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Pop-up Ads Coming to A TV Near You
Muddie writes "The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is reporting that television execs and advertising agencies think product placement and the 30 second commercial spot are not getting the respect they deserves from us consumers, so in order to combat us ignoring them, there will be pop-up ads taking up the lower quarter of your screen during normal programming. Not only that, but the ads will run during relevant portions of the programming (see a guy shaving in the mirror, get a pop-up ad from a razor company). Do "They" think we just don't see enough advertising in a day? If you aren't busy throwing things through your television yet, you can read the article over here (with no pop-up ads)."
Discovery channel does that with upcoming shows already. Though they take up more like the lower ninth, last only a few seconds, and only happen just after commercial breaks.
I wonder if we'll get x10 ads during spytv? God help us.
Time Warner will be getting their digital cable box back too. Hitting these guys in the pocketbook is your only way to get a message to them.
------
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
I'm glad I live in a country with advert-free TV.
Just imagine what this is going to do to the Playboy Channel and Spice TV....
many people record shows and skip the commercials, having pop up ads would effectively force you to watch ads no matter what, as long as it was a part of the broadcast signal.
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
Granted - nothing will keep me from watching West Wing and Law & Order - but beyond that when I just want to veg and watch TV - having popups in teh corner would be over the line for me - I'd do something else or watch a cable station.
I'd take brief ads screens during the pause in sat channel changes before I'd accept this type of advertising. Its too intrusive. I know the TV stations need to make money - but at some point ads will take over the show and I'll stop watching.
At some point overbearing ads will drive people away - I'm already ready to stop readnig NY Times because their ads pop up constantly, even using the Lizard.
Top Most Bizarre/Disturbing Error Messages
this isn't meant to be annoying.
sure, i like to watch a movie now and then, but honestly people, you'll be better off and enjoy life more if you turn of the tele, or get rid of it altogether. why not?
I've been without a TV for about 8 years now and it's been really nice. Oh sure, I can't chuckle along with my coworkers about last night's Friends episode, but somehow I still get by. The best part is that after coming home from work I actually have to find something constructive to do with my time instead of wasting the next 5 hours watching sitcoms. Toss your TV. You'll like the results.
Not to sound elitist, but I'm glad I've cured myself of the TV addiction. I watch 10 hours per year, tops.
Now, if they start inserting pop-up ads in video games, I'm screwed.
(Product placement in video games is bad, but I can tolerate it. Actual ads are a different story ENTIRELY).
They really don't talk about the fact that many now have 29"+ tv's in their homes. With a larger screen, losing part of it to ad's won't seem like such a horrible deal to many. We've already been conditioned by ESPN with it's sports ticker and CNN/et al with their news tickers. The shrinking of the content really sucks on 19" and smaller tv's, but with more and more people watching on their 51" projectors, this should help the networks and advertisers out a lot.
I can understand why advertisers are looking at doing this. I for one haven't watched a commercial in months since I've bought my TiVo. We got some new Dell PC's in the office a while back and somebody was joking around "Dude you're getting a Dell" and I had no idea what the hell he was talking about until he told me about the commercial :) Of course if it's during the programming I won't have much of a choice to watch it or not, that's just how the advertisers want it.
If you can afford to advertise, you don't need to.
We should not be so surprised. All the media will go through not one, but many revolutionary changes as digital media change the underlying assumptions.
./ in music, soon in video, and of course TV.
/. a few months ago. Time for another link to the future of TV advertising
We talk about it all the time on
TV advertising used to be linked closely with the show, the actors would break from acting and endorse the product during a show called "G.E. Hour" or "Hallmark Hall of Fame."
The PVR will make the 30 second ad not very useful, so they will move to other things.
I have a proposal for one possible change that was featured on
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
I mean, really. At what point would they stop, if they didn't have pesky laws, negative feedback and the like to get in their way? 12 hours of consumer commercial viewing, with another 4 hours for purchasing everything we've seen leaving 8 hours for sleep and personal hygiene?
I can see it now. Some agency will ink a deal with a state gov, you don't get your unemployment check unless you prove you've watched at least 10 hours of commercials that week. Or maybe they'll just pull a Running Man, and make it illegal to turn off the TVs. That would be a hoot, wouldn't it?
Here in the UK (not sure about anywhere else) MTV have "Ad break tennis" where you can play pong super-imposed over the adverts until they end and save your game to continue during the next set of adverts ;-) I guess they think the ads will still get the message across submliminally or something.
One thing I hate already with Sky is that the channels tend to switch to adverts all at the same time, so as you surf all you can find are more ads! Glad we have the BBC with no adverts. I mean why do the satelight/cable companies NEED 20 minutes of ads every hour (5 minutes after every 15) when I already pay 30 quid a month for the channels?? I only pay 100 odd quid a year for the BBC which has a lot of channels and no ads!
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
Interesting question, isn't it? There's a point where I couldn't possibly have the money I'd need to buy all the great products out there.
Believe it or not, there is a hard-coded limit to how much revenue can actually be gained by advertising. Just because more ads are on the screen doesn't mean I'm going to free up more money to spend.
You can bitch and moan about how advertisers won't be satisfied until they can interrupt your dreams and put luminescent logos on the inside of your eyelids, or you can do something about it.
Talk back! Or find some other way to Interrupt Pathological, Media-Simulated Social Interaction.
Quiquid latine dictum sit altum viditur
So now can we start hunting advertising executives for sport? Please?
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
... if they reduce, significantly, normal ads. I can ignore the banner/pop-ups and keep watching. I'd prefer the shows were not interrupted for a minute or two. Think how much better sporting events would be (ever watch the World Cup with it's 'pop-up' ads?).
Think about it -- if the norm on TV was these banner ads, and then one day they said 'we're replacing the banner ads with 2 minute interruptions in the program', people would go bonkers. In fact, what if that became the norm on websites?
I much prefer the banners.
Plenty of huge ugly banner ads on Slashdot yet sure enough they complain about the ads on TV. Go figure :)
as long as they are pop-under. (grin)
TNT already does banner ads - adding black bars to the top and bottom, then logos, then 'what's next' info, and more as time goes by. If the user has to actually interact to get the bloody thing off the screen, there is going to be a peasant revolt.
My dish has several channels that have an 'info' button. I keep disabling it, but since I won't run a phone line unless I can't see the video I loose the settings every few months. I think I pressed it a couple times - now I wish I could just make it go away. There will be much weeping and gnashing of teeth if I have to actually click to make the add go away. Actually, it would drive me to make an automatic cancel remote... more hardware... I'm sure the appropriations committee will approve the funding.
+++ UGUCAUCGUAUUUCU
Anyone remember Ed TV? Remember when Matthew McConaughey was about to get lucky with Elizabeth Hurley? Trojan had the Pop Up ad for Little Ed's "popup", at least until he fell on the cat.
Poor Elizabeth Hurley, she shoulda had a Bonzai Kitten.
My father is a blogger.
It's also fairly common on regualr TVs, VCRs and DVD players, for people who are watching a widescreen-format movie and would rather crop some bits off at the sides than see the bars along the top and bottom. Sure, zooming loses a bit of resolution, but that's preferable to seeing continuous banners.
Make sure that you write down any 800 numbers that are displayed. Call them up and tell them that they ruined your show, and you will never buy anything from them.
"None of this might be happening if traditional 30-second commercials got more respect. "
Oh wait, so its MY fault that your commercials SUCK? I'm to blame for the fact that I'd much rather prefer reading blinky-text html than watch nearly every car commercial?
Let me get this straight, I watch a movie, and then its temporarily obscured by your stupid advertisment... Is Blockbuster sponsoring this?
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Man shaving: Gilette
Small children: Bayer aspirin
Car on a sunny road: Honda or GM
Car being destroyed: Ford
Computer in cheesy series like V.I.P.: Red Hat, IBM, Sun or Mandrake
Computer geek with personality problems: Slashdot
Computer being broken into: Microsoft
Bob Dole: Viagra
Sarah Michelle Gellar: Trojans
Powerful, cynical villain: RIAA
George W. Bush: Hooked on Phonics
Dick Cheney: Arthur Anderson
Others?
Finding God in a Dog
I am not that starved for entertainment, so I have no problems waiting for it to come out on DVD.
Also, having pop up ads would force you to subscribe to HBO, et al, simply to get more crap free content. I really do find commercials irritating as it is...
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
This must be the reason for HDTV. As the screen narrows down squashed on my conventionals TV, I know that someone somewhere is seeing more pixels. More real estate to polute. When the old fashion barker appears on those shiny new screens in home theaters all over the country, I'm sure that the Booming stereo or quoad will have enough space for his voice to be heard clearly underneath the bigger placement advert that is the program. Wonderful! E-U-Toe-Peeeeee-Ahhhhhhhh! ha ha ha.
TV provides nothing of value.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
But the point is, pop-up ads like this would drive me over the line to do it right away.
If programs would be read like poetry, most programmers would be Vogons.
Sweet! I'm going to make a ton of money selling people a hitech piece of cardboard to slip over the bottom of their tv...
1. fashion piece of cardboard
2. ?
3. profit
user_pref("capability.policy.default.TVOwner.pissO ff", "noAccess");
I can't be bothered to pay for cable -- I hardly watch any television right now as it is... maybe 2 hours a week at most. If local stations started doing this, I'd probably just sell my TV.
I know that the shows are there to draw the audience into watching the commercials, which actually pay for the air time that the shows take up, but if they make a show less entertaining by causing ads to interfere with the picture it's just going to lead to people turning off their TV sets for good.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
... It's how to develop little rectangle-shaped holes in our perception so that we aren't driven insane by pop-up and banner ads while surfing. Hopefully the first focus groups who report back that they don't even remember what those little pop-ups were for because they were ignoring them will show the ad execs that this is a completely fruitless endeavour. Hopefully.
___
Cogito cogito, ergo cogito sum.
This all evolved from the whole USA network/Discovery Channel corner-of-the-screen ads. Some time ago I submited to /. my editorial on how to stop them. It was turned down, so I'll paraphrase it here again.
While the obvious solution to the problem is to stop watching those channels that assault you with ads, while you are trying to watch a show, many people just aren't willing to give up a station despite the annoyances.
So, as a moderate solution, I propse that you simply don't watch the commericals on that station. So, when you are watching any network with annoying ads during the show, change the channel when the commercial break starts. Probably the best choice is to switch to PBS for a couple minutes, then change it back when you believe the commericals will be over.
Although the response to this will take some time, companies will realize that not many people are seeing their ads on a particular network, and that network will get less money for ads.
And while I'm on this soap-box... I suggest everyone do the same thing at movies. When I saw the damn Heineken commercial during 'Austin Powers', I left (along with my friends) and we demanded a refund. After some arguing with the manager, we got our $50 back, and left. If more people had some backbone, you wouldn't be forced to stare at gigantic flashing "Coca Cola" signs for several seconds in the middle of every movie.
So, there's my solution. If they want you to watch commericals during shows, don't let them subject you to the commericals during the break as well.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The only chance you have to stop this nonsense is to
make a big fuss. Complain to the advertisers, teach
them that associating their product with a feeling
of outrage and annoyance does not sell more product
it sells less.
The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
The Oxygen network already does this. They have a constant banner on the bottom much like an ESPN2 sports ticker, but they use it to give trivia, dumb comments, and information about whatever you're watching, sort of like a pop-up video banner. And then when commercials come in, they actually use that space to tie into certain commercial spots, like laundry detergent or whatever.
Sometimes useful while watching Xena, but otherwise mostly annoying.
US Asian? What about US Europeans? Or US Africans? Is there something special happening on Asian TV shows in the States?
Java is the blue pill
Choose the red pill
How long before we see TVs and DVRs that filter these ads. Even a black corner of the screen is much preferable to distracting advertising during programming. We watch widescreen movies already with a % of the screen blacked out anyway...
-- Adam
The next great invention will be TV Spam...to watch a TV show, you will first have to look through 100 unsolicited programs on breast enlargement and Nigerian bank frauds. Bring on the white noise!!!!
I'm totally against the concept of TV pop-ups, but at least TBS and these advertisers are examining new routes of revenue and different business models instead of trying to destroy whatever they believe is hurting their current system (*cough* (RI/MP)AA *cough*). Give them a little bit of credit for that. Hopefully they'll just find a different less insane route. Just because they "haven't ruled it out" doesn't mean they'll use it. Besides, a big ad for Folger's or something popping up over Friends couldn't possibly make the show any worse.
Did anyone actually see these things? They said they tested them over the summer...
If I see one to three advertisements in a day, I'll probably remember them all. I might even think about them later on and buy something. If I see 300 ads in a day, they're no more memorable than the individual cars on the freeway -- which means I only remember the really obnoxious ones that pissed me off and caused me to swear revenge.
One would think that advertisers would understand this, and while they probably do, they ignore it because advertising is one of the great hoaxes of modern society. Every ad you see represents money in the bank for someone who suckered someone else into paying him to conceive or display the ad.
The person paying for the advertising really has no way of determining the effectiveness of an ad campaign. Increasing or decreasing sales could be attributed to any one of a number of factors. That's why so many organizations ask "How did you hear about us?" or "What caused you to buy our product?" (I always answer "Satan")
Just you wait, it's only a matter of months before they start showing commercials DURING the movie in the movie theater. Real commercial breaks just like TV.
In fact you will start to see boxed ads constantly on TV soon. That is, the show you're watching will only occupy the top 2/3rds of the screen or be a box in the upper right. The rest of the screen, about 30-50% of the total screen will be ads, sometimes several at a time.
BTW does anyone else notice that the Disney channel does not sell ads. They only market their own media. And because of that there are different rules for how much commercial time during each hour they can have. It's typical for them to run back to back 5 minute previews of the show you're going to watch in next hour. I think they're down to maybe 22 hours of content an hour.
this notion of relevancy is nonsense. How is an ad for a razor relevant to *me* just because the on-screen character is shaving? Personal relevancy is already offered (or approximated, at least) by targetting the ads to the demographic: You watch Days of Our Lives, you get Midol and Tampon ads. You watch Jerry Springer, you get ads for Natural Light and Slim Jims. You watch Al Jazeera, you get ads for glycerine, nails, and anti-coagulants. Of course, this is purely speculation.
Now, more than ever, people will want to be able to shoot thier T.V. Hmm... too badthe PS2 doesn't have an RF input, or you could write an app to allow you to "shoot" the image on the T.V.
Oh well. I guess TiVo will come out with a "letterbox" option to get rid of the add and re-center the image. And they'll find themselves back in court.
Copyright Violation:"theft, piracy"::Anti-Trust Violation:"thermonuclear price terrorism"<-Overly dramatic language.
Instead of pumping millions of dollars into finding new and exciting ways of delivering advertising, advertisers should concentrate on producing ads that hold the viewers interest.
I have a tivo. I fast forward past the majority of ads. But some, i rewind and watch again. Recently, the "power ade" ads, which feature CG scenes of what would otherwise be amazing physical feets. A jogger jumps accross an open draw bridge, a football player throws the ball nearly out of the stadium. These are interesting enough to make me want to see that again. Most ads aren't even good enough to watch the first time, so i don't. If they're forced upon me DURING THE SHOW, they are obviously going to be annoying. If i don't change the channel or turn off the TV, they're at the least going to leave a bad taste in my mouth. I'll look for products that don't remind me of being pissed off.
Just like those DVDs that FORCE you to watch the ads. If i wore a watch it wouldn't be a timex, because the forced ads are so damned annoying.
Who didn't see this one comming? What choice do they have with things like the TiVo and replay TV becomming more popular, the 30 second spot will become more and more worthless.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
no biggie. and maybe that'll cut down on in-between commercials.
Don't be ridiculous. Can you honestly see a TV exec saying "We had $200 million in interstitial ad revenue in 2002, but since we've picked up an additional $80 million in pop-up ad revenue we can afford to accept $80 million less of interstitial advertising." Big business is after big money, and they don't care how hard they have to annoy consumers to get it. Your only option will be to turn off the TV or turn the channel.
The funny thing about all of this is that the advertisers feel that people don't give commercials the "respect and attention" that they think they deserve. That's because the consumers don't think that commercials are generally worthy of respect or attention. They started doing interstitial advertising and people started flipping channels because they don't want to watch ads. They increased the amount of interstitial advertising and people switch channels and stay longer or they buy a Tivo to filter it all out. I wonder why? Oh yeah, that's right. People don't like advertising.
So now they want to adopt the Internet's most annoying, least respected and most ignored form of advertising: the pop-up. That will get them the "respect and attention" that their products deserve. Nevermind that people have already learned to ignore the popup windows on their PCs, which should greatly ease the transitition to ignoring the popups in their TV programming.
The only real difference between the Internet pop-ups and TV popups is that the TV pop-ups have the potential to be much more annoying. The first time that they pop up and block something important (the text of a suicide note in that mystery show, the car spinning out during the Indy 500, the outfielder failing to catch the fly ball that results in the game-winning run, etc) there will be ten kinds of hell to pay from every direction. Do the advertising agencies honestly think that by cramming themselves down our throats we will become more enamored of advertising? No, we'll just start watching channels that don't advertise with popups, if we watch TV at all.
The sad thing about this is that it is truly unnecessary. Actual commercials in general have been getting better over the years. Many of them are funny, some even quite entertaining. Adcritic.com built a web site that's sole reason to exist was to provide commercials for download over the net, and they were crushed by the demand and folded. What that says to me is that even though the average commercial is derided and ignored, people will go out of their way to see entertaining advertising.
If ad agencies made their commercials more entertaining then I wouldn't mind watching them so much. Ideas like the product placements in Survivor work well. You see the bag of Doritos, you see 7 starving contestants competing for the bag of Doritos, and you see the winning contestant chowing through them like they were ambrosia. Next time you get the munchies you think of Doritos. Advertising via sponsorship seems to work well too, at least in auto racing. Race fans are some of the most loyal consumers in the world, so long as their product is sponsoring their favorite driver or team. When choosing between two roughly equivalent products, I always choose the one that sponsors auto racing (if there is one), even if it is slightly more expensive. It makes sense to support those companies that support your interests, and I'm not the only sports fan that thinks that way.
It's interesting that TNT claims to have already trialed such a pop-up system last year during a showing of "Father of the Bride II" and didn't receive any phone calls complaining. What kind of ratings they got for that showing? How many people switched channels when they started seeing the ads? Does TNT realize that 90% of lost customers don't say anything about being unhappy before switching to a competitor? Would there have been a more significant response had they tested these ads during a more popular show? Just how many people actually tune in to watch a second-rate sequel that's seven years old on a second-rate cable network?
I guess in summary, there is a way to advertise effectively. If someone is thinks that pop-ups are effective then they obviously haven't figured it out yet.
So, will there be popups in the advertisements as well, a la Gator. Then, we can go to pop-ups in the pop-ups. I see the revenue opportunities endless! You can then sell for non-pop-up "premier" advertisements. Or they could go back to the cable subscribers and try to sell them on "premier" non-pop-up channels (much like the "advertisement-free" channels).
Perhaps we could just go back to charging people competitive prices for a good product instead of decreasing the prices and producing a worse product?
How is _alienating_ viewers going to make more people watch? Maybe they should take a lesson from RIAA and actually care about their customers...hey, wait a sec...
Nonperiodic Central Trajectory
Someone will make a box to put between the signal and the TV that will run a pattern recognizing algorhitm on the signal and blank out the adds. Just wait an see :)
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I sat down and did some math. With all the different HBOs/Cinemax and the package deals, I end up paying about $1 per channel per month. In that, I get movies and orgininal shows uncensored and commerical free.
Outside of those channels, I only watch about ten of the ~200 'normal' channels, with very little frequency. So I get to pay about $4 per channel with edited movies and ever increasing advertising.
Granted, some of that money from basic packaging goes directly for the cable overhead, but still, why am I paying more per watched channels with advertising then the better ad-free channels??
What a country.
The Internet is generally stupid
Seriously,
I have been TV-free for 10 years now, and believe me, I don't miss it at all. You only have so many hours a day/a life - why yield them up to shit programming chock full of shit advertising?
To hear people complain about TV advertising, and yet go on watching TV like it's some necessity of life like food or water or air, makes me want to cry/laugh.
Anyway, it's your life. If you want to sell it, that's your business. But don't whine once you've made your choice. And it IS your choice.
Green has lived without television since 1989, when his then-girlfriend moved out and took her set with her.
Does this mean he hasn't been laid since 1989? I suppose a new girlfriend would require a new TV?...
I'm not surprised a lot of this came from TNT....
....just my opinion.
Isn't the head of TNT the jerk who said, when talking of Tivo or Replay said that people had a 'contract' and HAD to watch their commercial??
This article is in the Atlanta newspaper? Hmm..home of Turner 'empire'? It's not even good journalism, as everything is taken at face value with no opposing views... it's simply propaganda.
For example:
It says the news channels have shown people accept all the various junk on the screen. I'd say nobody has a choice. Once one went with the garbage, all of them went with it at the same time. There's not a cable news channel with an alternative to see if the lack of the trash would impact viewer rates.
It says young viewers will accept all kinds of things on their screens...(like spam...my words). I'd say it's the younger generation who've most decidely they didn't like things like spam and pop-ups and been the ones who first create and use the software to trash the spam and thwart the pop-up/pop-overs/pop-unders (And I thank them, since I'm not the younger generation.)
I don't think TNT is an example of a 'test' market as they already have so many commercial minutes / hour that anyone who watches entertainment on their network already have succomb to just about anything and probably would take the additional crap. (JMHO, I've watched TNT twice in about the last year..and never made it through a program.. as they don't run programs with commercials they run commercials with a little programming.)
If it starts hitting the mainstream, I think you will find the revolt. The broadcast channels are still 'in the public interest' as far as licensing and their airwaves free. If AOL/Time Warner wants to turn them totally into infomercials with a tad of content, I'd say they can step up and pay billions for the use of the public airways.. as some in Congress wanted when they doled out the HDTV channel space...as if AOL Time Warner can afford spending billions on anything at this point. They're just want to turn TV into something as lame as AOL.
PS... the guy is right about one thing in that people have shown they can 'multi task'. The one nice thing, on occassion, that all those damn commercials do is..when they aren't in sync between a couple channels..is give one the ability to watch two complete programs at the same time on different channels simply by switching between the two during commercial breaks on the other. (Though, instead of putting up with some commercials, it pretty much insures that one doesn't see any commercials.)
Yea it (pop up ads) sure have done the trick for the internet world and reaped millions (most the sites begging for your last few bucks seem plenty rich from the plethora of ads boxing in the content right?). Now all we need is TV ads that randomly turn the channel to the POPUP network every few minutes.
(+1 Funny) only if I laugh out loud.
None of this might be happening if traditional 30-second commercials got more respect. Many consumers treat them as an excuse to change channels.
Ok now, I'm going to admit something scary. I like commercials, some of them anyway. Some of them are actually quite funny like the Squirrel-Geiko, Dog driving-carfax, dancing Gerbil-Block Buster. Well at least they were somewhat amusing before they were played to death.
There are three classes of commercial that will make me change the channel: Collect calling, Psychic hotline, and any best of cds. There have been several times I've been happily watching some show only to be driven away by yet another frightening visage of carrot top, terry bradshaw or even sweet Alyssa Milano... and when I say driven away, I'm not talking about flipping during the commercials but simply turning off the tv.
So, I'd say it's not the consumer's "fault" for becoming desensitized to normal commercials. It is the advertisers fault for making ads which are so awful they actually drive viewers away. If you think about it, some of these ads are so awful they are actually lowering the ratings of the stations running them.
This was/is inevitable. All those spinning graphics during programs used to announce what is on next have just been leading the way. They get you used to seeing something other than the program you're watching on the screen. Once we've accepted them, the more invasive adverts will be more 'acceptable'.
Once again, big corporations in the USA are leading the world in customer abuse.
I have a solution if TV ads get too oppresive - I'm not going to buy a new HDTV model.
The whole point to HDTV is better quality television - well, the networks aren't going to give me that, so fuck 'em.
Let's see how the consumer electronics divisions of the media giants respond if - because of shitty ads - people do not upgrade televisions.
I was taking the PATH from Hoboken to 34th Street the other day, and as the train went into the tunnel and underwater, I of course stared off into space at the window across from me. A few seconds later, I started seeing an animated Target ad being played out in the window. I looked around confused for a second... then realized what they had done.
The train goes at a certain speed. Intervals were timed. They had created an animated advertisement, without sound, on the walls of the tunnel by spacing frames along the tracks. As the train passed at the given clip, the scenes animated themselves (optically of course).
I think that was the coolest and most creative advertising medium that I've seen in ages. I've debated getting onto the PATH just to see it again.
How effective is this really going to be? I can't see them using any more then a "beep" when a text ad pops up, but how many people are going to "read" text on their TV screen? People watch TV to be entertained, not to read. Thats also why commercials are more and more becoming a form of entertainment rather then some mundane "Buy product X from big monopoly corporation Y". Just look at the superbowl commercials for proof of entertaining commercials.
People get bored _very_ easily and I can't see placing a simple logo and some text at the bottom of the screen being very effective, people can easily ignore it. Now a 30second commercial that makes you roll on the floor laughing your ass off is about as effective of advertising as it gets. So much so that people will actually go out of their way to see your commercial. (ie: spending hours downloading them from the former adcritic.com?)
Open Source Time and Attendance, Job Costing a
Isn't the whole idea behind pop-up ads that they would be more effective if content-related? In Quake, you would strat from small arms pop-ups, going through more powerful stuff, all the way to those lovely smart missiles pop-ups.
How big is slashdot? I think the more important question is how many of us are Neilsen households. If we all switch the channel and NONE of us have a Neilsen box, it doesn't do them any good.
It will be an area of advertising akin to what was in Minority Report. For those who've seen it, you know what I'm tlaking about. For those who haven't, or have missed the dozen or so stories on /., the advertising in Minority Report was throughly invasive. Personalized advertisments in nearly every public place. "Hello John Anderton. Feel the freedom of the new Lexus!"
I recently saw a news blurb on CNN (no link, this was on CNN TV) that talked about using flipbook style pics to create "moving" picture advertisments on the walls of subways for when the trains go by.
They interviewed the riders, and do you know what most said? "I like the new ads," or "these new ads are great!" I say, what the hell is wrong with these people? I see a 6 ads on billboard on the way to work, I hear another 6 on the radio (this is a 10 minute drive!) and then when I get on the net at work I see many, many more. Then I go home. I see and hear more ads, and if I happen to turn on the TV, I get commercials.
I think that one reason companies that advertise on TV are getting less business is because people have learned to tune the ads out. I don't even need to mute the TV anymore. As soon as they cut to commercial breaks, I tune out. I will, likely, learn to tune out ads in corners very quickly. I still won't like it. But I get advertisments in many forms throughout the day, I tune every single one out. I'm personally getting sick of it, and I know it's affecting my personal perception. I know it just makes me ignore more and more things. *sigh*
Sorry for the long free flow rant. Just my thoughts on the issue. Later.
Well, how dare they try to recoup some of the incredible expense that they incur providing you with millions of hours of free entertainment. If the realities of, you know, capitalism conflict with your apparently formidable geek-TiVo pride, well my friend, that's just a pill you're going to have to swallow. You can either go the HBO route or watch some commercials. Either way, stop whining to /., and by extension, me, about it.
I think there is a world market for maybe five personal web logs.
Part of the problem is the deluge of commercial messages, which makes it harder for an ad to stand out.
Scene III: A corporate boardroom, with a large polished mahogany conference table, shaved glass "windows," and an espresso machine in the corner.
Big Boss: All right, Gentlemen, how are things looking in the advertising department?
Franklin: Well, Boss, our revenues have been down about 3% over the last quarter.
Jaspers: Sir, it seems that advertisers have seen the research, and they're not willing to pay as much for commercials when they know people are starting to ignore them. We've reached such a level of saturation that they ignore them even when they stay on, and between having 2000 channels and those darn Tivo boxes, they can skip or miss them if they want.
Franklin: Yes, yes, it would seem that after years and years of constant commercial barrages, people are adapting and learning to treat them as noise.
Big Boss lets out a deep "harumph" sound, his eyes narrow, and he steeples his hands in front of him. Franklin and Jaspers wait, uncertain and timid.
Big Boss: I've got the perfect solution. We'll put even MORE commercials in. That'll fix it! We'll make them show up twice as often, and that way people will notice them again.
Timid silence, followed by quick shallow nods and "Yes, sir!" "Brilliant, Sir" from our two flunkies. They jump up and exit stage right, pausing briefly for Jaspers to whisper to Franklin.
Jaspers: I don't think he knows what "saturated" means, but I'm not going to be the one to break it to him...
It seems to me that this is very similar to the problems we're having with the recording industry and MP3s.
Their business model has broken and they're trying vainly to simply patch it up by calling in the lawyers and copy-protection gurus instead of addressing the root cause -- lack of value for money.
The same goes with the free-to-air (FTA) ad-funded TV broadcast model. They're losing advertising revenues because technology (TiVo/ReplayTV) is marginalizing their business model. Like the recording industry, they're trying to patch up this shonky model by simply ramping up the intrusiveness of the advertising -- which will have entirely predictable results.
So... here's the solution:
Just as the Net allows MP3 music files created by independent recording artists to be distributed in high quality and at low cost, the use of DivX now allows indie TV producers the chance to get their programming out there at low cost.
Just look at how widely distributed and highly praised the indie 405 movie became thanks to its release on the Net.
Just as in the music industry, there are a lot of really talented producers, directors, actors and effects people out there who might gain significiant benefit when FTA TV finally pushes their luck too hard and really piss off viewers.
I'm sure that most of us would consider a subscription or short (30-60 second) advertisement at the start of each indie movie as a small price to pay in order to enjoy more of great stuff like this -- whilst thumbing our noses at the FTA networks and their lame business model.
The secret to success is realising that an obstacle in your path is simply the chance to climb up and gain a better vantage point.
Does anyone here know in what format those ads play? Does MPEG-2 support a transparent alpha channel? or do they use something else? What's used today in TV networkd?
I have been tv free since they screwed up discovery channel (about two years ago)
What did they do to the Discovery Channel?
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
When the tv industry, which has a history of being hyper-cautious about alienating viewers, is willing to do something this utterly annoying, it's very revealing. They must be pretty damn close to the end if they are desperate enough to pull crap like this.
Remember, television viewers are not customers, they are product. The television industry's customers are advertisers. You can pretty much convince human beings to buy crap, because we've been conditioned to spend money to raise our self esteem. But you can't do that with advertisers. They emotionlessly buy raw numbers of eyeballs.
Just as the banner ad business model didn't pan out on the web; now we have ads that march out in front of the content. After decades with little or no in-home media competition, television is finally facing the same problem with its banners. The sheer volume of alternatives is going to drive people away in both cases. It's an interesting time in history. Like the recording industry, TV is a sleeping giant, awakening to find that the nice cool ice it's been sleeping on has gotten too thin to stand on.
Self destructing big media. I like it!
This is a brilliant piece that someone posted on slashdot some months ago ... honestly I do not remember the author's identity.
I've been targeted right out of the market.
I've had it. I can't take any more advertising. Television, radio, magazines, billboards, even the Internet for Christ's sake. Everywhere. Why do they keep targeting me? I never did anything to them. I don't even buy anything! They're wasting their time! Fast food makes me feel like shit, soft drinks make me dizzy, candy is disgusting, chips make my stomach hurt, I don't smoke, and any band that has ever been advertised anywhere sucks unequivocally. I eat tortillas and vegetables, I drink tap water. I ride my $40 bike for entertainment. I buy a new pair of Dickies at the army navy store every year and I get all my other clothes at Costco in 3-packs. My car works fine, I use my Internet connection for long distance, I've had the same boots for three years and re-sole them when they wear out. As far as booze goes, well, as long as it's wet...
So why do they keep attacking me? Why are they filling every square inch of every available space in my life? Above urinals, on concert tickets, underneath the ice at hockey games, on blimps, in video games, as props in movies, plugs in rap songs, on shitty Web Sites (No, I will not visit your motherfucking sponsor. If you're not in it for the love, and you can't figure out any better way to pay for your site than by slapping some ugly, corrupted banner across the top of your pathetic work, then fucking close up shop, kill yourself, and leave the Web to non-polluters). They'd advertise on the backs of my eyelids if they could get away with it, and I can't hack it anymore. They win. I lose. They succeeded. I failed. Like Brian Wilson, I just wasn't built for these times. I fold. Here are all my cards. Keep the pot, keep my ante, keep the goddamn jacket on the back of my chair for all I care, I can get another at Costco. I'll be out in the parking lot getting drunk and yelling at cute girls because I can no longer stand the taste of tentacles. Marketing has poisoned everything worthwhile under the sun, so I'm giving it all up. Everything.
But the way I figure it, there's no real loss. I've seen all of the episodes of the Simpsons 200 times each. Most of the good writing was done 100 years ago. I haven't listened to FM radio in years. I could play all my records beginning to end alphabetically and I'd be 76 years old when I got to the Zeni Geva. Online culture is a fucking yawn, only good for buying stuffed goats on Ebay and getting cracked copies of $1000 software. Movies always end up at the 99 cent video store across the street eventually, and you can fast forward through those commercials. My girlie's cute and the corner bar has Pabst on tap. What else matters?
True, by shutting myself off to everything, I'm probably limiting my future potential as a 'community building' or 'bleeding edge' cog in someone's nightmarish vision of Internet profitability, but fuck, a simple read through my writing should've cured that anyway (Note to potential employers: The bidding starts at $120,000 a year with full dental).
So I'm out. No more.
I just feel bad for those of you I'm leaving behind. You'll be wearing your Slave Labor Nikes, sweating under a Third World Vest, listening to Everqueer or Fratboy Slim, your hair styled stupidly with gasoline and aborted pig placentas, trying to choke down a Double Meat Fuck Splattered Cow Testicles On The Slaughterhouse Floor Pus Coagulated Lactacious Secretion Yellow Dye #2 Deluxe. Man, will you be looking dumb. It makes me want to cry. You poor, oversugared demographic you. You're filling your apartments, your bodies, and your minds with useless junk. You stagger under your own weight, throwing money in random directions until you collapse and die, buried by a bunch of people who you failed to create meaningful human bonds with, who forget about you on the way home from the funeral.
Maybe I'm just oversensitive, but I actually feel those fingers reaching out at me - cute little girl fingers, feeling at my face like a bind man, pulling at the loose threads all over my brain, trying to find a sensitive one, one that tweaks me. Desires to be successful, attractive to the opposite sex, spiritually satiated, or conversely, the fears of disease, dismemberment, of being outcast, of repressed homosexual desires. Herd mentality as dictated by herd mentality. A gas mask of soiled wool, worn in a steaming shower of chlorinated pond water. A lumbering culture created by profit motive, existing as window dressing to disguise the brutal cynicism of the architects, the brassy checks and balances of accountants bleating commands to the flunky tastemakers on the production line. The subversion of anything subverting. The conversion of something dangerous into something profitable. The gutting of the lion and the championing of the taxidermist. And the puffy vests, my god, the puffy vests....
I give it one more shot.
I hit that little "on" button, and immediately this little red dot appears on my forehead. I feel the barrel rising on the other side of the glass as some powersuited executive attempts to get me in his sights. His scope is the best money can buy, but my nausea and skittishness mark me as difficult prey. I make a sprawling leap over a pile of books, spilling a glass of wine and sending my cats scattering. The TV takes a shot at me. It misses, but after the smoke clears, there's a shimmering can of Pepsi on the coffee table, seductively held by a well manicured (but severed) hand. Then the Taco Bell dog is outside, scratching at my window, singing "That's Amore", the secret code that alerts Col. Sanders and Ronald McDonald to get their tumor inducing grease guns at the ready. "We have a resistor! Alert Cap'n Crunch and Mrs. Butterworth. Tell Hogan to pull that Subaru around!" And then, as the entire posse of 1-800-COLLECT goons attempt to joke their way through the front door, a helmeted uberyouth does a backflip on rollerblades against the window, almost crushing the Taco dog, thankfully getting tangled in the iron jungle of security bars designed for such a moment. The severed Pepsi hand launches itself across the room onto the stereo, turns it to HOTROCK 99.5 FM and starts dancing suggestively on the turntable. Warm, gooey songs ooze from the speakers, blurring the lines between commercial and product, product and art. The walls are running with honey, blood, and Gatorade. Limp Bizkit tries to sign me up for the Rap Metal MasterCard, but is outvolumed by a chorus of creepy NY Gap models, dead eyed and Children of the Damned style, singing nostalgic 80s songs with cool detachment, trying to sell me vests. Close inspection reveals UPC codes on the backs of their beautiful necks and a legion of bulimic girls behind them, mascara mixing with puke on ten thousand toilet bowls. Budweiser frogs are crawling out of the toilet bowls. A one-eyed, mutilated Asian girl holds a pair of new Levi's against the window with a thin, purple arm and starts screeching "It's a Small World After All" at the top of her lungs. Magic, The Old Navy dog, is sniffing butts with the Taco Bell dog, who had since bit the Asian girl on the leg and now yelling something about Gordidas. A waifish beauty suddenly appears on my bed, vying for my attention, trying to talk me into a new car, her hand slowly unbuttoning her blouse, batting her doe-ishly brown eyes, "C'mon Mark. It's only a test drive. No one ever has to know."
Realizing my one escape, I yank my battered wallet out of my back pocket and pull out a twenty dollar bill. The entire scene freezes. All eyes are transfixed to the damp, smelly piece of paper. Andrew Jackson snickers and you can almost smell the cannibalized Indian on his breath. A miraculous cross breeze flows through my apartment, and I let the money go. It catches an upward draft, a hot air thermal, and is gone out the window.
And then, something even stranger happens. The spokespeople, animals, models, body parts, and corporate whores all disappear in a anti-climactic 'puff' of yellow smoke, leaving a slight smell of perfumed intestine twisting through the air. My twenty freezes in mid flight about thirty feet above the ground. A helicopter drops out of the sky, and lowers a rope down to the cash. A man in a business suit slides down the rope, commando style, and captures the money in his mouth, gives a contemptuous snort, mumbling something like "sucker" under his breath. And then the helicopter is gone, vanishing somewhere behind the radio towers spiking the top of Queen Anne Hill. Everything is quiet again.
I didn't just turn that TV off. I unplugged the motherfucker.
You're right that there is some good stuff on TV, but I think that misses the point the original poster was making. I technically have a TV, but not cable so it's almost the same thing as far as I'm concerned. (HHOS) I think he was trying to say that if you miss a few episodes of the Simpsons, it will be ok.
My wife made a good point about this a while back. If I spend an hour or an evening watching TV, I can almost never remember what I did with that day. However if I work on the house, read something (even slashdot), workout, or go to a nice resturant, I remember it much more vividly. I'm not wonderful for watching very little TV, but I do get a heck of a lot more done. I think my life is more full when TV is an activity I choose rather than the default. YMMV.
Besides, when I watch I have a hard time turning it off, even if there is nothing on. Channel surfing is addictive.
cant proove you guilty so harras you until you pay up.
Isnt the license for any equipment capable of receiving broadcast tv?
Thats besides the point though. The BBC do advertsie - about 5-10 minutes an hour of bbc adverts (radio times, bbc programs, radio programs, idents), and the digital channels have logos all the time.
Let them charge subscription fees then! Just imagine - instead of the airwaves being loaded with whatever junk the networks have to air, they'd have to be filled with things people are willing to pay for!
In a free market and society, voids will be filled. Unless the media companies step up and offer what the people actually want, others will continue to provide it. And, it seems clear that people want to avoid advertising, so they'd better look to profit from it, before they lose money because of it.
We get free tv which is funded by the license fee (BBC), or adverts (ITV, C4, C5, handful of digital channels).
To get more channels you can pay more money.
I say we all sign a pact in blood swearing never to buy any product advertized in a pop-up ad! Moreover, write snail-mail to the companies that advertize in this way explaining why they just lost you as a customer. See how long that shit lasts...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I don't have a Tivo, but I do have a little proxy that removes all the ads from the Internet for me. It's great. But here's the thing, I readily admit that if everyone used this tool, the free Internet would die. Right now it's all based on ad money, and if the advertisers recognize that nobody can even see their ad, they're simply going to stop paying for that style of ad.
Now, you've all been so gung-ho about Tivos, about how great it is that you don't see ads anymore (along with all the other totally unmissable features). That's great for you, but you have to recognize that as soon as advertizers sense that you're not watching the ads anymore, they're going to either pull the funding away from television, or make the ads more irritating.
Is anybody actually surprised that this is happening? You're pushing us towards a future where we can either pay for ad-free premium channels, or ad-ful cheapers channels. The Tivo removal of ads isn't a long term solution, you're only making the long term situation much more gloomy. Admit to yourselves that you're either killing the industry that you love, or you're creating a profit environment where they're forced to annoy you with more and more aggressive ads.
It's not their fault that the ads have to get more intrusive, it's yours. Stop whining about it.
--
RumorsDaily
http://www.blindwino.com/driverjunk15.html
"Break out the gin, and the small violin, I'm a raging success as a failure." --Firewater
I'll take a piece of duct tape and tape it to the screen just so it covers the bottom 1/4 where the ads are. So there.
Say for example that the ads take up the bottom 15% of the screen. Would the solution then be to alter one's television to only show the top 85% of the screen? You could choose between stretching the remaining image to fit the screen, just blacking out the ads, or even replacing the ads with anything you want. (Personally, I could go for a Zombocom banner)
I doubt it would be hard to hack TV card drivers so that they would do this. How difficult and expensive would it be to do this to a normal TV?
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
Bwahahahaha. I threw my TV set out years ago.
Advertising doesn't work above a certain level of exposure.
Its called saturation.
For a while, the audience efforts to reduce the ambient noise, the ads, got more effective.
VCRs, Tivo, channel hopping, Zappers etcetera have saved commercial TV from exceeding the saturation point for years. But now the advertisers are becoming more desperate and more strident.
Attempting to increase the time per pair of eyeballs becomes counter productive and people will turn to any channel with fewer ads and more content. As long as they can that is...
People go to sports events because there's fewer ads and interruptions for non-content.
My tolerance for BS, uh, ads was merely lower than most people's but I think that when the ads and obvious product placement in the content exceeds 30% of the on-air time, people are just going to stop and read a book or go play outside or talk to each other or maybe NOT talk. (Mariages are going to either be ruined or a lot more fuckin' fun.)
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
I agree -- most ads are cheap crap that are overplayed to the point where they're probably right up there with Chinese water torture in terms of their effect on the human mind.
Maybe if advertisers and the creative teams they employed got of their fat backsides and actually created some stuff worth watching then they'd find that the terms "ad break" and "change channels" weren't so intimately linked in the consumer's mind.
Most Slash-dot users are probably too young to remember the Dinah Shore show on TV when it was sponsored by "The Chevrolette Dealers of America" -- but this is a great example of how advertisers and content can be blended to the benefit of both.
Imagine for a moment -- "The Nike Seinfeld Show", or maybe "The Coca Cola That 70's show."
Of course asking a single sponsor to pay for the equivalent of all that ad-time would be a bit steep and represent poor value -- but ask yourself exactly why advertising costs so much anyway...
Why on earth is anyone (even Jerry Sienfeld) worth more than a couple of thousand bucks an episode? Isn't it about time these "stars" realized that the future of their medium might just be in jeopardy unless they're prepared to take a pay-cut that puts them back in "the real world."
Back in the 1960's, Chevrolette could afford to sponsor an entire show because Dinah Shore got paid a "fair" wage for what she did. The advertising was intrinsic to the program -- even the show's theme was a song that included the words "see the USA in your Chevrolette..."
When you have actors asking for, and getting, tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars per episode (or more) then it's no wonder the ad-funded model no longer works.
This is all too much like the music industry where someone (not always the artist) is charging far too much for the services they're providing.
If everyone starts thinking "moderation" then maybe those halcyon days when an entire program could be sponsored by a single advertiser without the need for endless ad-breaks or pop-ups could return.
That isn't much worse than those stupid animated CG prehistoric creatures that the Discovery channel ran along the bottom of the screen to advertise their show about... umm... stupid CG prehistoric creatures.
The already annoying network logo at the bottom of the screen has increasingly been replaced with more and more ads for coming attractions.
Pop-ups for 3rd party products are just a natural evolutionary step.
So, ya'gotta ask, why are we paying for cable? Certainly not the clean picture and reliable reception; at least not with Cox (Fairfax County, VA) anyway. I guess if you want to escape the crap, you have to pay for premium cable (HBO, Cinemax, etc.). I don't know because we don't have 'em. Come to think of it... the only reason I watch TV at all is because I don't pay for cable. I moved back with the folks, and well... the cable is there like free booze for an alcoholic. When I was on my own, I listened to NPR, read books, and fiddled with the computer a lot more. We didn't even have a TV.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Of course, most people don't have anything other to occupy their time these days anyway, so they might as well watch their programming in all of it's purely marketing glory.
Heh, did anyone else see Minority Report? What brilliant irony, a film with tons of stuff showing how scary, invasive, and annoying advertising could become, is a film laced with product placement from beginning to end...
How long till the moon has a Pepsi or a Nike logo staring down at all of us. We the people, we the consumers.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
If you don't like the advertising you find on _commercial_ television you don't have to watch it. Noone is forcing you to watch Oprah. Noone is holding your head, peeling your eyelids back, forcing you to watch re-runs of "The Antiques Road Show" or any other of cable's lovely programming. Personally, I can't stand television. Reason: you can only do a few things while watching television. You can eat. You can drink. You can waste your life away hour after hour doing nothing particularly useful or even really all that entertaining. And of course, most importantly, you can be spoon fed all of the social engineering bullshit that television stations try to cram down your throat, letting you know what you should be thinking about certain ideas. No, you need not bring your own thoughts to the table if you are going to watch television.("noone in particular" have mercy on your soul if you actually get your news from TV...)
For all of you who like to watch television, I have a book for you: "Fahrenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury. If you couldn't locate the public library if it was up your ass on fire, here is a web site for you:
http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/
If all else fails, consider getting off the couch and going for a walk. You might even consider showing some affection to your significant other. Whatever you do, know that the sooner you turn off the TV forever, the sooner life gets better for you.
Russian Russian Russian RussianDollSig DollSig DollSig DollSig
I still download the shows I like to watch, but I find that the small amount of trouble I go through to obtain the various episodes online is worth the effort to 1: avoid all commercials, and 2: get a clear picture. I don't have cable/sat, and from the amount of TV I watch, there's clearly no reason to waste my money on either.
Remember, advertising is only effective so long as its not annoying. People are used to the typical commercial break. Those are annoying in their own way, but they do give people the opportunity to hit the bathroom or grab a bite to eat. Popups will probably be about as well received as they are on websites. I've found myself consciously avoiding sites that have popup ads, or even worse those ads that obstruct the page content. Yes, I realize there are browsers that eliminate both these "features", but I'd rather vote with my eyeballs by denying those sites the hits.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
When I stop watching TV all together, and the sales plummit and all the big annoying businesses go out of business. What will happen then?
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
"Just how many people actually tune in to watch a second-rate sequel that's seven years old on a second-rate cable network?"
I don't see a quick and easy way to get those particular ratings, but over 2.5 million people tuned in to WTBS last Sunday night to watch
- Austin Powers
so if even 1/10th of that number watched- Father of the Bride
, and if only 1% of the unhappy people actually complain (rather than your estimate of 10%, just to be pessimistic) then I think all practical people would call TNTs little experiment a success.I'm not saying I like it. I'm just lending you another perspective. Your other point about entertaining ads is also a good one, but there is a caveat: many entertaining ads get watched, and remembered, but the watchers can't remember what the product or brand was. I'm getting getting off on a bit of a tangent here, but come along anyways. IT IS VERY VERY HARD TO MEASURE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF ADVERTISING. There are all kinds of different goals: build brand awareness, build product awareness, improve brand image, improve product loyalty, etc. Sometimes when you catch the consumer at just the right time, you can make a lifelong impression, particularly on young people. When I was a young teenager, Diet Coke ran a "just for the taste of it" campaign for a while with gorgeous visuals of hot chicks, and cars, and jets swooping, and catchy music I can still remember vividly, and for a time it made me think Diet Coke was "cool." And so I drank Diet Coke over all other soft drinks for the next 15 years. No practical amount of market research is going to clearly protray something like that, so TV execs, and ad firms, need to convice advertisers that stories like that really happen and justify $100,000 for 30 seconds, or whatever the ad rates are. Another quick one, when Energizer came out with the pink Energizer Bunny campaign, it was a huge success by some measurements: most people recognized the Bunny after only a little exposure to the ad, and could correctly identify the product behind it. But there was NO EVIDENCE that it made people any more likely to buy Energizer batteries. Is that a success or a failure? Well they cancelled the campaigne for a long time, and then they brought it back, so its a matter of opinion obviously. Will pop-up ads work? Thats a matter of opinion too, but in the face of falling ad revenues, TV execs are willing to try anything.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
With the Cartoon Network starting their "Adult Swim" bloc of animation, I was hoping that maybe the WB and MGM cartoons that CN has on its "banned list" might resurface. Unfortunately CN doesn't have the cojones to do it. So nobody gets to see amazing cartoons like "Coal Black And De Sebben Dwarves", "Tin Pan Alley Cats" and "Blitz Wolf" because they're not politically correct.
Some Bugs Bunny cartoons like "Bugs Bunny Nips The Nips" and "All This And Rabbit Stew" are on the "banned list" which meant that in 2000, when the pre-1948 WB cartoons and the 1948-on WB cartoons were "reunited" as AOL Time Warner properties, they couldn't air all the Bugs Bunny cartoons on June Bugs like they originally wanted to.
This crap also goes on with newer cartoons too. The incredibly good animated series "Daria" finished its run on MTV this year, and is now being aired on "The N" which is what Noggin calls itself after 5pm.
Now, Noggin is a joint partnership between MTV Networks' Nickelodeon channel and the Childrens' Television Workshop, best known for Sesame Street. This means that a lot of stuff gets cut from "Daria". So much so that some episodes get turned into meaningless mush after the schoolmarm censors get done with it. There are also episodes that will not air on The N.
At least I have my tapes of the episodes as they originally aired. [sigh]
I hate censorship.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
Actually Max Headroom is more apropos to modern media than it was back when it first aired. It won't be long until the networks, the RIAA and the MPAA run things for real, all TV sets lose their on/off switches, and they put TV sets in alleys so that homeless people can watch. Why, there even is a computerized talking head that reads the news! 20 minutes into the future? More like 20 seconds now...
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
Its called saturation.
Well, one less pair of eyeballs will be glued to the screen. When are these yahoos gonna get it? Too much is too much, it just gets tuned out. Like the surf at the beach, after a few minutes, you just don't hear it anymore.
Some friends of mine asked when I was gonna but a HDTV. Told 'em, when my current set stops working, I won't worry about buying a new one, 'cause I only watch about 30 minutes a week as it is. I can't see shelling out tons of bucks for watching ads.
Did any one read merchanters(sp) war? It was about a future world, where products like Coke and Pepsi hooked you, and you could go to jail for not watching enough ads. Spooky.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
It's funny the way an ad can grab your attention in a way the advertisers didn't intend. There some brand of bottled water that has a really spiffy effect in their ads. A bottle of water has all these different types of athletes swimming around in it and is dripping on to some flat surface. The athletes spring up from the water droplets and bike, run, climb off or whatever.
It's a really neat effect. I don't remember and could care less which brand of bottled water it was for. They're lucky I even remembered it was for bottled water. It won't induce me to buy anything but you know....that was a neat special effect!
Citizens of the "United States of Mexico" are commonly called "Mexicans" just as citizens of the United States of America are commonly called Americans.
Someone who lives in North America may be called "North American" and someone who lives in South America may be called "South American."
There is no continent called "America", although North and South America are often referred to collectively as "The Americas."
References:
- World Atlas
- World Atlas 2000
- The Continents
- Continents of the World
- World Facts and Figures
Now can we please just accept that Americans are Americans? Those that persist with this "Americans is everyone in the western hemisphere" line are just people with an axe to grind and are trying to take away part of Americans' identity by making it politically incorrect to call yourself American.Get over it.
Haven't you realized that there are other forms of entertainment?
Cheap ones, too.
I mean, real cheap. Masturbation, for example is real cheap, like free (as in free beer).
You just fantasize about some hot chick (or guy - all the tastes are in nature), then pop-out your boner, then just whip it 'till it creams.
No fuss, no bills, just a bit of jizz!!!
The silly translucent station logos are bad enough, as is squishing the credits to unreadability, and the line of text that pops up at the bottom to continue a commercial break a little longer for the station is starting to cross the line, but if they really start interfering with the show itself, I'll turn it off and wait for it to come out on DVD and watch it then. I don't mind non-intrusive product placement, but what they really need to do is make commercials worth watching. I wish I had a Tivo when Tasters Choice was running their serial commercial, as I missed several of them, and I don't like coffee! But I'd rather start paying directly for my tv shows, or do without entirely, than put up with intrusive advertising.
I grew up frequently finding the television as my babysitter. It's a very hard habit to kick. I've realized that when we have children that it will probably be best for them to seriously limit the amount of TV time. This is going to be a very difficult change for me because I've long been in the habit of mindlessly watching TV.
The problem in giving up television is that as soon as you turn the TV off you have to come up with something to do. If one had gotten in the habit of always watching television when there is nothing to do, it becomes difficult to come up with things to do even. So it become easier to just go back to watching television. Not sure what the best approach is to this. Sometimes I've had some success but I eventually seem to fall back into my bad habits.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
Or at the very least, a pay version of TV WITH NO ADS will arise.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Hell... why even show the TV shows? Why not just show the fscking ads 24/7?
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Conversely, if the media companies made the shows more entertaining you probably would be more hesitant to change the channel in case you missed something. How often do you change the channel only to come back to the first show a little too late? Probably a lot, it happens to everyone.
This doesn't mean that the ads on the first station weren't entertaining enough. What this means is that the content of the show is so unimportant to the viewer as to make avoiding ads more important than anything, even at the risk of missing the show itself.
Think about die-hard fans wathcing their favorite show, or when your favorite movie is on, or it's the Superbowl (etc.), see if any one of those viewers is willing to change the channel. Not at all, they're afraid of missing anything.
I think the real lesson here is that people care a lot less about Friends than the execs all think we do. If we cared about the stuff they were putting on tv then we'd be willing to watch the ads in anticipation of the show, just the way interstitials were meant to work in the first place.
After the initial amusement wore off, I started thinking more about it. Look, I think *all* of us grow tired of all the advertising out there. It might make the author feel self-important to act as though he's the lone dissenter to advertising - but it's just not so. Still, it's not wise to equate advertising with modern culture.
"Pop culture" is a sort of glue that holds us together and helps us make bonds/relationships with others. When you want to strike up a conversation with someone new, you start looking for "common ground". It really does you no good to break into a big discussion on an obscure topic the other party has no previous knowledge of. They'll get bored and walk away. Communications is a 2-way street. You listen and respond, listen and respond.
You can go on attacking popular music ("Fratboy Slim" as you prefer calling him, or "Everqueer"), or lambast the latest Hollywood movie productions and TV series. Whatever floats your boat. Still, it doesn't change the fact that all of these little blips on life's "radar" provide common experiences that people can relate to and talk about in daily life.
Useless junk? Well, sure it is. All entertainment could be classified that way. Sports too, and drinking for pleasure. Humans need breaks. We can't *always* be doing "productive" things. We need some down-time, and some plain old "fun time" to recharge our bodies and minds.
Fast food exists primarily because it's inexpensive + convenient. If McDonalds never ran a television ad again - do you think they'd go away? Doubtful - although they might not like having less opportunity to remind you that they're a breakfast/lunch/dinner option. People would still go there and eat their processed foods. People's tendencies to eat this sort of unhealthy fare are much more complex than mindless brainwashing by commercials. If you think otherwise, I'm afraid you sell all of us short.
...because the day I see one of these ads, i will pawn my telivison set.
If I was a television show producer, and I had a contract with a major network to run a season of my show, I would put in the contract that they must run each episode in it's entirty. Then when one of these ads pops-up, sue the broadcaster for breach of contract because it obscured the episode. Same with the stupid channel logo at the lower right hand side.
The Discovery Channel has been doing this crap for months now and it pisses me off. Showing big stupid animations about Nigel Marvin or Monster Garage (which would be a great show if they didn't do those retarded fake races at the end.)
Not only that, but the ads will run during relevant portions of the programming (see a guy shaving in the mirror, get a pop-up ad from a razor company).
GREAT! Most of what I watch is Sci-Fi, so I can't wait to start getting pop-up ads for teleportation devices, Phase III blasters, and vacations to galaxies far, far away!
You're right, but quality is still mostly subjective.
I only watch a very few shows that I don't want to miss coming out of commercial so I'd know to stay put:
Everything else on TV is crap. Wish I could pay only for those 4... er... 3... channels, instead of the 600 compressed-to-shit channels TW bundles with their digital cable.
--
Power to the Peaceful
Suppose Germany didn't have a proper name and Germans should call themselves 'Europeans'. Or the Japanese called themselves 'Asians'. How would that be "Insightful"?
at those who are up in arms about this. TV is mostly shitty, it's not forced on you, and yet it still defines reality for most people by selectively pushing ways of thought that stimulate the libido, and leaving out specific ways of life and thought and break the status quo. Those of you who think I'm full of shit and don't believe that TV is a brainwashing tool are brainwashed. There are infinite things to do in this life. I hope you aren't pulled into a vortex of despair when you find out you spent most of it in front of a glowing brainwashing box.
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie
I would just simply not watch a show with commercials on at the same time. There are just so few shows worth seeing these days that I will just revert to watching DVDs. But then again, they will probably fuck that up too and have commercials on there as well. Already happened on my The Fast and the Furious DVD (which pissed me off to no end).
I must start wondering if commercials don't work anymore or something. I atleast start to really *HATE* the irritating companies behind the commercials.
The funny thing is, the United States constitution is the same way, 'cept it is extremely fair and doesn't work remarkably well.
If what you are reading sounds funny, or sarcastic, lame, or stupid
it is because it is supposed to be. just laugh
It just makes me want to hug the TV licence fee ~$160 per year. This gives me 8 TV channels with no ad breaks - whole uninterrupted movies.
Just imagine a whole evening's viewing without anything allegedly washing whiter.
The UK TV licence, you can't justify it but by gum it works!
When I told this to my co-workers, one of them said her son watches dragonball z, and they recently started to put a 25% of the screen border around the show. What does this border display? Why, commercials of course.
Now, I do not own a TV myself, so I cannot verify this (Who can?). But I can tell you people one thing: I am SO glad I tossed mine out a long time ago.
"I'll just do such-and-such and yeah, that'll screw 'em!", here's a wake up call.
Are you in one of the 5,000 households with a Neilsen People Meter? Or failing that, are you in the "sweeps"?
No?
Then your opinion means absolutely nothing. Nil. Zilch. Nada. Zip. Nobody cares if you switch off your TV and go and frolic in the great outdoors. Nobody that matters will ever know, and nobody will change what they're doing because of your actions.
Are we all clear on that now?
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
I think I've been quite successful not to watch commercials for two years. I got rid of my TV set. Actually it broke and I didn't replace it.
These days I watch movies and my favourite sci-fi series DVDs on my computer which has pretty good stuff attached to secure comfortable viewing of such media.
Look ma, no in-between-ads!
News you ask? I get plenty of that at work. Working in a newspaper has its advantages...
I see people say complaining about video games and saying how they better not touch them with adverts.. but how many of you would rather the main character in a game ... lets say duke nukem ...break into a bar, shoot some pigs up, then afterwards look around the room seeing the bartender shaking in his boots.. then hear duke say "gimme a shot of tequila". I'd rather he say "gimme some jose cuervo". and he drinks it and moves on.. simple nonchalant advertising in video games make them a tad more real and more fun knowing that he's drinkin a coke and not a soft drink or a "cuke" (like sorny or panaphonic)
I just hope we're not forced to see ads during load times one day.
I have thought for YEARS that breakfast TV should have ads in the lower quarter of the screen, INSTEAD of ad breaks. How annoying is it to rely on the 'clock on the telly' all morning, only to have it disappear every now and then for some damn ads!
Having the ads scrolling / running at the foot of the screen would be cool - not in something like the simpsons, but in most crap it'll be fine!
About the only thing I watch on TV are movie channels, the history channel, and the Sci-Fi channel. I don't give a rat's ass whether NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox, WB, and UPN fill 59 out of every 60 seconds with pure advertising. I don't waste my time watching their crap anyway.
About the only thing that is going to result from this is that the channels that DON'T piss off their viewers are the ones that people are going to watch, even if the actual quality of their programming is inferior. Of course I don't expect television execs to understand this, but then again I really don't care. Television is one of those activities that I spend the least ammount of time doing. If it were to diappear off the face of the earth I don't think I'd miss much.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
I am inside the advertising business.. Yes, I am sitting in the dark side.... please, pray for my soul...
First, advertising is designed to crank up the satuiration until you see a revinue drop because you hit that saturation point. the ENTIRE business plan behind advertising and marketing it to saturate it and saturate it hard until you just hit that "the customer is gonna puke" point then you back off a teeny bit.
You are right, they will attempt to wring every dime out of it. Ameritech is already advertising during the ringing if the person you call doesnt pick up after 3 rings... (3rings, "Hello, the person you are calling isnt answering, would you like to pay us for some really neat features that will notify them that you called, or notify you when they return and use their phone? only $1.99 per use! press Pound to hear more..." rining continues.. "Pepsi commercial starts...")
If you want to know where our world is heading in regards to media, watch max-headroom.... it is really really damned close. Orwell and his 1984 is all wrong, the govt is not who you need to fear, it's the corperations....
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
1. The only way to keep information free [beer/speech] is to support web content with advertising.
2. The Internet is collapsing because web advertisers won't pay site owners.
3. The web advertising market collapsed because the ads are too easy to ignore.
4. Intrusive advertising is annoying and should be stopped.
5. Go back to step 1.
If ads begin obscuring a show I watch, I will stop watching it. I don't watch ST:TNG anymore due to the awful squish-o-vision the network employs to squeeze crap in at the bottom. If it happens to anything I value watching (ie, the stuff I got cable for) I will cancel my cable subscription.
I don't watch much TV, and I skip over the ads of what I do watch with my Tivo. Ad-free TV has been nice, and I'd even be willing to pay for the shows I enjoy (one at a time-- I'm not paying for all the crap to get a few good shows a la cable), but if the options are ad-covered, distorted-aspect-ratio crap or nothing, nothing wins hands down.
SuperBowl...? Everyone watches the commercials. The execs think "everyone will be watching, we have to make this good" the consumers are saying "this will be good, therefore we will watch."
How about those "Funniest Commericals" television shows where all the content is funny commecials. How about those small clips passed around in email?
If a commerical is well done and entertaining, it will get viewer following -- and the product will stick. If it's just annoying in-your-face product announcement, people can (and will) move on.
In past stories about PVRs, slashdot posters always got modded way up for saying something along the lines of:
"It's not my fault the TV networks' business model is obsolete. If I want to skip commercials I will and if the networks don't like it they should stop whining and come up with a better business model."
Well, here's that better business model you asked for. If you don't like it, stop whining and come up with a better PVR!
Some of us have this thing called a government. You see, you can't just run a TV station whenever you like to - you gotta get a licence. And the public have a say in the licence. It is called democracy. It works like this. TV company decides to put ads inside programs. TV station licencing authority say "no you don't" and revoke TV station licence. TV station realises that ads inside programs is NOT a good idea, because they no longer have a business.
It is just a matter of deciding whether the public or the TV companies run the government. If the TV companies run the government, then you DON'T have a democracy - if you do have a democracy, why can't you revoke their licences until they behave themselves?
I am anarch of all I survey.
Don't the people making these commercials and pushing this crap go home and sit down to watch TV and hate the commercials just as much as you and I? Can someone explain why humans do stuff like this to other humans, much less themselves?
Aren't these folks retaining some semblence of human-ness? It's like, if you piss in the pool it's messed up for YOU too.. not just the other people in the pool.
I guess I just don't get it.
Vortran out
Knowledge is like ignorance.. too much can be just as bad as not enough.
Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family, Choose a fucking big television, Choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players, and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol and dental insurance. Choose fixed-interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisure wear and matching luggage. Choose a three piece suite on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing sprit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing you last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked-up brats you have spawned to replace yourself. Choose your future. Choose life. People think it's all about misery and desperation and death and all that shite, which is not to be ignored, but what they forget - is the pleasure of it. Otherwise we wouldn't do it. After all, we're not fucking stupid.
But they do, at least as far as I can tell as a non tv watcher listening to the occasional conversations at work. Sometimes they'll talk about what happened in some show, but quite often conversation is about the funnier ads. It's amazing how long those impressions can last.
For example, I missed the guy who's not a doctor, but plays one on TV (and then apparantly goes on to prescribe whatever medication is being pitched).
I also missed the old woman who fell over and couldn't get up.
Now I did catch the superbowl a few years ago when some friends were having a superbowl watching party... and guess what everyone was really interested in watching? A lot were for dot-coms back then.
There are so many more, but not having seen them I really don't pay much attention to the conversations.
PJRC: Electronic Projects, 8051 Microcontroller Tools
Great! Glad you're here. Do you watch TV? Forget about ABC for a second.. how do you feel about this as a regular human being (guy/gal) at home sitting down to watch a little TV (e.g. your favorite show) and having pop-up ads?
Do you, as a human Joe, ignore commercials?
How do you think the rest of the folks watching feel about that? Why would you do something (put in pop-ups on TV) to us that you yourself presumably would detest? Doesn't the Golden Rule have any relevance whatsoever anymore?
To be honest.. and maybe I'm just a weirdo.. I actually try to patronize the sponsors of my favorite shows. Precious lot of good that did for the X-Files and Star Trek: Voyager.. but hey, I tried.
Vortran out
Knowledge is like ignorance.. too much can be just as bad as not enough.
When I tell most people this, their eyes pop out of their heads as they realize that a large portion of their daily lives have no meaning to me. "No, I have no idea what happened on Buffy last week." They take it as a value statement. It's like I'm saying "You suck." Actually I like most of you, it's TV that sucks.
The average person (in the US) spends 4 hours watching TV a day, but there are real reasons to keep watching:
* Connection to others. TV creates social connections, even between people with little else in common. Feeling 'out of touch' with others would then require you to find other social connections.
* Communication to the masses. Corporations and Governments use TV as a way to send out their messages to mass populations. You might miss the important messages from these organizations if you didn't watch.
* Introduction to new products. Often TV is used to launch new products and services to major markets. How would you knew a new product was introduced if you didn't watch TV?
* It occupies your time. It fills an average of 28 hours a week. If you eliminated it, you'd be force to do something else with that time.
So when commercials are increased on Public TV (and cable too, you actually pay to watch those commercials), I don't worry. It's a balance issue. The commercials need to pay for the air time, staff, actors, equipment... well basically everything in the broadcasters budget. Billions and billions of dollars. If advertising doesn't work to make the advertisers the money back (plus profit) then they have do something else.
The question you should be asking yourself, however, is 'how well do advertisements work?' When a corporation is willing to pay billions of dollars to get ad space, they are getting a return on that investment. You are buying that product... when they advertise to you on TV. Do you remember making that choice?
Cheers.
"...placement and the 30 second commercial spot are not getting the respect they deserves from us consumers"
Awww... Are profits down? People aren't paying attention to their already intrusive ads? Gee, imagine that. As if interupting your favorite show with 2-5 minutes worth of commercials weren't enough. Or those banners at the bottom of the screens. But pop-ups? I'm picturing MTV-style factoids popping up like the videos...
"Lara!!! He's dead!"
"No! That can't be!!"
"Maybe you should sit down..."
POP! *Buy Sealy chairs and matteresses from Furniture Direct and save 50%*
"Are... Are you sure it was him?"
"Yes, Lara... I'd recognize that sport coat anywhere."
POP! *Mens sports wear at everyday low prices from Jackson's Supply*
I'd like to think no self respecting network would impliment this, but who am I kidding...?
You need a FREE iPod Nano
"How did he die John? How!?"
"It looks like he was shot to death... Probably a drive-by, Lara..."
POP! *Glock semi-automatic 9mm pistols, ammunition and parts availible at Al's Guns and Supply!*
Sorry. I had ta ^__^
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Slashdot lets its readers choose whether to get ads, or pay directly. TNT's viewers are not given that choice.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
If you won't eat it, we'll force it down your throat! Some guy at Time-Warner recently said that the average American would pay $250 a year to get the kind of programming they do now for free without the adds. That's a little over $20 a month, about the same as an AOL account. Where do I sign up?
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
I bought a new Sony Vvega and it's never shown a Commercial (really) since I've owned it.
It doesn't get HBO, or even the local channels. It doesn't get anything but Playstation 2, XBox, Gamecube, Dreamcast, N64, Saturn, Turbo Graphics 16, SNES, Genesis -- and -- uh -- sometimes my Laptop.
So, you see, my television doesn't really show commercials, unless you count the radio commercials in Grand Theft Auto 3.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Typical American. No knowledge of geography ;) The proper name for Mexico is United Mexican States, not United States of Mexico (subtle semantic difference, not just word order difference). Calling it the United States of Mexico is like calling the United Arab Emirates the United Emirates of Arabia. Under your logic, citizens of the United States of America and Americans, and citizens of the United Mexican States are Statesians.
PS> I think the 'american' moniker is fine. It's not like anybody else wants it anyway...
PS> Sorry for that crack. I couldn't help myself. I was on a roll. You know you were thinking it!
Frankly, as anybody from the Indian subcontinent knows, every single "race" box in the U.S. lumps Indians under "Asian or Pacific Islander." As if the whole Red-Indian Brown-Indian thing wasn't bad enough. If Americans have to take a little semantic pain, then they should get used to it. It happens to everybody else all the time. If the Irish people in the UK can deal with everybody calling their country England all the time, than anyone can live with slightly inaccurate moniker.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
Actually that episode was originally called "The F Word"...I wouldn't be surprised if that was yet another cut by The N.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
No, but I'm willing to pay that EACH for the 5 stations I watch... (CNN, Sci/Fi, Comedy Central, TNN, and Fox)
I can do without the other hundred and some-odd channels.
Whoever stated that signature sizes should be limited to one hundred and twenty characters can just go ahead and kiss my
This is already happening in Europe. I live in Finland and watch Viasat. They have annoying popups coming every know and then, blocking 25% of the screen, asking to click OK to get more info. Truly annoying, and the technology isn't apparently ready cause the sound stops for a few seconds after the popup has dissapeared.