I’m not hopelessly naive. I know that money talks. Why wouldn’t MLB.com want to make some extra revenue by putting adverts into MLB.TV?
But there are limits to what’s acceptable when you are already paying good money for the privilege of watching the service.
Firstly I logged on to the Royals-A’s game mid-inning, only to see my viewing delayed by thirty seconds thanks to an advert (“hurry up, hurry up!” was my main concern at the time). Then, I had to sit through the same advert when the general broadcast went to a commercial break (“this is a really annoying advert – especially that Yankees fan”) . If that wasn’t bad enough, when I switched from the 400K feed to the 700K feed, I had to watch the bloody thing again! And it looks like we will have to sit through the same clip every half-inning throughout the game.
The advert is for Dick’s Sporting Goods and in fairness to them I’m sure they will be delighted with the situation. As a business, you want to gain publicity and to have your name stick in people’s memory. “Dicks” is certainly a word that will come to mind every time I have to watch this clip, that’s for sure!
5 comments
Well that right there has broken the deal for me. I was very close to getting MLB.TV back again, but if they’re now putting commercials in, they can go to hell.
If I’m paying $25 CDN a month, I’d better not get freakin’ commercials.
That’s evil. Cable TV is already a complete con. Remember the old days when you paid for TV channels they were commercial free? I pay $50 a month for cable TV, and every channel barring 3 have commercials. (Two PBS stations, the other is a kids station.)
That is really sickening that MLB are doing that. The one big selling point for me is now gone:( I can’t stomach baseball on TV because of the endless commercials and refuse to watch it, and now my only other avenue has been ruined infected.
Guess I’m done with baseball.
Looks like it’s calmed down a bit, as we didn’t get the advert during every break over the weekend! Still annoyed about it though. They provide such a good, simple service, why do they feel the need to mess about with it?
That “Dick’s” ad plays EVERY FREAKIN’ HALF INNING. It has made me so crazy I think I’ll shoot myself, then Dick, then Bud Selig……wait a minute, that won’t work. Ok, I’ll just shoot myself and get rid of the Misery of the “Dick’s” commercial.
I guess both sides have their eyes filled with money, so they can’t see the problem. I could just about accept one showing of the advert when you log-in (although even that is frustrating), but to continuously show the same one over and over is madness.
Do these companies work on the principle that any publicity is good publicity? So many times you see plain bad adverts that annoy the hell out of you. Do they just think that if they can make it annoying, they will get people like us talking about their company? I can’t see many people sitting through this rubbish and thinking “I might buy something from Dick’s”, can you?!
I believe they do Matt. It’s the same way you get the same irritating commercial twice in an ad break over here.
They’ve got dollar signs in their eyes at MLB, and that’s all they care about. I mean what are you going to do? Cancel? You know how had that is. That demo of the new technology recently where the guy said basically “What are you gonna do? Cancel?”. IMO that was tacitly admitting they know it’s a nightmare to cancel, and it’s a deliberate decision.
I’ve not watched baseball in about 3 weeks now. I miss it, but my only option is Sportsnet, and endless commercials and Jay’s promos.
I’d rather eat my own face.