Dish has agreed to restrict the ability of its Hopper DVR to automatically skip over ads when Dish customers watch ABC shows, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal. The agreement comes as part of a larger retransmission deal that will continue to give Dish the ability to carry broadcast and cable networks owned by Disney, including ABC and ESPN. Consumers will still be able to manually fast-forward through ads recorded by their DVR. However, they won’t be able to access the Hopper’s automatic ad-skipping feature, dubbed Auto Hop, until three days after the show aired on TV. The three-day rule is due to the fact that broadcasters can monetize advertising until three days after a show aired on television. After that window, ads don’t get counted anymore, making them effectively worthless for broadcasters.
Read the full story at Giga OM, and the original report at The Wall Street Journal (paywall).