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TV Networks Cutting Back On Commercials (bloomberg.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Cable providers aren't the only ones feeling pressure from cord cutters. The TV networks themselves are losing viewers the same way. A lot of those viewers are going to Netflix and other streaming services, which are often ad-free, or have ad-free options. Now, in an effort to win back that audience (and hang on to the ones who are still around), networks are beginning to cut back on commercial time during their shows. "Time Warner's truTV will cut its ad load in half for prime-time original shows starting late next year, Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bewkes said last week on an earnings call. Viacom has recently slashed commercial minutes at its networks, which include Comedy Central and MTV. Earlier this month, Fox said it will offer viewers of its shows on Hulu the option to watch a 30-second interactive ad instead of a typical 2 1/2-minute commercial break. Fox says the shorter ads, which require viewers to engage with them online, are more effective because they guarantee the audience's full attention."
up next: an app for your phone that interacts with all the crap they try to make you watch before they show you any content, then beeps to let you know the actual content is starting.
The networks always cut back on commercials leading into Presidential election years. TV and Radio both reduce commercials and jack up rates because they must offer equal quality time spots to all candidates. As a result, they have to clear out the riff-raff of cheap spots usually filled with "As Seen on TV" and "get rich quick" products in order to have the spots necessary to fulfill both their bread and butter big hitter brands and political ads.
We could eliminate about 75% of the marketing and advertising industry at the bottom of the ocean, and society would benefit substantially, a roughly analogous proportion as the legal profession. No surprise, both are exceptionally well paid professions, with no guarantee of results, which don't require any proof of skill (passing the bar once in life is neither required, nor a particularly notable achievement).
I'd be happy with ads on SyFy if they just hunted down and executed the moron executive that thinks horror, paranormal, CSI and low budget "reality" tv ghost hunts are somehow even related to actual Sci Fi.
Has Fox forgotten that vegging out or having background noise while doing other stuff is most of the point of watching TV. Nothing will tick someone off more than have to fumble around and click to proceed every few minutes.
To me (and many other folks), the biggest single problem with commercials is that they are too loud. I zip past commercials if I'm running a time-shifted version on the DVR, but if not, I mute most of them and always mute the loud ones. In fact, there's no better way to make me ignore a commercial than for it to be too loud. So, a simple step to making commercials more tolerable would be to reduce their volume. (Oh, and while we're at it, can we ban those creepy Allstate commercials that have the deep disembodied spokesman's voice apparently emanating from normal people?)
I assume there are technological solutions to the volume problem, but none seem to come built-in to TVs and they don't seem to be readily available as some sort of add-on box. Perhaps there's some free software somewhere to do this just like there's free DVR software, but some of us don't want to go that far.
Decades ago, some Magnavox TVs featured something called "Smart Sound" for this, but evidently that either didn't really work or somehow otherwise never caught on. Until it does, the broadcasters and advertisers might start solving this problem for everyone on their end.
Yeah, all that stuff should be over on the History Channel where it belongs. :)
Every channel has lost its original focus. The one I really hate is HGTV for dropping gardening and becoming the real estate channel.
I think most of the tech showed in CSI counts as sci-fi.
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Too little too late. You guys jammed them in so much and so hard, plus using heavy compression so they are louder. I'm done. I record with a DVR that auto REMOVES commercials.
Suck it, I wont be watching your commercials anymore.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
There was something on the BBC news this morning. They're incorporating the ads into the shows.
A character in an Australian soap skates past a poster, and the poster will be for a local product depending on where it's being broadcast.
They were even [the moving version of] shopping different cars into scenes. And the pixels weren't wrong - it wasn't at all obvious, even if you've seen a few.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."