I read this in a short story in HS.
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RIP freeze frame fun on The Simpsons! (Score:2)
RIP freeze frame fun on The Simpsons!
One more on the no-buy list (Score:3)
Time for a new layer of hell (Score:5, Insightful)
Where the inventors of this - along with all advertising executives - where the inhabitants are tied down and forced to watch adverts for eternity.
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Someone queue up Beethoven's 9th.
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After nine billion views?
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https://www.behance.net/galler... [behance.net]
Indeed (Score:2)
A good suggestion.
No (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't ask why people was "want" this. I ask why would anyone TOLERATE this kind of crap? Consumers just need to learn the word "no." When suddenly nobody buys such crap, the message will be very crystal clear. It is the same with streaming services or game consoles, or whatever. If they force content on you that don't want and can't disable- complain loudly to them. If/when possible, cancel your service and make sure to tell them why. Consumers have a lot more power than they think.
And my recommendation for "TVs" is the same it has been for eons. USE IT AS A DISPLAY MONITOR ONLY. Do not connect it to the Internet, ever (maybe for a firmware update). If it doesn't work that way, return it. A large/quality TV is expensive and should last for years. Connect external content devices to it as you please. If one misbehaves or goes rogue or stops being supported, then replace that one little box. Or create your own box.
Just don't connect your TV/Monitor to the Internet (Score:3)
Even if it's nearly impossible to get just a dumb monitor with the panel you want that only has a bunch of HDMI inputs and you kind of need to get something "smart" just don't connect it to the internet, and let it be just a simple monitor/TV. Weren't Roku just recently in the news for locking up your device until you accept the new (very onerous) T&Cs? Nobody needs that, nobody needs ads around or during everything, and nobody needs a permanently connected webcam (often +microfone) controlled by some OS that's way worse and closed and against the end user than Microsoft ever had the audacity to produce.
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You still think your HDMI input will work when you're offline?
Now I've got a patent to go file...
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Too late. TVs that won't work until they can phone home have been around for years.
That's lovely (Score:4, Insightful)
Whenever I pause content, it's to do one of two things: go away from the TV, in which case the ads would be targeted at my couch and rug; or to look at something on the screen, like an easter egg visible from only a split second. In which case the ad would be in the way.
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Exactly - it's bad enough now that often menus get popped up when you pause and usually right over the spot I wanted to look at in detail...
Guess who has 2 thumbs and will never by Roku TV? (Score:2)
All of these guys and gals...
Circumventing DRM? (Score:2)
Might this not be construed as circumventing the DRM on the HDMI signal? Wouldn't that be illegal by the DMCA?
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Your game's pause screen probably doesn't use HDCP encryption.
Although movies do use this while the actual movie is playing.
However, the Television is allowed access to the content for showing it. It's not circumvention to implement the standard.
So, roku doesn't want us to use their tvs? (Score:2)
Because randomly interjecting stuff into a data stream is a great way to ensure that I won't buy your product. What else are you injecting without telling me? What are you reading? Yeah, no thanks.
No ad-free option? Then I'm not buying. (Score:2)
I am willing to pay a fair price for the content I consume, just as I do for everything else I purchase. What I am not willing to do is trade my time. They say time is money, but that's not correct; time is much more valuable than money. You can always make more money. You can never make more time.
What I now require is the ability to purchase access to your content without advertisements. No ad-free option, no subscription.
We have licensing firms that already provide blanket global licenses for specific rep
Simply glad I never bought a Roku. (Score:2)
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For a long time (and technically still for the time being, still got some standalone ones hooked up) Rokus were my favorite streaming devices. Simple and straightforward, clean UI, lots of decent apps, independent of big companies pushing their own streaming services (Firestick, Chromecast, etc) and even supporting older devices for a surprisingly long life. They seemed pretty developer-friendly as well including the ability to quasi-sideload unofficial/private channels too. But they've been gradually turni
Keyboard (Score:2)
Roku needs to add Keyboard support before they try adding Ads.
There is no reason to not support a keyboard for entering search
This is why... (Score:2)
I'll take reasons I'll never buy a roku TV for 200 (Score:2)
Retarded Companies (Score:3)
Why would I pay for a device that gives me a worse experience all around? Are they going to make the device free if they do this? I'm sure there are some people who would go for that, but I'm not one of them.
Roku must not like making TVs because this will fucking TANK their TV sales altogether. I'm not buying a TV that shows ads no matter who makes it.
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We'll eventually make it to the grim meathook Max Headroom future where you are legally compelled to never turn off the advertisement box.
Cool (Score:2)
Ok, I was wrong (Score:3)
For all of my adult life, I've thought that software patents were evil, that they provided no benefit to the world.
I was wrong. Some patents can be incredibly valuable to the world. For example, this patent means that I'll have about 20 years before anyone else tries this garbage, lest they incur the wrath of Roku's patent lawyers.
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Unlikely. They will license it for cheap, because the more widespread it is, the more valuable it becomes to Roku. If you can't buy a device that doesn't have this "feature," people won't avoid their crap. They want universal adoption, so they'll make it as easy as possible for everyone.
Presentations will be fun. (Score:2)
Suddenly the screen is filled with an unskippable ad for Karl Jr.'s "Extra-Big Ass Fries", followed by a unskippable commercial featuring a giant-knockered goth girl selling turnip greens to the sound of electric bagpipe music.
What new algorithmic AI-induced hell is this?
how about reverse (Score:3)
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HDMI dongle that removes ads?
yes, like a mouse wiggler. something that detects the pauses as well and inserts some mild movement to stop triggering the ad detection.
Power Button (Score:2)
If I turn the TV off instead of pausing, it goes right back to where I was when I turn it back on.
Or, just hack the shit out of the firmware and post how you did it on hackaday.
Nvidia Shield Pro (Score:2)
Cool, one more reason to not get rid of my Nvidia Shield.
Almost 5 years old, still the best set-top streaming player out there.
doesb;t that count as piracy (Score:2)