Happy Tree Friends Gone

I killed my subscription to the Happy Tree Friends video podcast yesterday. I'm not sure why, but episodes I had already downloaded were downloading themselves multiple times through iTunes. The additional downloads were identical to the first ones, except this time they contained ads. I'm not sure it was intentional, but to me, it came across as an attempt to push ads at me. Maybe it wasn't deliberate, but I'd be awfully tweaked if someone decided to waste bandwidth and HD space by pushing a new versions out just to get the ad impressions. That ain't right.

On another note, I can't believe that companies are so lacking in creativity when they sponsor podcasts. A while back, I posted that the really good podcasts are just the push portion of a push-pull mechanism that encourages interactivity. The podcasts ads I've seen don't really seem to want to be a part of that dialogue. The advertiser just runs their :30 or puts their logo on Amanda Congdon's shirt or whatever. I don't see companies soliciting audio comments or linking back to their blogs or anything like that. It just seems to be more of the same "buy my crap" messaging.