
Plex’s DVR Now Auto-Removes Commercials from Your Recordings - hbcondo714
http://www.cordcuttersnews.com/plexs-dvr-now-auto-removes-commercials-recordings/
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joezydeco
I can recall a time not long ago where commercial skipping invoked the fire
and fury of the TV networks, which resulted in lawsuits and injunctions
against the major DVR makers.

[https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/05/tv-networks-say-
youre-...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/05/tv-networks-say-youre-
breaking-law-when-you-skip-commercials)

So, what changed?

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dperfect
It probably has something to do with this ruling:

[http://variety.com/2015/biz/news/judge-rules-that-dishs-
slin...](http://variety.com/2015/biz/news/judge-rules-that-dishs-sling-
features-ad-skipping-dont-violate-copyright-1201410019/)

It sounds like Dish and Fox did end up settling out of court (with Dish adding
some commercial-skipping limits for Fox-owned content), but apparently that
was done more in response to claims of copyright infringement for Dish/Sling
features that allowed content to be viewed in unauthorized locations (not the
commercial skipping itself).

That said, I don't know if there's a major distinction between what Dish
was/is doing with recorded content and what Plex is doing.

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reaperducer
What's old is new again.

In the 90's I had a Panasonic VCR that would automatically skipped
commercials. It worked by detecting what broadcast engineers call
"superblack," which is what goes over the air between recordings (say, between
a TV show segment and the commercial start, then again at the end of the
commercial break). It's a black generated from a lack of signal. Regular
"black" like black recorded on tape is less black if you look at it on an
oscilloscope, but not detectable to the average eye.

It was a great piece of technology, but had interesting social effects. After
a year or so I noticed that I didn't get many of the jokes that people talked
about around the water cooler at work. I was unfamiliar with certain catch
phrases. I had to ask someone, "What's a macarena?"

In decades past, TV commercials were part of the collective knowledge, and a
socializing factor. Think of Coca-Cola's numerous iconic ads. Or Apple's
"1984." Today, with so many people streaming shows and skipping commercials on
their DVRs, I wonder if that's contributing to the social fragmentation of
American society.

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Ironchefpython
> Today ... skipping commercials on ... contributing to the social
> fragmentation of American society.

Yes, in the same sense that curing polio has decreased the number of paralyzed
and dying children from bonding in hospice facilities.

~~~
notwedtm
This is the only analogy I would find appropriate in this case.

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nfriedly
I love Plex! I've never had cable, but since I moved a few years ago, I
haven't even bothered connecting an antenna to my TV.

However, between this and the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade (which was streamed
to youtube, but in a super-annoying format where you had to constantly adjust
the view to actually watch it), I think I might dig out my antenna and hook it
back up.

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upofadown
I remember when I used to use MythTV's commercial skipping that if it got
fooled then the same things that fooled it would fool you too. So you would
sometimes miss a chunk and never know it other than coming away with an
impression of a disjointed plot. Even though it did a good job and rarely got
it wrong the rare wrong time was enough to make me stop using the commercial
skipping.

With MythTV you still had the complete file and could go back and check if you
were suspicious. In this case the only way to tell would be to find the file
somewhere else and compare.

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drewg123
Many open source PVR software packages do this for free (Mythtv, SageTV). If
you want better guide data, Schedules Direct is $25/year.

I've been using SageTV (which was the foundation of the Google Fiber TV DVR)
for 10 years since before Google bought them an open-sourced it. Between
SageTV, Netflix, and ad-blockers, my son has basically never seen a
commercial.

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unixhero
Plex is the most addicted self hosting service I've ever used.

~~~
CSDude
But it tries to transcode my already compatible files with my Apple TV and can
kill an ARM NAS home server

~~~
Veratyr
Dunno if it's an option but the NVIDIA Shield TV can either direct play pretty
much anything with Kodi or it can act as a low power Plex server with a
hardware video encoder.

~~~
nacho2sweet
The Shield is great, and can handle 2-3 transcodes at a time just sitting
there silent. Can share with both me and partners parents who have Roku built
in TVs. However I have a lot of h265 content and it will transcode stuff back
to h264 and suck up bandwidth/processing when I wish it wouldn't but I think
that is a limitation of Roku.

~~~
Veratyr
Yeah, that's a limitation of Roku, the older ones don't support HEVC.

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tinus_hn
In other news there now is a great new way for the networks to keep you from
recording their shows: just change it so Plex thinks it’s a commercial!

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taoistextremist
I believe this is the "Hawaii 5-0" approach to television.

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hbcondo714
There's no mention of CableCard so I wonder if removing commercials is limited
to DRM-free broadcasts only

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dperfect
My experience with an HDHomeRun Prime (and CableCard) is that _none_ of Plex's
DVR features (not even live TV) work with DRM programs. Someone please correct
me if I'm wrong, but DRM content only appears to be accessible using something
like Windows Media Center (specifically, PlayReady). It's not a big deal for
me since most of the DRM content channels (that I'm interested in) also offer
online streaming options, but it is annoying.

~~~
hbcondo714
Time Warner / Spectrum encrypts more than 90% of the channels delivered to me
so I guess Windows 8 w/ Media Center is the only HTPC option for me still
after all these years

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nmeofthestate
The linked webpage is a cancerous malware ad infested mess on mobile,
ironically.

