[Garrett]

Ofcom are thinking of allowing an increase in averts from 7 minutes per hour to 12. What a lousy watchdog they are.


http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2007440352,00.html

[Singh400]

BOOOOOO

[redwing]

oh thats really anoying , its the one thing i love about British TV . Id hate it if it got like the US

Yes its crazy we were trying to watch taggart the other night and we swear there was adverts less than every ten minutes.
and channel five drops adverts in randomly it seems in the middle of a film anyone noticed when the film comes back the exciting bit you were watching. Has reached its conclusion

Why do they do it in the respect they must have to go home watch The TV themselves. I guess its not about that is it its about the paper folding stuff we all like and never have enough off.

So we just worked out Corrie street will be roughly 20 minutes long.

Lis@~~

[nwgarratt]

Most of the time there is way more than 12 minutes per hour. I have seen almost 20 minutes of ads on Five in one hour (including the ads between current and next programme). I have also seen ads just 3 minutes after the start of a programme and before the title sequence.

Most ads break seems to be 3 to 4 minutes each. I have even seen ones at over 5 minutes on More 4 during deal or no deal.

[krish]

Originally Posted by nwgarratt

I have even seen ones at over 5 minutes on More 4 during deal or no deal.

In the early nineties the Ch4 corporation lost £millions when BCCI bank collapsed (unlike Northern Rock they were a bunch of crooks involved with terrorism, Irangate, money laundering etc), so from that moment they increased their ad time as well as creating as many new revenue streams as they could - its no suprise that slowly led to a significant reduction in the quality of their original programming

[Steven]

Dear.

God.

No.

[nwgarratt]

It's just another excuse to get the DVD's instead. I already get them because of the ad breaks already, cut episodes, have to wait a week for the next episode etc.

[Garrett]

Originally Posted by nwgarratt

Most of the time there is way more than 12 minutes per hour. I have seen almost 20 minutes of ads on Five in one hour (including the ads between current and next programme). I have also seen ads just 3 minutes after the start of a programme and before the title sequence.
.

Seem like that every week in CSI.

there's no way that there's not already 12 minutes per hour of advertising breaks including trailers for other shows on Channel 4 and the like. Personally I can't see the difference this will make since Sky have been dedicating 17 minutes or so per hour to advertising and trailers for at least 8 year's.

The answer is simple don't watch live TV, record it and watch it later skipping adverts.

[eternaldark]

Thats why we download all our programs, its a right pain the number of adverts on the telly,

especially as you get an advert right at the start, then when the program resumes you get the bloomin title sequence!!!

Sky 1 i noticed their adverts are just over 5 mins a break!

[brian s]

Originally Posted by west

The answer is simple don't watch live TV, record it and watch it later skipping adverts.

I've been doing this for some time now. Trouble is longer ad breaks can foul up the shows themselves particularly on repeat. My mother is sure that the afternoon repeats of Midsommer Murders are edited to accommodate longer ad breaks. I was aware of this many years ago when Ch4 repeated The Prisoner. At first they edited out the penny farthling bike that was used at the ad breaks in the original transmission. After complaints from the fans it was put back and they then edited the show itself!

All the best
Bri

[Joe Pineapples]

Thats why we download all our programs, its a right pain the number of adverts on the telly,

especially as you get an advert right at the start, then when the program resumes you get the bloomin title sequence!!!

Same here. A good example is Prison Break starting last week in the U.S. I know it starts this week(?) on sky (which i pay for), but i am still going to watch the U.S version - advantages - less obtrusive logo (yes they recognise widescreen tv's and DONT shove it near the middle top of the screen), no spoilers during the week, and of course, adverts removed (though obviously not by the network).

Hopefully getting sky+ soon, so will probably never watch a programme 'live' again.

[redwing]

[QUOTE=

Hopefully getting sky+ soon, so will probably never watch a programme 'live' again.[/QUOTE]

yes Sky + is your friend , Ive not watched a live programme for ages . Always half an hour later at the least to skip all that nonesens AND the dreaded "comming up " spoilers.

Still a shame were going down this route .

[Goooner]

Originally Posted by west

there's no way that there's not already 12 minutes per hour of advertising breaks including trailers for other shows on Channel 4 and the like. Personally I can't see the difference this will make since Sky have been dedicating 17 minutes or so per hour to advertising and trailers for at least 8 year's.

The answer is simple don't watch live TV, record it and watch it later skipping adverts.

C4 seem to be the worst culprits in my experience, when they used to have Lost, which is a 42 minute show, they showed it in a 65 minute timeslot

I haven't watched live TV for years (live football excepted) I record (or torrent) everything I watch and skip the ads.

[brian s]

Originally Posted by Goooner

C4 seem to be the worst culprits in my experience, when they used to have Lost, which is a 42 minute show, they showed it in a 65 minute timeslot

Yes I can remember fast forwarding through loads of ads when I watched this. At least they didn't edit it for an hour slot to fit in more ads like they did with the Prisoner.

Cheers
Bri

[Toasty]

Sorry, bit confused, what constitutes adverts? Most US progams are around 42Mins long when shown. Every channel I watch these programs on populate a full hour of the schedule. So that's around 18 minutes of promotional material per hour. So do channel promo's count toward advert length? If not, then I guess we'll see more product adds and less channel promo ads.

The only way this will get annoying for me is if a 40minute show starts occupying more than an hour slot. Otherwise, I see no difference.

Edit: Just read gooner, yes, C4 took the with Lost, but wasn't that just the first show or two? It will definitely be annoying if schedules become scattered with 65 - 70 minute time slots!

[PoochJD]

Hi,

Sadly UK TV channels consider adverts, anything that is NOT related directly to the channel, e.g. proper adverts for products like chocolate, cereals, insurance, etc. All other material, like trailers, promotional stuff, and other channel-related stuff doesn't count, and is considered as channel-related, and is henceforth not counted as "advertising".

So, in a standard hour for a US TV drama like "Lost", "Prison Break", "24", etc, you should get:
- 42 minutes (approx) devoted to the show
- 12 minutes of actual advertising
- 6 minutes of other material, trailers, promos, announcements, etc.

Also, it should be mentioned that OFCOM averages out "advertising" time over the course of a whole day (e.g. 24 hours). So, whilst during popular shows the ad breaks are longer, during less popular shows, the breaks will be as little as 30-seconds! By that definition, it means that the shows watched by most people at peak times, do indeed, include more adverts and advertising in general, because there is actually more being included in that show!

However, if what the report on The Sun website suggests, than it is almost certain one of two things will happen:
- programmes will be physically shortened to fit in to an hour-long slot (either by cutting the show itself, or by removing credits, opening sequences, et al, or
- programmes will be placed into 65-70 minute slots, meaning TV scheduling will become an absolute nightmare, as almost nothing will start at a reasonable time (e.g. on the hour or half-hour). Instead, scheduling will become more and more like our European counterparts, or like Five, where shows start at all parts of the hour, e.g. 8:05pm, 9:25pm, 10:40pm, etc, etc.

Ultimately though, more advertising means less viewers, and more people recording shows instead. Simply put, most viewers don't care about ads and don't want them. Any increase, will only send UK TV further into the gutter!


Pooch

[pmc]

The British TV industry will be really shooting themselves in the foot if they allow this. Like many here I either source my TV by other means or PVR everything so I never actually watch ads. On AVForums though we naturally tend to be early adopters and more tech savvy than most. However if they force more and more ads and intrusive logos on the general public more and more people will follow us into an ad free world. Is that really what the TV companies want?

[Singh400]

Well atleast it's better than those ads they have in the US. The popup over the program.

[Toasty]

Originally Posted by pmc

The British TV industry will be really shooting themselves in the foot if they allow this. Like many here I either source my TV by other means or PVR everything so I never actually watch ads. On AVForums though we naturally tend to be early adopters and more tech savvy than most. However if they force more and more ads and intrusive logos on the general public more and more people will follow us into an ad free world. Is that really what the TV companies want?

I agree with your sentiments, however, 65-70 min shows will be a pvr nightmare, especially during the busy autumn / spring schedules.

[brian s]

Originally Posted by Singh400

Well atleast it's better than those ads they have in the US. The popup over the program.

I read some where that Sky have considered having constant ads on one side of the screen on one of their sports channels.

All the best
Bri

[nwgarratt]

Originally Posted by Singh400

Well atleast it's better than those ads they have in the US. The popup over the program.

It has been happening for a while now. I got a ad pop up for Prison Break almost in the middle of the screen during NCIS despite having a proper PB ad a few minutes earlier and again after NCIS finished. This was on Five.

Even CBBC are showing a similar thing during Shaun the Sheep and those episodes are only 7 minutes long.

[krish]

Lewis Black having a go at this sort of thing at the recent Emmys ...

[youtube]DKVGk6h5N54[/youtube]

[PoochJD]

Hi,

Charlie Booker has been doing something similar on some of the BBC4 "continuity announcer" segments too - ranting about someone talking over the end of shows, and crushing the end of credits screens on shows. It's quite fun, but it's a shame it's only being done in the first place to promote his show, rather than actually making a valid point about how TV channels are assuming we're all braindead, and thus incapable of knowing what channel we're actually watching, or of finding out when other shows are on.


Pooch

[Singh400]

Well I haven't seen the popups on British TV yet. Might have to look out for it. Nearest thing I seen to a popup ad on TV was wayy back on ITV and that small bar they had rolled across the screen.

But I don't believe they are as intrusive as the US ones. Those are huge. They literally cover the bottom half of the screen!

Originally Posted by PoochJD

Hi,

Charlie Booker has been doing something similar on some of the BBC4 "continuity announcer" segments too - ranting about someone talking over the end of shows, and crushing the end of credits screens on shows. It's quite fun, but it's a shame it's only being done in the first place to promote his show, rather than actually making a valid point about how TV channels are assuming we're all braindead, and thus incapable of knowing what channel we're actually watching, or of finding out when other shows are on.


Pooch

Yeah crushin the credits and speaking over them is terrible.

Originally Posted by krish

Lewis Black having a go at this sort of thing at the recent Emmys ...

[youtube]DKVGk6h5N54[/youtube]

Top man! I agree with everything he said.

[nwgarratt]

Originally Posted by Singh400

Top man! I agree with everything he said.

Never heard of him but totally agree.

These are what the Shaun thew Sheep ones look like. The green mess isn't transparant so block anything onscreen. The first is to show that another Shaun is on next, and the other is for a show called Evacuation which a quick advert is also shown after Shaun ends 2 minutes later and just before it actually starts on TV !!

Looks how small the credits are. They are in the bottom corner.

[brian s]

Originally Posted by nwgarratt

These are what the Shaun thew Sheep ones look like. The green mess isn't transparant so block anything onscreen. The first is to show that another Shaun is on next, and the other is for a show called Evacuation which a quick advert is also shown after Shaun ends 2 minutes later and just before it actually starts on TV !!

I noticed this type of rubbish when I watched The Sarah Jane Adventures last night. They would appear to be training the kids for the future.

Cheers
Bri

[Singh400]

Originally Posted by nwgarratt

Never heard of him but totally agree.

These are what the Shaun thew Sheep ones look like. The green mess isn't transparant so block anything onscreen. The first is to show that another Shaun is on next, and the other is for a show called Evacuation which a quick advert is also shown after Shaun ends 2 minutes later and just before it actually starts on TV !!

Looks how small the credits are. They are in the bottom corner.

<snip>

Ah right I see! That is bad.

[PoochJD]

Hi,

Essentially, the BBC are assuming that everyone - adult and child - has the attention span of a gnat, and even during a show like "Shaun The Sheep" (which lasts a mere 7 minutes per episode) that viewers will up and leave the TV, unless they are "reminded" - and I use that word in the most negative way possible - what's coming-up next.

I mean, especially with "Shaun...", we all know that it's a double-bill, and that two episodes air in a 15-minute block, but I don't need to be reminded at the end of the first episode, to not get off of my sofa/chair, because I might miss the second episode! And the new "green" DOG's CBBC1 is using, are appalling, as they are not only solid blocks of colour as NWGarratt showed above, but they also stay on-screen far longer than is necessary, often covering the character faces or heads!

I get the impression that the BBC is beginning to want to treat its audience with the same contempt that Channel 4 and ITV do so. If they want to capture the lowest common denominator audience, then do-away with the TV Licence fee, and then see how you fair having to fight for viewers against other channels. But if you want the Licence Fee to remain, then treat the viewers with some decency and as adults capable of thinking. With the UK turning over to digital-only soon, it will no longer be necessary to advertise what's coming on next, as everyone will have EPG guides! And if viewers haven't learned how to use them by then, then they still have TV guides in newspapers, digital text services, the internet, the multitude of TV listings guides and numerous other places to obtain the information from.

TV should be for showing programmes, and only that!


Pooch