I visited the Discover site to see the outakes and extras for Mythbusters.  Most were only a few minutes long, but every one started with a 30 second commercial that couldn’t be bypassed.  I watched a couple of clips, and left, never to return.

I’m seeing this more and more on video sites.  First it was pop-up ads.  They’re annoying, but there’s usually a little X that lets you turn them off.  But now sites are insisting we watch commercials before they bless us with their video.  Screw that.

The one place I will put up with commercials is Hulu.com.  They play entire episodes of shows, and add one commercial where the show originally had commercial breaks.  (They also have entire movies, but I haven’t watched any, so don’t know how they do commercials on them.) Most are thirty seconds long and some are only ten or fifteen.  Occasionally they’ll offer the option of watching one sixty second commercial at the start of the show and then present the rest of it commercial free, which is pretty cool.  It’s worth it to watch Babylon 5 or Arrested Development.

But for every place else, forget it.  The internet is about choice, not force, and if you think you can force me to watch an annoying commercial before I can watch your short clip, you’re wrong.  I’m outta there.