Too Many Darn Commercials

[MontanaFrank]

Denver vs Carolina good game when there playing,but too many breaks in play,i could go to the local knock shop come back and not miss a thing,hehe !!!!

That's the $%#^ing way all US tv is except our public broadcasting station and premium pay tv. It wee-wee's me off so much and I can't understand why us Americans are not up in arms over this. When I was a lad, there was a law that only allowed 5 minutes of ads every 1/2 hour. I never watch anything live. It's all DVR'd and I hit the 30 second forward button way too many times.

I did enjoy the Twitch Stream. There is only one commercial at the beginning. I sure look forward to Dr. Who.

I've been waiting so many years to rant about this in a public forum. Thanks for letting me do this on this delightful forum.

Is the USA the worst at this? I don't know.

Edit: [MENTION=2636]wolfson[/MENTION] .. Thanks for giving me this opportunity to rant.

 

[Locksley]

I guess most people don't care enough.

For myself I stopped watching T.V. along time ago and now with Blu-rays and the new UHD-blu-rays I live in a land without comercials... well I watch YouTube stuff too but would actually stop if the comercials become too intrusive. I do stop watching things that got too much comercial breaks in them so that showing my irritation with comericials nowadays.

I think the whole industri has shot itself in the foot!

 

[Jeff Strong]

I'm lucky baseball is my favorite sport. Waaaaay less commercial breaks than the NFL, and the breaks are shorter as well.

Go Cubs!

If they win the World Series, I'll weep pure tears of joy. I've been a diehard fan for as long as I can remember.

 

[Xanija]

That's the good thing about the most popular sport in Germany, Soccer (or Football for our British English speakers). The game is 2 x 45 min. and the only ad breaks are before and after the match and during halftime break, when I grab another beer and go for a bio-break.

American Football is way too ad-friendly, but I think we're getting less ad breaks in Germany, as the sport is not as popular as in the US and it starts quite late in the evening.

For movies and TV shows there is a regulation allowing a break every 30 minutes, on average 20% of the broadcast time may be reserved for ads.

Usually I'm using either a streaming service when watching movies or I use an Internet DVR service, which removes all ads for me. I can't watch a movies with so many ad breaks, although I understand it's their primary source of income.

The same problem is with Internet sites, YouTube content creators etc. As long as the ads were not too aggressive, I was still fine with them. Then they were starting to shove popup ads in my face and I started using ad blocking software. On sites which I frequently use I unblock, if ads are not too intrusive. On Youtube I have ads switched on, as I want to support the content creators. But I will skip ads if they are too long, i.e. over 1 min. and not remotely interesting. I don't like ads in the middle of videos.

The big success of ad blocking software of course leads to content behind pay walls, something I notice more and more happening in Germany. Seems like people start accepting to pay for Internet content.

 

[EldarOfSuburbia]

A typical half hour show in the US will have 4 commercial breaks, I think. One right after the cold open/opening credits, 2 midstream, and a final one before the prologue/end credits. Go figure.

 

[Tron]

Here in the UK most channels run commercials every 15-20 minutes. If a game of football/soccer is showing then we get ads before the start, 45 minute half time break, and at the end. Adverts can last about 5 minutes.

The BBC channels run advert free. But it's a requirement to pay a £145/$192 yearly license fee, this supposedly part funds the BBC as well as being a necessity if you own a TV in the household.. Its a moot point but I do find out of all the channels I have on my EPG the BBC is the most watched.

 

[Kolchak357]

I'm with you Frank. I dvr everything except live sports. The commercials are maddening. What really gets me are the ones you see over and over and over again during the same program. Many don't even make sense. There are so many car commercials around that don't tell you anything about the car. What is that all about?
I've gone to watching NFL RedZone on Sunday's. 8 hours of NFL football without a single commercial and you get to see every game that is on and they guarentee to show every score. Greatest thing ever!

 

[EldarOfSuburbia]

I've gone to watching NFL RedZone on Sunday's. 8 hours of NFL football without a single commercial and you get to see every game that is on and they guarentee to show every score. Greatest thing ever!

I am EldarOfSuburbia and I endorse this message. NFL RedZone is da bomb. No commercials and no boring bits.

 

[Kolchak357]

I am EldarOfSuburbia and I endorse this message. NFL RedZone is da bomb. No commercials and no boring bits.

I wish there was a college football version that I could watch on Saturdays. But I assume that is a contractual impossibility.

 

[EldarOfSuburbia]

I wish there was a college football version that I could watch on Saturdays. But I assume that is a contractual impossibility.

My wife's opinion of college football is even lower than that of her opinion of the NFL. While I can get away with the odd NFL game in the family room, I pretty much have to confine my college football watching to the basement. I prefer that anyway, I can stream games on my tablet while playing on my PC. With baseball and football seasons now overlapping, I'm already starting to stream on 2 devices anyway....

 

[soundwave106]

That's the $%#^ing way all US tv is except our public broadcasting station and premium pay tv. It wee-wee's me off so much and I can't understand why us Americans are not up in arms over this. When I was a lad, there was a law that only allowed 5 minutes of ads every 1/2 hour. I never watch anything live. It's all DVR'd and I hit the 30 second forward button way too many times.

I think Americans actually *are* up "in arms" about this to some degree, which is why so many people have DVRs and so many people are also "cutting the cord" (the most popular streaming services are ad-free premiums ala Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc.).

If various sports started also offering ala carte streaming I think the cable TV model (with its annoying advertisements) might be in trouble. When you have like 30% of the air time devoted to commercials (as has had happen with some of the TNT NASCAR races) you're going to annoy a lot of people.

Cable television show quality has also declined a lot, which I think is accelerating the trend. A lot of the well received new television seems to be either on Netflix or a premium cable channel (HBO or Showtime).

On the Internet, too, the ad industry has also shot themselves in the foot. I recommend ad blockers for everyone just on malware grounds alone. Advertisements are also terribly intrusive these days, slowing down your browser / computer considerably in some cases. It's a pity, because you'd really like to support some content creators that currently rely entirely on ads somehow.

 

[MontanaFrank]

Here in the UK most channels run commercials every 15-20 minutes. If a game of football/soccer is showing then we get ads before the start, 45 minute half time break, and at the end. Adverts can last about 5 minutes.

The BBC channels run advert free. But it's a requirement to pay a £145/$192 yearly license fee, this supposedly part funds the BBC as well as being a necessity if you own a TV in the household.. Its a moot point but I do find out of all the channels I have on my EPG the BBC is the most watched.

I had just read about the yearly tv license. I found that interesting and would pay that for a group of commercial free channels of various content.

 

[MontanaFrank]

I think Americans actually *are* up "in arms" about this to some degree, which is why so many people have DVRs and so many people are also "cutting the cord" (the most popular streaming services are ad-free premiums ala Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc.).

If various sports started also offering ala carte streaming I think the cable TV model (with its annoying advertisements) might be in trouble. When you have like 30% of the air time devoted to commercials (as has had happen with some of the TNT NASCAR races) you're going to annoy a lot of people.

Cable television show quality has also declined a lot, which I think is accelerating the trend. A lot of the well received new television seems to be either on Netflix or a premium cable channel (HBO or Showtime).

On the Internet, too, the ad industry has also shot themselves in the foot. I recommend ad blockers for everyone just on malware grounds alone. Advertisements are also terribly intrusive these days, slowing down your browser / computer considerably in some cases. It's a pity, because you'd really like to support some content creators that currently rely entirely on ads somehow.

Your make some gread points soundwave106. I do understand about the quality of cable programming. I grew up in the 60's and I'm a child of the TV generations and have watched so much of it that I find it hard for me to cut the cord. My cable package is up at the end of March and seriously thinking about serious changes and invest in a streaming service(s).

I will check into downloading an ad blocker. I have disabled Flash in Chrome.

 

[Pinballwiz45b]

The fact that nothing's even on for me to watch nowadays just turns me off of watching TV and resorting to Twitch instead. (What does it take to get episodes of Millionaire, with Regis, back on TV?)

And I'd agree as well. Too many darn commercials nowadays.

 

[MontanaFrank]

I wish there was a college football version that I could watch on Saturdays. But I assume that is a contractual impossibility.

I would like a college version too, but you are right about contacts and various networks. Glad Eldar and you thinks NFL Redzone is the bomb. I look forward to tomorrow.

 

[MontanaFrank]

I'm lucky baseball is my favorite sport. Waaaaay less commercial breaks than the NFL, and the breaks are shorter as well.

Go Cubs!

If they win the World Series, I'll weep pure tears of joy. I've been a diehard fan for as long as I can remember.

I am not a great fan of baseball, but would weep with you Jeff. My mom loved the Cubs and I've also pulled for them every ears because of mom and that dang goat curse.

 

[wolfson]

Frank I`m so use to no breaks on all our football codes on pay tv,i refuse to watch any sport on commercial tv,only if I can`t watch it on pay tv.i love your NFL it`s great.it`s like a game of chess !!! I was surfing the channels last night till early morning.early evening our 4 football codes then after midnight football from Europe,EPL,Spanish,French,German and Italian football.i was a zombie by 7.00 am my pay tv on Foxtel is $61 au a month all in HD,there is 17 sports channels and a spare 1 just in case,plus main event for live boxing,wrestling and ufc,that`s extra ,I don`t use this channel,there`s more than enough on the other channels.

 

[shutyertrap]

Typical network TV breakdown; half hour show is 22 minutes long, hour long is 42-44 minutes long. It's been that way for years. Reason you think there are more commercials is that they'll sometimes run the first 15 minutes of a show with no interruptions and then come the back half have a break every 5 minutes. On top of that, you have what I think is the biggest crime of all, the giant banner ad that takes up a 3rd of the screen and totally distracts from the show. So even though I DVR every show I'd watch, I still have those things to bother me.

Sports take their breaks according to the play of the game itself, plus the scheduled breaks at say 2 minutes left in a quarter. That's why it drives me nuts during an NBA game when near the end coaches take timeouts for everything, meaning a commercial every time. Unfortunately I can't DVR live events as it just bothers me to do so!

 

[Biff]

I legally watch live hockey on US & CA channels, so I know what it's like in north america.
Honestly, it doesn't bother me, I got used to it.

I only hate commercial breaks in movies, shows and documentaries
but luckily I don't have such breaks on national tv and Netflix.

 

[superballs]

Ever see the Young Ones?
My favorite episode is the one where Vivian eats the TV while the other three distract the TV License inspector, when he finally gets in, there's just the cord hanging from Vivian's mouth, the TV inspector is all "you're nicked" and they are like "what for" and the inspector points to vivian's mouth cord asking "and what is that?", Vivian replies "A toaster"