DirecTV Toying With Commercial-Skipping DVR

Although commercial revenue is one of the most revenue-centric parts of the cable and satellite business, DirecTV seems to be willing to accept the fact that if you record something on your DVR, you aren't going to watch the commercials. Period. So the satcaster is apparently working on a new service that would allow customers to automatically skip the commercial breaks on recorded programs.

DirecTV has the technology thanks to an acquisition it made last decade. It purchased a company called Replay TV which pioneered some of the early digital technology for identifying when a commercial break begins and how to skip it and return to the actual programming without missing a beat. DirecTV CEO Mike White made a seemingly baffling comment in a recent Reuters interview when he said there wasn't a "raging demand" from consumers for commercial-skipping functionality.

There is some question as to whether or not allowing customers to automatically skip commercials would entail some sort of breach of contract between a cable or satellite provider and the networks that it carries. But Dish Network already provides a DVR solution that allows users to bypass the ads when playing back recorded shows. DirecTV will apparently wait to see how that plays out for Dish before it eventually makes its move.

[via VentureBeat]