Tablo Automatic Commercial Skip Feature Coming to Mobile & Web, Exiting Beta Via New Tablo Premium Service

Announcements
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Hi folks -

Two big pieces of news today…

We now officially First, we’re excited to announce that in the coming months, we’ll be extending support Automatic Commercial Skip to Tablo apps for iOS and Android mobile devices, as well as our web app for PC and MAC.

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Keep your eyes peeled here for app update announcements!


Secondly, as we outlined during the rollout of Tablo’s Automatic Commercial Skip feature, part of the open beta process included evaluating ongoing infrastructure costs related to delivering this feature.

Processing each individual recording requires significant cloud computing resources as well as ongoing development and maintenance of the advanced machine learning systems and DSP algorithms that make this feature tick.

While we’re proud to have been able to offer Tablo Automatic Commercial Skip as a free service to our customers with active Guide Data Subscriptions during the open beta, these ongoing cloud infrastructure costs are beyond what we can include as part of the basic subscription, which has not increased in price since Tablo’s launch in 2014.

To avoid raising the base TV Guide Data Subscription price for everyone, we have instead chosen to move Automatic Commercial Skip into a new, and optional, Tablo Premium Service add-on starting February 6, 2020.

You can read more about this on the Tablo blog here:


Pricing for the new optional Tablo Premium Service add-on will be as follows:

  • $2.00 USD ($3.00 CAD) per month on top of the monthly Tablo TV Guide Data subscription
  • $20.00 USD ($30.00 CAD) per year on top of the annual Tablo TV Guide Data subscription
  • $20.00 USD ($30.00 CAD) per year for lifetime Tablo TV Guide Data subscribers

The ability to add this feature to your Tablo within the account portal will be available in the coming days is available NOW! But it’s worth noting that your subscription will begin immediately and the feature is still free until early February so there’s no rush.

If you don’t currently use Automatic Commercial Skip, nothing will change for you.

If you do, please visit the Tablo blog for more information about this change, how to subscribe to keep Automatic Commercial Skip enabled on your Tablo, and what will happen if you choose not to subscribe.


Wondering If Your New Premium Service Subscription is Active?
You can check your Tablo’s Premium Subscription status on account.tablotv.com as well as via the SETTINGS screen of Tablo apps on Roku, Fire TV, Android TV, and Apple TV.

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If you have any questions that weren’t addressed in the blog post, comments, or feedback, you can reach us via email, phone, Facebook, Twitter, or reply to this post.

1 Like
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Using Roku connected to my Tablo device…

I saw a brief message this morning on my Tablo.
It read something like “Commercial Skip Transitioning from Beta”.
Then I believe it directed me to “tablotv.com/skip”. The message disappeared before I could put my glasses on and read it again.
I exited the Roku channel, selected it again, but this time there was no message.

I looked at the Tablo website and could not find any information regarding this topic.

Did I read this right?
In the long run, what does this mean for Commercial Skip?

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Same thing happened here. Can’t find any info about it on their website, so maybe it was a mistake and they showed that too soon.

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Got the same message when I turn on tablo this morning not to concern because I don’t use commercial skip.

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Saw the message. Went on line to the address and nothing was there concerning the Skip feature coming out of Beta. Maybe we will see something later on this since they initially stated the feature would be a ‘cost’ item if we wanted to continue the capability.

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$20 per year isn’t a bad deal, but it is per device not per account. I just don’t use my Tablo enough to justify the cost, but I am sure some do.

While I am sure all of us would like it to be free, it is a lot of extra server processing. It makes sense to charge a nominal fee to use it.

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Is the Commercial Skip feature per device even for those with grandfathered lifetime subscriptions?

And where is the option for lifetime commercial skip. I have enough of these crazy annual payments. I would prefer to pay once and be done with it.

2 Likes
8

Beta Team Members gonna get this for free?
He asks his leading question attempting to influence the business model via jedi mind trick.

2 Likes
9

From the blog post:

Pricing for the new optional Tablo Premium Service add-on will be as follows:

  • $2.00 USD ($3.00 CAD) per month on top of monthly Tablo TV Guide Data Service
  • $20.00 USD ($30.00 CAD) per year on top of annual Tablo TV Guide Data Service
  • $20.00 USD ($30.00 CAD) per year for those with lifetime Tablo TV Guide Data Service

Lifetime “basic” subs should get a discount compared to the annual “basic” subs (IMO).

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It is per device for everyone. And there will be no lifetime payment, and I don’t blame them for not offering it. It’s hard to tell whether this service will last for many, many years, or will it be dropped after 1-2 years.

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Hmmm… let’s see… I have a lifetime subscription. So right now I have no recurring Tablo billing.
$20 a year… $1.66 a month… about a nickel a day… well considering Tablo is how we watch TV and we DVR a lot and so use the commercial skip for basically… everything… yeah. I can get behind this for $20 a year.
I’ll be adding it when I see it in the portal.

4 Likes
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I didn’t know that snowcat worked for or was a spokesman for Nuvyyo.

And it should be obvious that since the price is the same regardless of what type of model you have, those users with just a 2-tuner or dual units are subsidizing 4-tuner users. You obviously can’t record the same amount on a 2-tuner versus a 4-tuner.

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Fair point. But no one with a 2 tuner is recording shows 24 hours per day on both tuners and neither is someone with a 4 tuner recording on all 4 tuners 24/7.

In reality, someone with a 2 tuner could be recording 40 episodes of shows per week and someone with a 4 tuner could be recording 20 episodes per week.

So should Tablo charge per episode processed? :joy:

2 Likes
14

Now include folders to separate recordings to basic service or to the premium if I am paying for this anyway!

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It is my opinion that it was the commercial skip feature was a nice addition to the ever evolving digital TV industry, it helped secure my loyalty, membership and relationship with Tablo. Deciding to charge extra is only going to cause me to reconsider my subscription since I have a dated 2 tuner model anyway. Tablo, you just gave me the reason to start looking at all the alternatives out there now.

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I like CS enough that I would bite if there was a one-time “lifetime” price, say $50-$75 in addition to the lifetime subscription I already have. Please consider working something out for customers who already have the lifetime subscription.

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Sign me up.

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I agree I would be willing for the $50-$75 “upfront” payment.

That way I’m assuming the future risk and I can’t cancel. And I have multiple 2-tuner models.

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$20 dollars is peanuts, but their reasoning is total BS. No cloud based servers would cost them that much. But I get it they want to make money, more power to them. What I don’t like is the no lifetime option. I cut the cord because I despise paying anything monthly or annually so this is a no go for me on that reason alone.

Not to mention the commercial skip does not work 100% of the time. and to pay for a feature that still has bugs doesn’t seem right at all.

Let’s hope this isn’t the start down a dark path for Tablo, where they start charging extra for any little new feature or enhancements.

5 Likes
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The function has to become far more reliable to justify paying for it. Right now it’s failing about 25% of the time so the value of paying for a 75% reliable service isn’t there. The more Tablo “improves” the more it is pushing me to another OTA DVR solution.

3 Likes