"Watch something new" pop up

[DarylM]

I was watching the lastest episode of The Americans.  It was an enthralling slow-build episode with a subtle conclusion.  So I was extremely annoyed that, during the final scene, a message popped up inviting me to "Watch something new".

I hate pop-up ads and banners at the best of times.  But the ending of a show is the most important part, and to have it interrupted is very distracting.  Especially on a service I'm paying for!

To cap it all, if I click on the 'yes' option, I'm taken away from the show I'm currently watching.  What's the point of that?

If you absolutely must have these pop ups (and I'm not convinced you do) then why not have them 20 seconds from the end when, almost always, the credits will be rolling?  Or, better yet, after I've finished watching my show?

I love the content on Now TV, but this has made me genuinely angry.  I know I shouldn't be bothered by something so trivial, but I really don't want this on a service I have to pay for. 

Please remove these pop ups as soon as possible.  Thank you.

[Anonymous User]

@Anonymous User -R wouldn't it have been better to at least test it out before launching it then we wouldn't have the issue we are having now?  Did every single customer ask for it?  If not then it should have been implemented with a switch for the people who don't want to be told what to watch next.

[Anonymous User]

@Anonymous User it's been live on other devices including Xbox for months, with no issues at all. This is something that only affects the NOW TV Box. We'll fix it as soon as possible, and if you don't want to report affected shows to us that's fine.

I've got nothing more to say on the matter than what I said above.

Thanks,

Tom

[Anonymous User]

@Anonymous User-R I'm glad it was tested before release and it can't be the meta data at fault as said above unless those other platforms have different meta data.

Oh well, I'll just have to lump it or take my money elsewhere.

[dr_necessitor]

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@Anonymous User wrote:

@Anonymous User it's been live on other devices including Xbox for months, with no issues at all. This is something that only affects the NOW TV Box. We'll fix it as soon as possible, and if you don't want to report affected shows to us that's fine.

I've got nothing more to say on the matter than what I said above.

Thanks,

Tom

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Fair enough@Tom-R   but you did previously say here

"it's unlikely that that would be introduced. I don't want to set an expectation that it will be."

in response to another poster's comment of

"can we have a setting within the Apps please, where we can choose to turn this feature on or off.  I do not want it, period".

So my current expectation right now is that there will not be a feature to turn it off. However it will stil annoy me as an unwanted feature that can't be disabled and as such will grumble about it. But hey-ho it is what it is I suppose.

@commanda6 has suggested using the back button to make it disappear (thanks!) as a workaround which I wasn't previously aware of.

[Anonymous User]

@dr_necessitor that was my answer to several comments from the person I was speaking to last week.

To clarify, I was saying it's unlikely that we'll introduce a feature enabling you to switch the episode cue off. I have however fed this back as something that people would like. That said, having looked at Netflix this afternoon, you can switch off the auto-play of next episodes, but you can't switch off the "cue" that pops up during the end credits, which is the same feature we've introduced.

The comments I made about fixing it relate to the issue which I've acknowledged where the cue pops up too early. They shouldn't be popping up until the titles roll at the end of a show, and this is what we're working to fix. This only happens on NOW TV Box and Roku, and we're aiming to fix it as soon as possible. In the meantime, we can manually fix any shows found to minimise the impact on other customers, but we need those to be flagged to us.

Thanks,

Tom

[dr_necessitor]

Thanks @Tom-R - at least you are feeding it back which makes me happy!

As for Netflix, we have"Play next episode automatically" set to off (in Your Account>Settings>Playback Settings) and I can confirm that we do not get any next episode cue during the end credits at all (that's when watching via the Netflix app on TV G3 which is what we use for watching Netflix - maybe it's a different experience on other devices, I wouldn't know about that, but what I see via TV is the experience of choice for us).

Fully understand about fixing the issue where the cue pops up too early and good to see that is being addressed.

[Anonymous User]

@dr_necessitor I don't think the gen 3 Apple TV would have done the cue anyway would it? The apps on that version were pretty basic, although I admit I haven't tried Netflix on it. I tried on an Android phone and disabling that option in my account simply stops the episode from rolling on at the very end of the credits.

Anyway, thanks for coming back to me 🙂

Tom

[dr_necessitor]

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@Anonymous User wrote:

@dr_necessitor I don't think the gen 3 Apple TV would have done the cue anyway would it? The apps on that version were pretty basic, although I admit I haven't tried Netflix on it. I tried on an Android phone and disabling that option in my account simply stops the episode from rolling on at the very end of the credits.

Anyway, thanks for coming back to me 🙂

Tom

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@Anonymous User With that option turned on, when the end credits roll the app kicks in - the picture shrinks into one area and the rest of the screen includes cueing up the next episode with a countdown to the start. At this point you can either do nothing and watch the next episode or you can intervene with the remote to do something else. It doesn't interfere with the visible end credits other than to make the picture no longer be full screen (which is not a problem on a big telly).

I would say the Netflix app for gen 3 Apple TV is reasonably featured - certainly not basic, but I'm afraid to say that it's probably better featured than the current NOW TV app - sorry!

[Anonymous User]

@dr_necessitor no need to apologise! I was under the impression all apps on older Apple TVs followed pretty much the same template, so it was my mistake.

Disabling the option does work differently on Android - it basically makes it work the same as the NOW TV functionality, so I'm sure you can understand why I mentioned it as that's all I'd tested on. I was going to test on my Xbox last night, but it totally slipped my mind as I lost track of time binging on shows 🙂

Tom

[commanda6]

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@dr_necessitor wrote:

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@Anonymous User wrote:

@Anonymous User I'd prefer the option to turn them off, I don't even want them over the end credits of paid content!

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+1 from me. I do understand that some customers want & like this particular feature, but what about those who don't want or like it? Netflix has a similar feature to easily enable "binge watching" of consecutive episodes. But we've turned that feature "off" so that when an episode ends, it ends and we decide what to watch next.

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@Anonymous User wrote:

If paying customers wishes are not to be considered then this service is becoming less worthwhile.

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Agreed. It seems like a bit of a "my way or the highway" approach as far as this feature is concerned. 😞

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Hi @dr_necessitor and @Anonymous User

I too have turned off the autoplay next episode feature on Netflix as I don't like that either, but Netflix will still queue up the next episode for you. So all you have to do is hit okay to watch it.

Now TV doesn't autoplay the next episode. It just queues it up for you so you can play at the touch of a button. If you wish to. I know the issue of the pop-up appearing to early is not ideal, but in the event that the pop-up does appear when you don't want it to you can get rid of it immediately by pressing the back button on your remote and it won't appear again unless you exit the stream completely and then decide to carry on from where you left off