TiVo data shows people skip commercials up to 84% of the time

Data from TiVo shows that television ads lost as much as 84 percent of their audience. We've always known that the ability to fast-forward over ads really cuts down viewership. But I find myself watching some of the ads just because they look good (kudos to creatives). Last week, I was watching a new weird show on BBC America -- "Being Human," an intriguing show about ghosts, vampires and werewolves -- when I found myself twice being fooled by the commercials that looked much like the show. It's another good concept to make commercials look enough like the program that you stop the TiVo fast-forward to watch the commercial. TiVo is incorporating its data into what it calls "power ratings," that it says reflect actual audience.