TV over the air had ads to pay for the TV shows and channels you watched because they couldn’t really secure the signal they sent out. but also it wasn’t really supposed to be secure in the first place. but TV production was expensive. so you got commercials, ads and sponsors when you watched.

then cable TV came about. cable TV was supposed to be ad free because you were paying. but then they would have had to fill in for segments when over the air TV was showing ads so instead of that they just showed the same ads and got paid for it. that’s double dipping.