Unfortunately advertising has become an inevitable part of digital life, but, fortunately, there are several pushbacks in the nature of aggressive and invasive ads. Given the nature of its business, it is not surprising that Google has become a child posters for an advertising strategy that is always questionable. It comes with the spotlight again this week when Google doesn’t just enter video ads on the home screen from the Android TV and Google TV platform but also make the ad automatically play with audio and there is no way to turn it off.
To be fair, this is not the type of ad you see on the web, lure you to click it and potentially risk your privacy. This video ad is of course distributed by Google and comes from several specific streaming partners who try to tempt Android TV users to register subscribing.
Video preview for services and channels as it might not be too terrible, and the autoplay might not be too bad. Anyone who has a Netflix account may have noticed the same autoplaying preview for the video. What is obtained by the Android TV owner in the arm is how advertising plays with audio, which can be a slightly disturbing and annoying shock for those used to operate Android TV quietly.
The 9ToG5Google does not record that video ads are only autoplay in certain circumstances, but the situation is easily repeated when someone returns to the veranda screen regularly. Make worse problems are the absence of any option to deactivate this ad or even turn off autoplay or audio at least.
Needless to say, the Nvidia Shield TV owner who received the latest Android TV update was very angry about this change. It looks like Google does not support the provision of “suggested” ads on the Android TV screen, but the least can make experience increasingly angry for the user.
