7/6/23 8:48 AM

Has anyone here upgraded to the Premium Plus that is "touted" as having limited ad content? Wondering how it is? Is it easy to upgrade and then downgrade after TdF is over?

I'm getting really irritated with today's coverage of stage 6. The regular feed has been switching to banks of commercials at some of the worst times in the race (including the early descent of the Tourmalet). They are butchering the coverage with way too many breaks to ads. The worldfeed has a few less ads, but I'd rather listen to Bob & Phil.

Anyone have input on the Premium Plus version?

7/6/23 9:23 AM

I did that one year, their fine print that they can not control ads on some content was abused, but maybe I expected actually no ads...

I just mute audio during non content. Best to watch in on demand or back to buffer start when live. Which is what I have going on as I type this.

This year I got Peacock in a package thru Roku. This are different ad wise that either of the 2 direct from Peacock subscription methods previous years. I do not know if this is Peacock or Roku, although I suspect Roku.

Seems during the week I get 'will conclude shortly' pauses which I assume are commercial pauses with no ads in place. On 4th and weekend I get the ads.

Advertisers choosing when to pay for ads?

7/6/23 9:55 AM

I should mention, live rewound back in the buffer I can fast forward these pauses, but not when they are actual commercial content on holidays/wkends...


Also the 'back 10 sec' button gets used a lot FWIW.

7/6/23 10:28 AM

Today, I also had an excessive number of problems with audio breakup and digital artifacts of lvideo freeze frame on the regular Peacock feed. One of the relay links must have been operating at minimal signal to noise with inadequate margin. Might have even been the fiber optic to my house, but I don't think so because it was better (more watchable) when I switched to the Worldfeed.

Sparky, so you thought the premium plus version still had too many commercials?

7/6/23 10:48 AM

I have it and don’t find the commercials too annoying, and I also get the pauses Sparky refers to occasionally. I didn’t have excessive problems today - I think it died and I rebooted, plus a couple times I got the spinning icon for a few seconds. I watch it on an iPad with Wi-Fi, often when I’m doing something else. I can’t compare it to regular but I think it didn’t cost much more. I don’t have real high expectations so I’m generally happy with it. Don’t know if you would be or not.

7/6/23 11:13 AM

I watched this morning on my tablet and TV. I had no issues (except for a lot of commercials).

My free year of premium through Spectrum expired this week. If you cancel your subscription and let it expire, this code N2TEWDZZ will give you one year of premium for $20. The code is supposed to be active until 9/1.

7/6/23 11:47 AM

I pay for premium plus just for July. I appreciate the "cancel any time without a hassle" option.

When commercials come on during live stream i get a holding screen with not totally horrific muzak. There are a couple commercials that are part of the actual broadcast like from thefeed com that i think they pay too be part of the broadcast. Overall not that bad even for me, i abhor advertising with the white hot passion of a billion trillion suns

Had to ride this morning so just watching the replay, no muzak breaks. I'm expecting an epic race given the course profile and mountain finish.

7/6/23 3:20 PM

Rob, can you cancel online or do you have to call a phone number, hold, and then deal with a human?

7/6/23 3:34 PM

Last year it was online. Super easy.

7/6/23 4:52 PM

Just checked, I am on premium. I did a one year for 1.99/mo. special.

So what I said above re:commercials is for Premium FWIW.

>Yep, this morning when I watched no commercials. Elaine wanted to see last 20k, and commercial city.

You can't skip thru them like I skipped thru the "will continue pauses in the morning"...

I wonder if each are same amounts of time, commercials to those will continue pauses I can FF thru.

7/7/23 8:54 AM

I use the world feed available thru Peacock, no commercials, no Bobke.

7/7/23 9:06 AM

"no Bobke."

He's got so much less doofy over the years. I'll take his worst over the main non US commentators.

Where in the world is Carmen Voigt I wanna know. ;)

It sounds like Bobke does to/for you what Mccrossan does here. He just never stops spewing extraneous crap, my word! Even Elaine looses interest in stages hearing him and his lack of space/pauses in spew-age.

7/25/23 4:27 PM

quote:

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Rob, can you cancel online or do you have to call a phone number, hold, and then deal with a human?

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7/27/23 5:54 AM

Thanks for the feedback, Rob.

Coverage seemed to improve a bit in following days and I ended up sticking with regular Peacock Premium. I think I was just especially irritated because I had vacayed in the Pyrenees last July and stayed for a week near Luz St Saveur, which is essentially km 0 of the Western approach to the Tourmalet. Being familiar with the landscape, I was looking forward to seeing the descent off the pass into Luz SS (including the road that went by our rental house), but they kept cutting away to long strings of commercials and essentially missed much of that part of the stage. I got over it.

My group got to ride the Luz Ardiden and Hautacam climbs, but the weather was nasty the day we had earmarked for the Tourmalet.... mist and rain showers with slippery road surface that included a mudslide, and we decided that if we all made it up, there was no way we wanted to descend that beast at high speed on a narrow and wet road surface that was open to traffic with numerous campers and box trucks trying to beat the TdF to the Hautacam stage.

7/27/23 1:25 PM

I'm shivering just thinking about that descent in those conditions.

Saw on Reddit that peacock lost $3b this year and that's it's all part of their projections...insane.

7/27/23 6:53 PM

Same here. We ALL chickened out from climbing it, from the West side anyway. The East side appears significantly "tamer".

We decided to drive it and saw a camper drop his wheels off the paved surface and tip precariously on a section with no guardrail and maybe a 50-60 meter drop. Also forgot to mention the sheep stampede where about 40-50 sheep came down off the hillside and onto the pavement and were running straight at the vehicles (on the way up the mtn) before veering off. I had images in my head of skidding my tire on sheep poop and going over a precipice. Had great dry roads for the two climbs we did do.

7/27/23 7:54 PM

"I had images in my head of skidding my tire on sheep poop and going over a precipice."

That's funny, at least until I though about it actually happening. ;O

8/8/23 9:09 AM

Just signed up for GCN network. $50/yr and I know I'll get my money's worth. I watch them on youtube all the time but with a vpn I can get all the race coverage I want. I'll probably still pay the $10 in July as long as Phil is still around, though. I don't pay for any entertainment streaming services so I guess this is my vice.

[EDIT].....yeah. What little productivity I had is now gone.