Star Trek: Discovery Catch-All [Spoilers]

hbi2k wrote:
Gremlin wrote:

... paying to watch ads is a bit too dystopian for me.

People always say this like it's some scary new development. Newspapers and magazines have charged the end user while still selling ad space for centuries.

... that are way less intrusive and can be ignored. Video doesn't work that way. I'd settle for a couple of tasteful "this episode is brought to you by..." ads instead of the obnoxious/annoying/repetitive ads you know we'll get.

Also, it's a false equivalence to compare print media to video. Premium video has the tradition of no commercials, that's why people are upset.

Given that this week was the first time I've seen the most disturbing Wendy's commercial ever, I think I have to agree that video ads are much more intrusive.

I have no problem with supporting content creators, even with advertising, but I have a limited budget and ten dollars a month for one TV show that I'm sort of curious about is a bit steep. If I was really, really excited about new Star Trek, had a much bigger budget, or cared about any of their other shows it would be different.

Leela: Didn't you have ads in the 21st century?
Fry: Well sure, but not in our dreams. Only on TV and radio, and in magazines, and movies, and at ball games... and on buses and milk cartons and t-shirts, and bananas and written on the sky. But not in dreams, no siree.

PaladinTom wrote:
hbi2k wrote:
Gremlin wrote:

... paying to watch ads is a bit too dystopian for me.

People always say this like it's some scary new development. Newspapers and magazines have charged the end user while still selling ad space for centuries.

... that are way less intrusive and can be ignored. Video doesn't work that way.

Exactly. Print ads don't completely prevent you from consuming content for whole minutes at a time.

Gremlin wrote:

ten dollars a month for one TV show that I'm sort of curious about is a bit steep.

Agreed. And knowing I'd be forced to sit through 12 minutes of advertising per episode makes it an easy decision for me to keep my $10. I'll wait until the whole season gets released on Netflix (US) or Amazon Video.

It's not that you're not allowed to decide that this is a bad deal or that the ads are so intrusive that you're not willing to pay for the service. It's your money, you can spend it or withhold it as you see fit. But getting all indignant over the fact that somebody put ADS in something that you're PAYING for-- perish the thought!-- strikes me as a little silly.

hbi2k wrote:

But getting all indignant over the fact that somebody put ADS in something that you're PAYING for-- perish the thought!-- strikes me as a little silly.

Who's getting indignant? I've disliked video/TV advertising ever since I was a teenager. My attitude toward advertising is nothing new. The difference is that, these days, I have options. So I'm deciding to wait to watch this new series on the platform I choose, rather than give $10/month to CBS.

I'm thinking that Trek hasn't had a really good track record since...when was DS9? It just isn't worth it to me. Enterprise and Voyager (to me) were just bad shows. The last good movies (again, to me) were the first Trek reboot and First Contact. I'd say that if you want your Trek fix, check out Star Trek online. It's money better spent.

hbi2k wrote:

It's not that you're not allowed to decide that this is a bad deal or that the ads are so intrusive that you're not willing to pay for the service. It's your money, you can spend it or withhold it as you see fit. But getting all indignant over the fact that somebody put ADS in something that you're PAYING for-- perish the thought!-- strikes me as a little silly.

Oh c'mon, is it that hard to understand why people are upset?! Let me put it simply: network TV is usually free with commercials. Premium cable/video like HBO or Netflix is paid and ad free.

CBS is not only trying to double-dip by making the show both paid and ad supported, but they are preventing binging by removing the episodes after a few weeks. That alone right there is shady. If they have a good service, with good content, and fair terms I'll gladly pay for it. But they are banking on well-to-do sci-fi fans (meaning Star Trek nerds) to foot the bill for their joke of a digital service.

You're damn right I'm voting with my wallet and not supporting them, but they are going to hear from me why. It is consumer unfriendly, and it's a little insulting for your "shut up and accept it" attitude toward it.

They've been trying to screw Trek fans for years.

Remember the DVD volumes instead of seasons for TOS?

And then finally season sets came out for TOS and TNG but they were $80-100, when every other TV show at the time was $40-60 retail?

CBS has now officially announced the ad-free membership plan.

http://trekcore.com/blog/2016/08/cbs...

Quintin_Stone wrote:

CBS has now officially announced the ad-free membership plan.

http://trekcore.com/blog/2016/08/cbs...

Same price as Netflix. Only 2 original shows: Star Trek and the Good Wife spinoff. Well worth it!!!

Yeah, this is a service that offers very little of value, and is designed to be as unfriendly to customers as possible. The ads are just one of many problems with CBS All Access.

Not much valuable content.

Not even sure this Star Trek series will constitute valuable content.

Expiring episodes.

Yet another streaming option from a small fry content creator in a world with too many options already.

The price is rather high for what's offered, especially when phrases like "12 minutes of ads" are in there.

12 minutes of ads.

Ad free pricing too high.

Not an ounce of customer good will to work with.

You'll have the hardliner anti-piracy crowd subscribe faithfully. The rest are going to steal your show, CBS.

I don't have a lot of anger or upsetness about paying to watch ads. Maybe I got that out of my system in the years of refusing to pay for Hulu before they had the ad-free tier. Though I have been finding video advertising to be more...corrosive?...in recent years. Not because they've changed, but because I've changed. Maybe I just don't like the demographic that the advertisers seem to think I should identify with or something.

Plus, I basically only binge watch shows these days.

I am somewhat amused that this discussion is taking place around Star Trek, which is just about the most utopian, a-capitalist show on TV.

Good news from the article:

Star Trek will launch four months later than originally announced at the request of the creative team. Bryan Fuller's Star Trek: Discovery will now premiere in May

Both the ads included and ad-free service price is shocking. Who's the person at CBS who is so delusional? Did they actually do market analysis? Cheaper than HBO Now so I guess they aren't completely insane. This has to be some business strategy I don't understand.

PoderOmega wrote:

Both the ads included and ad-free service price is shocking. Who's the person at CBS who is so delusional? Did they actually do market analysis? Cheaper than HBO Now so I guess they aren't completely insane. This has to be some business strategy I don't understand.

Don't forget only keeping the last 5 episodes. HBO has every ep of every show for the last 20 years.

Not sure I could have invented a better system to insure that people pirate this show. No better way to do that than charge them for something and then refuse access to it.

WTF!!

I do hope it is more about him having to work harder on American gods, and not him unhappy with how it was turning out

If he's staying on as Executive Producer and still writing then it's probably not a major train smash, more scheduling than creative dispute. Berg and Harberts seem like a good set of hands to entrust the show to.

I guess they're still going with that ugly starship design.

PaladinTom wrote:

I guess they're still going with that ugly starship design. :?:

So CBS is the non-Abrams universe, right?

Iridium884 wrote:
PaladinTom wrote:

I guess they're still going with that ugly starship design. :?:

So CBS is the non-Abrams universe, right?

Last I heard, yes, and also still another prequel, before TOS. They keep going backward instead of forward. But will somehow work in time travel, although maybe leaving out the borg.

They will never leave out the Borg.

I'm just glad that there's actual video proof of the series in production. Seems to me like all the news about the show so far has been pre-production stuff, at the time when the series was supposed to have been released.