Wednesday, January 19, 2022

Automatic content recognition: Your TV is listening. And watching.

 

https://digiday.com/future-of-tv/wtf-is-automatic-content-recognition/

“And by 2026, 51% of households worldwide are expected to own a smart TV…”

The increasing demand for smart TVs is resulting in more viewership data for targeted ads and personalized content recommendations. This article covers automatic content recognition, a tech process that enables a smart TV to listen to or watch content with us. ACR is used across linear, streaming, digital videos, and any device connected to a smart TV. This type of tracking was under fire in 2016 when the U.S. Federal Trade Commission fined Vizio for tracking and collecting ACR data without a viewer’s consent. But, even after a class action lawsuit settlement in 2018, 90% of Vizio smart TV owners still opted in to ACR tracking. Millions of people with LG, Roku, and Samsung smart TVs have also opted into this tracking, too. Why? As a Samsung smart TV owner, I find personalized recommendations helpful especially on streaming platforms (go Netflix!); I save time and avoid searching / scrolling through the noise. But truthfully, the main reason is because I didn’t read through my privacy policy nor terms of use carefully enough when setting up my TV. I am interested to see if there will be another backlash as more ACR data is available to marketers and as more smart TV owners are becoming aware of this tracking. We will also see which companies can successfully ingest this data for personalized marketing.  

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