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Coming soon to a TV in your home, whether you like it or not -- lots of really great advertising.
Littleton-based EchoStar Communications Corp. plans to expand efforts to pump advertising and other programming into the personal video recorders that serve as the company's satellite signal receivers, even while consumers in England howl in protest over a similar tactic by a rival company.
In England, owners of TiVo PVRs awoke one recent morning to discover that they had a new, unrequested BBC program recorded onto their hard drives. It was listed on their PVR menus as, "A must see from the BBC -- Dossa and Joe," and consumers discovered they could not delete the item.
Mike Goodman, an industry analyst for the Yankee Group, described the consumer reaction as "very negative."
A PVR holds a limited amount of recorded content, usually about 35 hours worth. EchoStar has shipped about a half million PVRs to Dish Network subscribers. EchoStar controls the signal, and company spokesman Marc Lumpkin said EchoStar has "pushed" content into PVRs occasionally in the past, but the practice will increase by the end of this summer.
Click here for the rest of the story
Littleton-based EchoStar Communications Corp. plans to expand efforts to pump advertising and other programming into the personal video recorders that serve as the company's satellite signal receivers, even while consumers in England howl in protest over a similar tactic by a rival company.
In England, owners of TiVo PVRs awoke one recent morning to discover that they had a new, unrequested BBC program recorded onto their hard drives. It was listed on their PVR menus as, "A must see from the BBC -- Dossa and Joe," and consumers discovered they could not delete the item.
Mike Goodman, an industry analyst for the Yankee Group, described the consumer reaction as "very negative."
A PVR holds a limited amount of recorded content, usually about 35 hours worth. EchoStar has shipped about a half million PVRs to Dish Network subscribers. EchoStar controls the signal, and company spokesman Marc Lumpkin said EchoStar has "pushed" content into PVRs occasionally in the past, but the practice will increase by the end of this summer.
Click here for the rest of the story