Royal Phillips Electronics has filed a patent on a TV that would allow broadcasters to "lock" your TV when a commercial comes on -- no channel surfing for you!

Philips acknowledged, however, the anti-channel-changing technology might not sit well with consumers and suggested in its patent filing consumers be allowed to avoid the feature if they paid broadcasters a fee.

Ya think?

On Wednesday, company officials issued a statement that noted the technology also enables the opposite: allowing viewers to watch television without advertising. The intention was never to force viewers to watch ads against their will, the company said of the technology.

"We developed a system where the viewer can choose, at the beginning of a movie, to either watch the movie without ads, or watch the movie with ads," the company said.

Right...and I've got this bridge that goes across San Diego Bay to Coronado that I'd like to sell you.