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Live Commercials Will Save TV?
Vitaly Friedman writes "Entrepreneur Mark Cuban doesn't believe that traditional television advertising is dead, it simply needs to be more interesting. And what's more interesting than being live? From the article: 'It's no secret that the traditional 30-second spot has been losing much of its luster with advertisers. With the rise of other media options (videogames, home theater systems, Web surfing) on the one hand and the recent growth of DVRs like TiVo on the other, traditional television advertising has been feeling the squeeze. Broadcasting executives are struggling to figure out the economics of the new digital landscape, and have been willing to try just about any creative idea, such as TiVo's plan to replace old commercials with new ones when watching recorded shows.'"
This is perfect, some GREAT opportunities for wardrobe malfunctions and haircombing shots... :)
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
Unless these commercials consist of little more than someone scrolling through a powerpoint, how could this not get expensive fast? Most commercials are recycled for months or years, not minutes...
So Matt Lauer will take a break from reporting the news of the morning to tell us about Quaker Oats now?
Most commercials are skipped at the PVR stage. How is making it live going to make a difference? Second a lot of commercials use CGI. Is that going to be real-time?
No more talking gecko!
Mr. Owl: how many licks does it take...
One of the most annoying things to me about TV ads is seeing the same ones repeated 3 or 4 (or more) times during a one hour show. Even if the ad itself isn't particularly annoying, it becomes so after I've seen it enough times over a short enough period of time.
What I'm driving at is that I think live TV commercials *would* be interesting, at least at first. No doubt they would become just as normal and familiar as everything else shown on TV in the past 50+ years, but at least we wouldn't have to see the same thing over and over and over again.
On the other hand, considering how much money is currently spent on pre-recorded commercials, I somehow doubt that we'd see more than a few live ones, only during prime-time, and only on major networks.
Arguing about vi versus Emacs is like arguing whether it's better to make fire by rubbing sticks or banging rocks.
network exec's are sitting around a table trying to remake 'friends' As long as these asshats have control (clearchannel) don't plan on seeing anything good - may I suggest Adult Swim on the cartoon network?
Broadcasters, your captive audience is escaping. We no longer will sit back and be bombarded by obnoxious ads that insult our intelligence. Live advertising won't do the job. I know I'll simply ignore live ads like I do most advertising already. The mute button still performs its said task, removing most of the annoyance factor during ads, and I can always change the channel and right back again to avoid ads.
Forget ads on TV. Come up with a better way to get the sponsors' messages out to the public. Ads are everywhere now, and people are just becoming more resistant to them.
I haven't watched commercials for a while. MythTV has auto commercial skip, and "skip ahead 30 seconds" as standard features. Watching live TV is so...low tech.
Most commercials make me want to jab something sharp into my eyesockets. Some, however, are actually funny. Or, if not outright funny, at least visually interesting. Make more of those and I might be persuaded not to switch channels.
I think it's pretty obvious that television is undergoing a major shift. As the article pointed out, more and more people are Tivo-ing their programs and skipping commericals, IPTV is coming up. Live commercials are really just a way of having new commercials more often, but I don't think that that will help anything. With all the new ways people are watching TV, there needs to be a new way of delivering ads. I don't know what it will be, but my money is on Google to come up with it. They already have a pretty good record when it comes to new kinds of advertising, and incorporating their ads into lots of different products, as well as making them good ads (relevant, anyway).
I've always pictured the color of OS zealotry as a sort of bright flamingo pinkish hue
You know, I have a DVR so I can skip the commercials. Will this new 'replacing recorded commercials with new ones' screw up my skipping of said commericals? If so, then TIVO is gonna get pissed when everyone returns them because they can't skip the commercials anymore.
Click Click Bloody Click PANCAKES!
Just get rid of advertising, Pay for the show with DVD sales. Why isn't it allready like this?
--The universe will not be altered by forum threads, even those which are very wry. --Tycho Brahe (Penny Arcade)
How about no commercials would save TV? It's the commercials that people hate, so remove them.
TV needs people to watch it, and more and more people don't want to because of the ads.
If 24 is actually 18 hours long, that says something awful about how much advertising is on tv.
Ok, no ads, means no money for tv, so:
Why not reduce ads to a level at which they stop being so intrusive? Have a couple at fewer times and charge more. Make better TV to get more viewers and spots can become more expensive. Revenue could stay the same, and TV would actually improve.
"Hello friends. I'm your Vitameatavegamin girl. Are you tired, run-down, listless? Do you poop out at parties? Are you unpopular? The answer to all your problems is in this little bottle. Vitameatavegamin. Yes, Vitameatavegamin contains Vitamins Meat Vegetables and Minerals. Yes, with Vitameatavegamin, you can spoon your way to health. All you do is take a great big tablespoonful after every meal. Mmmmmmm..... It's so tasty, too! Tastes just like candy! So why don't you join all the thousands of happy peppy people and get a great big bottle of Vitameatavegamin tomorrow! That's Vita-meata-vegamin! (wink)"
What?
Really, while the idea of live and/or more interesting commercials does have some appeal, in the end I think advertisers will simply resort to more and more product placement. Which could lead to some interesting convolutions of plotlines for shows that don't take place in modern society. I can see sci fi shows placing products with the rationalization that they are so damn good that the companies that make them today are still around in the future. But what about historical shows?
I predict more time travel and dream sequences.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
If you want a road map of whats going to happen to TV, take a look at radio.
Sirius and XM are becoming more popular and from what I've seen, public radio is gaining an audience. People are abandoning commercial radio because now there are alternatives! The same will happen to TV, take note!
-Ponga
It's no secret that the traditional 30-second spot has been losing much of its luster with advertisers.
The traditional 30-second spot lost its luster with audiences about sixty seconds after the first one was broadcast.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Won't QVC be up in arms over this "live advertising" idea?
I would venture a guess that people are just sick of all the advertising and are doing other things than pay attention to it. You can't surf the web, listen to the radio, take a nice drive, or watch tv without someone trying to brainwash you into buying their product with a jingle, ad or billboard. The superbowl commercials are pretty popular, but as creative as they are, if they were the same marketing drivel dayin-dayout, they would suck too.
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Well, in the beggining ads were live. Such was even made fun at a Chaplin movie a King in New York http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050598/.
Really, it isn't. You just get screwed up lines, and pay a hell of a lot extra for it.
What's interesting is relevance. The average bachelor isn't going to run out and buy tampons because an actress told him how fun it was to go rollerskating on your period, but he might go out and buy exercise equipment because Chuck Norris told him it would improve his roundhouse kicks.
The problem is getting the information necessary to tailor ads to individual preferences without it being a hassle for the viewer or infringe on privacy. Rather than try and obtain their preferences through positive reinforcement, I suggest there should be a huge red button on every remote that says I never want to see this advert again!
This way, viewers can get rid of the really annoying adverts and the ones that don't interest them at all, and advertisers can build up an idea of what they do like by seeing what they don't block.
Obviously, there has to be some safeguard against simply blocking every advert, but that shouldn't be too difficult. For example, only let viweers block x number of adverts, and when they block more than that, start unblocking the least recently blocked ones.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
well, some of US anyway. see you there?
for many of US, the only way out is up.
don't forget, for each of the creators' innocents harmed (in any way) there is a debt that must/will be repaid by you/US as the perpetrators/minions of unprecedented evile will not be available after the big flash occurs.
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some of US should consider ourselves very fortunate to be among those scheduled to survive after the big flash/implementation of the creators' wwwildly popular planet/population rescue initiative/mandate.
it's right in the manual, 'world without end', etc....
as we all ?know?, change is inevitable, & denying/ignoring gravity, logic, morality, etc..., is only possible, on a temporary basis.
concern about the course of events that will occur should the corepirate nazi life0cidal execrable fail to be intervened upon is in order.
'do not be dismayed' (also from the manual). however, it's ok/recommended, to not attempt to live under/accept, fauxking nazi felon greed/fear/ego based pr ?firm? scriptdead mindphuking hypenosys.
consult with/trust in yOUR creators. providing more than enough of everything for everyone (without any distracting/spiritdead personal gain motives), whilst badtolling unprecedented evile, using an unlimited supply of newclear power, since/until forever. see you there?
"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."
Most ads I fast forward through on my PVR, but some I rewind a watch a few times. For example, the "we're for dogs" ads from Pedigree, or Victoria's Secret ads, although I neither a dog nor a girlfriend and the latter vendor never has anything in my size. A good interesting ad has people asking their friends if they saw them. On the other hand, the spectacularly annoying ad is toast in the PVR era.
Keep in mind that Music Videos are essentially ads.
One of my friends who lived in Germany in the 80's told me that at that point commercials were clustered in large blocks, with the impetus to draw people based on creative values.
A better solution might be the concept of explicit ad antibodies, watch an ad once and have the option of killing it with a press of the remote, coupled with an "applause" button as well. By rating ads, the advertiser could have a much better guide to the level of acceptance of each ad.
But when you need it
So repetition is what the advertisers want.
The trick is to make the repetition less boring so people don't fast forward through the commercial and you lose that repetition.
But the writers have enough trouble making a 20 minute show interesting enough just once a week for a season. Asking them to make the commercials interesting
Marlin was constantly talking and segue'ing into ads for them.
I don't think advertisers are going to go for live spots. For one thing, all it takes is one on-air screw-up to blow an entire ad campaign and wreck an advertiser's credibility. Giant corporations don't advertise because they want to entertain people; they advertise because they think it generates revenue. TV advertisers are for the most part extremely risk-averse organizations, and they want control over the message they broadcast.
As others have noted, product placement is the wave of the future. I wouldn't be surprised if single-sponsor shows started popping up. Now that's a return to the old days. Imagine "The Lords of the Shire" TV sitcom, starring Sam, Pippin, and Merry, and sponsored exclusively by Dr. Scholl's. Hey, I didn't say it would lead to better shows!
Broadcasting is giving way to narrowcasting, and my guess is whether it's on a TV screen, a computer screen, or your iPod screen, advertising in the future is going to be more narrowly focused and less obvious than it is now. Live commercials are exactly the opposite of where commercials are headed.
Then again, wtf do I know? Cuban made zillions by predicting where the Internet business was headed, and I'm just another random Slashdot monkey who thinks he knows what's going on.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
That's usually when I give up and turn the TV off for a week. -CF
But at least it can go out with a bang :)
Also, unedited feeds + audience = hilarity
Pictochat Art!!!
Make better TV to get more viewers and spots can become more expensive. Revenue could stay the same, and TV would actually improve.
[sarcasm] Yes, it's just that simple! [/sarcasm]
It's easy to tell somebody to make something better; it's very hard to actually do it.
I mean, if people just wrote better code there would be no bugs!
Not to mention that "better" is highly subjective.
Back on topic, the number of commericlas is annoying but I can live with it. The ones that I absolutely loathe, though, are those "pop-ups" on TNT where a fucking NASCAR driver rides to his pit crew and has them change the tires while you're tying to watch a god-damned show. That is the future of commercials, though; if you're going to skip their traditional commercials with your fancy TIVOs and whatnot then they're just going to layer new commercials on top of the show. It's fucking sick, really.
One of the more interesting aspects of the internet is that if you make an interesting ad and use viral marketing, people will come to you. Carlton United's Big Ad was a huge success, in that people learned about it by being told by friends, and were therefore much more receptive to the message than just having it spewed at them. After its success on the internet, they tried showing it on TV, but they got such a lacklustre response compared to the online version that they pulled it after only a couple of week.
The Tivo/DVR changes the whole dynamic of television. It used to be mandatory to watch the commercials, or at least wait them out. Now, the DVR makes it trivial to skip them over.
Ever watch American Idol? Notice the TVs behind Ryan Seacrest displaying Coca Cola logos and bubbles? The ads are becoming part of the show.
But, along these same lines, ads are starting to get better. Every day, I get video files forwarded to me by E-mail that are frequently... ADS. And they're funny as hell.
Here's an example: It's funny as hell, and I sure don't mind forwarding this to my friends. So, this leather company not only gets people to look at their ad, they don't even pay the costs of distribution!
The world is changing. Guess what? It's been doing that since it was created...
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
. . .the best commercial i've seen recently has got to be the caveman one.
.OR MAKE IT REALLY GODDAMN FUNNY
.don't like it? go fuck yourself
And yet this commercial is a complete failure, because you called it the "caveman one."
MAKE THE COMMERCIAL ABOUT THE PRODUCT/SERVICE YOU ARE TRYING TO SELL
Old style ad:
"Cars"
Post WWII ad:
"Our car is better because it has an extra chrome rimmed hole in the fender"
Modern ad:
"I'm a cute kid. If I go hungry it's going to be all your fault, because you didn't buy our car. Did you notice that I'm cute?"
Maybe "ads" don't need to be more interesting. Maybe they just need to be ads, not blatent attempts at manipulation so bleeding obvious and pathetic that even the morons feel insulted.
I've been watching the post modern attempts at being "interesting" for the past few days. Mostly I react by thinking, "Jesus Christ! When did they start giving toad lickers money to produce commercials?"
I can't think of a specific ads or product as an example though, which just goes to show you how effective the whole thing is.
. .
Which is usually also the case for really goddamn funny ads. You tend to remember the joke, but not the product. See comment about the "caveman one" above. What the advertiser needs is for you to say "The (insert scuzbum here) one with the cavemen."
. .
I assume this is the statement that garnered you a flamebait mod, and yet that's the gist of it. They really need to come to grips with the fact that advertising can ultimately only inform about the product, and perhaps generate some good will, not force a purchase, so stop trying.
KFG
Making them interesting and correctly targetted will get people to watch them. Making them live won't accomplish this, it's just another gimmick that people will ignore.
In Ireland anyway:
5. Time life products- especially the country music compilations
4. Hair products; at least the models are usually hot
3. Personal injury claims- bloody ambulance chasers. At least no-win no-fee is banned in Ireland
2. Personal finance & insurance - please, just make it stop... I'll give you money
1. Mobile phone ringtones; kill me now.
When the posters fear their moderators, there is tyranny; when the moderators fears the posters, there is liberty.
My wife and I probably watch about 10 hours of tv a week between us. Cable costs us about $10/month or roughly 25c/hr and tivo costs another $7 iirc.
If we could download those shows (even if it were 50c/hr) then we'd probably do that instead. It will obviously hurt the local affliates, but it could make financial sense for those producing the programs.
This isn't exactly a new idea... Anyone who's watched old TV shows like Jack Benny have seen 'live commercials'. Like when the star of the show comes out and talks for a minute about their sponsor's product, then they return to the next act of the show.
Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together.
why don't we see more integrating of commercials into the regular programming?
Masked figure draws back curtain--raises hand to strike.
"I stab at thee with TrueSharp(tm) cutlery. Remember, nothing stabs quite like a TrueSharp(tm)."
I realize there are some logistical issues to work, but it will make skipping the commercial impossible.
The economics of commercial creation are different from the economics of creating general TV content, it's cost-effective to spend megabucks on creating a 30 second commercial if one is going to spend a lot more megabucks on commercial time and one is hoping to sell enough products based on it to make this profitable. What I think he's really saying is... punch up the entertainment content and spend only a bit more money per commercial.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Personally, I'm of the opinion that the problem isn't the medium or the execution, but more that society (or at least, a subset of it) has become entirely numb to advertisements.
Don't get me wrong, I laugh at adverts if they're legitimately funny, but that doesn't mean I'm going to buy the product.
We've been bombarded by them so much that we simply don't take in the relevance of the product. My own mother, who is perhaps the biggest couch potato I know, has been using the ad breaks to make a cup of tea for as long as I can remember.
Additionally, I know myself that much of my product awareness is broadcast from leading individuals in communities that I feel I can trust not to BS me, something not possible until the advent of the internet, and in particular the blogosphere.
Do you see what I did there?
Who else finds that the stupid 15 second full screen web ads many companies have are plain useless and annoying. Most don't even show the company logo or product until the end of the ad, and all of the ads are just plain boring. That's why I always click "skip this ad". Surely they should try to get the main message across in the first second or two because I'm out before the ad ends usually.
Is not the 30 second commercials, but the fact there are so many of them in a row.
Every time I read an article on this subject, someone is hypothesizing that in the next release TiVo may kill the ability to skip commercials altogether. I can't think of anything to be less afraid of. If TiVo did that, TiVo would vanish overnight and we'd all be watching Myth TV or any number of other PC based solutions.
So what's the solution for the TV networks?
There's only one "killer" solution for the TV business, and its been around for a long time: Its called "Pay Channels". (Or paid digital downloads as the case may be). And its the future, whether you like it or not.
The advertising model as we know it will cease to exist.
Product placement is a fantasy. It will never carry the same level of messaging, or command the same revenues. The networks will try to push it, but the advertisers don't think they're getting their money's worth, and the viewers will just be increasingly disgusted.
The answer is "Pay for it" and its already here
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
..commercials these days suck.
I can recall only two commercials offhand. One for Geico - "Of course they want free pie and chips. It's chips, with pie, for free."
And another for.. Progressive, I think. "Is this what your insurance company thought when you told them you have a ninja?"
Obviously, the solution is simple. Commercials need:
a) More British accents
b) More ninjas
c) Possibly more pirates
Drive By Farting
Amazing how people will do crazy stuff when they know they can get on TV.
For the last few years, my roommates and I, we've had a Superbowl party. None of us really care for football though. What do we do? Use it as an excuse to get together and socialize with friends. And after it's been on long enough, we Tivo through the game, and watch the commercials.
Yes, marketing types, we watch the Superbowl commercials ON PURPOSE!!!
I can't remember who won, or even who played in, the Superbowl for the past several years. But I remember the E-Trade monkey, Terry Tate the office linebacker, the pets.com sock puppet, Autobytel, and those Budwiser frogs. Hell, I know the dialogue to the 1984 Macintosh commercial by heart!
What's the difference? During the Superbowl is about the only time the advertisers put out commercials that DON'T FUCKING SUCK!!! Get that you pinheaded marketing drones?!?!? Make your commercials NOT SUCK... make them entertaining... and I WON'T Tivo past them! No tricks, no stunts, no blipverts, no need to try and rig broadcasts so I CAN'T fast-forward; and don't accuse me of being a thief for getting up to go to the bathroom; just stop making your commercials suck ass!
cya,
john
Imagine all the people...
I think the whole "Six Pack Abs" thing is a crock. I've consumed quite a few six packs, and my abs look nothing like that. Others who have consumed more six packs than I have consumed have abs that look even less like his than mine.
The problem is hollywood has no idea what "interesting" means.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
They'll just throw away creativity and rely on the fact that they can rehearse the same crap over and over again. The worst part is you will never realise you're in the same commercial until you get to the part where you want to shoot yourself in the knee.
Then it's worse, cuz you feel youve been suckered.
The problem is that advertisers aren't being very scientific about this. When you read a newspaper, no one forces you to read the ads, yet they are very effective! No one has proven that skipping ads makes them less effective.
I think advertisers would be surprised if they tried to determine how much of their message "sticks" when viewers can skip through them. Specifically, when someone is skipping through an ad, that person is paying close attention. Likewise, even when people have the ability to skip an ad, they will still let them play while they walk to the kitchen for a [insert heavily advertised snack or beverage].
A company like Tivo might want to consider investing in experiments that demonstrate how a Tivo can make traditional television advertising more effective.
No, I will not work for your startup
I just got a Tivo, and the one thing I notcied is I actually pay MORE attention to the commercials as I fast forward through them, than when I watch live TV.
Like now I am totally ignoring the tv during a commercial as I post to slashdot. However, when I use the TIVO I have to concentrate on the tv, and thus the commercial to effectively skip it and resume my show.
I glean more than enough information in the 3-5 seconds of commercials than I care to. This is obvisously because all commercials are the same, and offer so little information that the essense of every commercial can be conveyed in just a couple of seconds. Much like we can make a snap decision about web sites before they finish loadinging.
Media companies need to wake up, and learn how to deal with new technology. There is a way to take advantage of people's short attention, they just need to figure it out, and stop trying to force people to "do it the old way". There is a way to make advertising a win-win for everyone.
For example the "Google Text Ad" it might not be perfect, but it is *relatively* unobtrusive and can be useful in some situations. Those ads are not perfect, but I MUCH prefer them to the shitty flash ads. I don't need friggin' multimedia ads on a web page, I just want inforamtion delivered as efficiently as possible. Flashy ads waste my time an d space on the page, that could be filled with real information. The text ads waste less spaces, and are much easier to ignore, and therefore they are better.
-MS2k
Let me reiterate - I don't watch live TV. Until they build a device that prevents me from viewing commercials, I'll skip them. Always.
Seriously, the best hope anyone has of advertising to me is product placement within the show itself.
even better print the advert on the back of toilet roll . as seems to be one of the places that most people go during the ad breaks.
For one thing it provides the bathroom breaks that I seem to need more often as I get older. In fact, it's because of commercials that I don't need a Tivo to record the parts I would have otherwise missed. And repetition is effective. While I don't use the products, the names of Preparation H and Gold Bond Power are burnt into my brain. That's what I get for falling asleep with the radio tuned into the news station.
What?
It'd seem it could be really interesting if they could have commercials generated based on real-time factors or even from live interaction with viewers. It could even be a canned commercial with a transparent background that shows something like people posing in the background of live cams (hi mom!), showing online games going on, etc. I think the key is to not just be live but to interact.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Adult Swim has it down, being the only (segment?) on T.V where I do not skip the commercials. Not only do I respect the programming, but the messages in between the commercials are almost as entertaining as the shows themselves. It feels more interactive (I've seen my rants being poked at), and the commercials they show are
A.) Are not repetitive,
B.) Feels like they are actually aimed at myself as a consumer.
I feel that if networks do not start mimicing this brilliance soon, and make the audience engage with the time between the commercials, then a massive amount of revenue will be lost as the MythTV and TIVO generation grows.
3 degrees of separation from Vladimir Putin
well at least they could find appropriate ad's for the chan
kids tv for example ,
so conversation with your 5yr old
dad : what would you like for santa to get you
5yo : hmm dont know
5yo : dady whats a period
dad : its a bit of time , like a break time
5yo : ok
5yo : then i guess i would like a tampon from santa
shocked dad : why
5yo : because the women on tv look to be having a good time in there period
and lets face it advert guys know kids will want anything
While I'm not in the advertising industry, I'd say that the ones that should be quakin' in their boots are the ad agencies. How many people read a story online about a funny video on YouTube or Yikers or GoogleVideo, or whatever and watch some inane homemade video. I think that if there were a way to have random people create "ads" and they would be randomly shown, then that would garner a lot more interest than the "canned" stuff coming out of the ad factories.
--"advertising can ultimately only inform about the product, and perhaps generate some good will"--
thats just it... if your product is good, tell me why & maybe ill be interested. But when an ad doesnt really mention the product, or doesnt have anything to do with the qualities or features of the product, I just assume it must be inferior. Otherwise you wouldnt have to resort to such gimmicks.
Basically, if something is advertised on TV i assume that it isnt worth buying, if it was worth buying, they wouldnt have to advertise it.
My opinion however, may be worthless in this area, as I havent watched TV in over 5 years. The reason i quit watching? too much obnoxious advertising.
For a while, I've though that what tv needs is to have something like google that listens for the words that are said (via transcript or voice recognition) and posts a link to relevant ads. For instance if your watching a news report and the reporter discusses housing starts, there could be a link to a local real estate agent and so on.
No Sigs!
So hands up if you think it will actually be live?
I think they will prerecord "Live" commercials anyhow, so it will be another form of duping. How are they going to convince us it is live?
-- Cheer, Cheer, The Red and the White.
The best ad I've seen recently here in Canada is one for Dose Magazine. "We paid for this spot to increase awareness. 'DOSE DOSE DOSE DOSE DOSE!'". Honest, blatant advertising that's cheap to produce, about 7 seconds long and memorable (mostly because it didn't annoy the heck out of you).
I'm turned off to products with bad ads, and that includes good ads which are shown four times an hour. Almost nothing I buy is a 'tv brand', but I must not be in good company because obviously commercials are effective (or they'd stop paying tens of thousands to air the things).
Why is every country in the world better that the US when it comes to TV?
We should employ some European writers and learn from them!
1) I would like the option to have no ads. At all. For anything. Whether this means paying extra for the live stuff, buying on DVD, or paying for a fast internet connection and fast PC to display the program, I don't care.
2) Showing something for the first time on TV is an advantage, and can support more ads. The 20th time it's shown, people are just going to shift to DVDs or downloads. But the first time it's shown, alternatives don't exist so much. So less ads during repeats, thanks. And keep in mind that old, good stuff will still have higher ratings than new, crap stuff.
3) Asking people to rate ads in real time sounds like a winner, except that you'd need to correlate it with appropriate demographics AND not just confine the survey to people who are willing to do it for free or who have lots of free time. Hey advertisers! I'm (probably) richer than Bubba the Trailer Dweller, but you ain't getting my preference data unless it's at MY convenience and you pay me!
4) Targetted ads are likely to bring in more revenue, right? So why not give people the option (and that's OPTION, not LEGAL REQUIREMENT, you putzes) to have their TVs show more ads they like and less ones that they'll never respond to? Letting people increase the appeal of their TV experience means better ratings, and more people watching the ads, which leads to more demand for the ad timeslots.
5) In general, people don't like ads. They don't want ads. Ads are an imposition on their lives. Advertisers, unless you do something to make the punters more likely to watch the ads (such as giving them some power over the ads or determining what makes an appealing ad), people are going to keep spending their money on ways to stop you annoying them. You are not a necessary evil or funding mechanism. You are not a part of the content industry. You are not a pretty snowflake. You are bottom-feeding scum hanging off the arse of society, and the majority of us live in hope that one day you will all die in a fire. However, the less you annoy us, the longer it will take us to get around to your 'industry' with a box of matches. Capice?
My main gripe is that they (a few years ago) increased the number of their between show trailers, which are often basically advertising.
All the Beeb needs to do when it has a charter renual is to trot out Sir David Attenborugh, Michael Palin and Have I Got News For You and ask the powers that be "How else are you going to make these"
I must point out though that you seem to be forgetting another form of TV revenue, subscription (such as satellite or cable). I would pay a few pounds more for my Sky subscription if they removed ads, which of course they can as they are getting revenue. Mr Murdoch however, disagrees and actually puts adverts on pay-per-view satellite broadcasts, you pay the subscription, then you pay the box office fee for the game, then you still get adverts. Fortuantely the (reluctant admission) superb Sky+ box still lets you bypass the ads, just pause the live program for 10 minutes at the start, then watch normally, skipping the adverts as you go.
If this were really happening, what would you think?
Maybe some truth in advertising would be funnier.
http://imdb.com/title/tt0099316/
This may be out-of-print, so if you missed the Jaguar ad, you're bummed! I never laughed so hard. The Sony commercial was hilarious, too. If all TV ads were like this, I would pay for cable again.
No sig for you! Come back one year!