Remember when Tivo was going to be the death of TV advertising because you could edit out/fast forward through ad breaks? Tivo never really caught on in the UK but there’s an interesting new development in the US which I spotted on www.pvrblog.cm. Even if you fast forward through the ad break (or the programme, I assume), Tivo can superimpose a pop-up ad on your screen. It looks like this:

A writer on the blog says:

This morning, I started watching Ghostbusters 2 on Comedy Central and, as I always do, paused it for a while so I could FF through commercials. At the first commercial, I used my trusty FF button only to see an ad for The Interpreter smack dab in the middle of the screen. Seems Tivo has started placing ads on your TV when you FF or RW live TV. To me, this is quite obnoxious because it takes up most of the TV screen!

I have to agree. This does look like a particularly intrusive and annoying form of advertising. Malcolm White, my old chum and former Planning Director of Partners BDDH, likened this sort of approach to a skinhead battering on your front door. The advertiser is like a skinhead who belives that if he knocks on your door often enough and hard enough then you’ll open the door and welcome him in. The consumer just thinks, the more he knocks, the less likely I am to open the door.