Long commercial breaks

[Owain Taggart]

I have no problem with commercials and I even tend to like the little breaks in between whatever I'm watching if I have other stuff to do. I do have a problem when channels seem to abuse commercial breaks. You know, the ones that seemingly go on forever. Some channels are atrocious for this. It's why I don't watch PeachTree TV very much, and for those wondering why a Canadian like myself watches a local Atlanta channel, it's what Canada gets instead of TBS or WTBS.

Just now for example, I went to watch something on it, hoping to catch a few minutes of something while eating lunch, and it was caught in its interminable commercial break. Just when I thought it was over by announcing they were coming back to whatever they was on, they started a whole new string of commercials.

Well, F You, Peachtree. Thanks for making me feel like I'm watching more commercials than the actual show that you're showing. Five minutes of ongoing commercials is just too long.

 

[Amaris]

MSNBC is god-awful for long and frequent commercial breaks. I watch Rachel Maddow and (sometimes) the Ed Schultz show, and there seems to be a new commercial break every time you blink, and they go on, and on, and on.

 

[Jadzia]

You should also factor in how much airtime is devoted to commercials, as you may get bigger but less frequent ad blocks. Time it over 1 hour and see.

On some channels in the UK, it's normal for 25% of airtime to be commercials, with breaks being about 4-5 minutes long.

Fifteen years ago, it was something like 20% of airtime with 3 minute breaks.

Thirty years ago, I'm told it was something like 2 minutes of commercials between programmes, and only programmes longer then 45 minutes were interrupted with a similar/shorter break ... which probably amounted to less than 10% of airtime.

 

[KJbushway]

Syfy is bad at this as well. Its hard for me to stay on that channel sometimes.

 

[M'Sharak]

You should also factor in how much airtime is devoted to commercials, as you may get bigger but less frequent ad blocks. Time it over 1 hour and see.

On some channels in the UK, it's normal for 25% of airtime to be commercials, with breaks being about 4-5 minutes long.

Fifteen years ago, it was something like 20% of airtime with 3 minute breaks.

Thirty years ago, I'm told it was something like 2 minutes of commercials between programmes, and only programmes longer then 45 minutes were interrupted with a similar/shorter break ... which probably amounted to less than 10% of airtime.

All of that would be reasonably accurate as well for commercial TV in the U.S. at the times given, and the biggest factor determining the amount of each hour devoted to advertising is ratings. The larger the audience watching, the more the network is able to charge advertisers per minute of airtime. High ratings can mean fewer commercial spots per hour (but more expensive ones) and poor ratings can mean longer ad breaks (more ads per hour, sold at a lower cost-per-minute rate.)

 

[WillsBabe]

I went to watch something on it, hoping to catch a few minutes of something while eating lunch, and it was caught in its interminable commercial break.

I hate it when that happens. And of course, there are ad breaks on every channel at once! Other than that happening to me occassionally, I hardly ever fall foul of the hell that is commercial breaks. I usually dvd-r my tv or watch it on catch-up.

 

[Mike Farley]

They still show television on television? I thought DVD had killed that off.

 

[DBR]

Back when SPACE wasn't owned by CTV, they had really short commercial breaks. Like 1-2 minutes short. It was great, and then they aired a small 5-7 minute geek news segment in between shows.

Those were the days.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

I never watch commercials if I can avoid them.

 

[C.E. Evans]

If I record a half-hour show off TV and pick a random spot to start viewing it, there's a more than 50% chance I'll hit a commercial break rather than the actual program. The same thing is true if I watch a program on-air and decide to channel surf during its commercial breaks--if I see something interesting in the listings and decide to try it out, there's a more than 50% chance it's in a commercial break too.

 

[scottydog]

Because of DVDs and the ability to record programs, I have grown to have no patience to watch commercials. Just 10 or 15 yrs ago, I didn't have this problem.

 

[Roger Wilco]

Pretty much the only thing I watch on tv these days is live sports and watching commercials is often more or less inevitable, although it doesn't bother me too much as long as they try to fit the commercials in in a way that takes as little away from the action as possible.

 

[B.J.]

^That seems to be a big problem recently, putting a break in where one doesn't belong, like in the middle of an action sequence. I've seen them put breaks in the middle of Star Wars' trench run of all things!

 

[Warp Coil]

Would you rather have longer commercial breaks, or more frequent but shorter breaks?

I can tell you that the cable networks for which I work average about 43:30 of content in a one-hour timeslot. They currently have 5 commercial breaks (but a few years ago it was only 4 breaks). I'm not sure what the rationale is for wanting more, but shorter, commercial breaks. Perhaps they are trying to prevent viewers from changing the channel or getting restless while they suffer through the commercials?

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I understand when cable TV started there were no commercials. By the time I got it (as a kid) they had moved to having a commercial break between shows. So, for a half-hour show, you'd get to watch the whole thing and then sit through ~8 minutes of commercials. Sometimes there would even be a timer telling you how long until the next show was on!

Then, of course, cable started to work more and more like regular network television, cramming in commercial breaks all over the place.

 

[Tan Ru]

MSNBC is god-awful for long and frequent commercial breaks. I watch Rachel Maddow and (sometimes) the Ed Schultz show, and there seems to be a new commercial break every time you blink, and they go on, and on, and on.

I always wonder who the guy was that actually watched MSNBC......

 

[Amaris]

MSNBC is god-awful for long and frequent commercial breaks. I watch Rachel Maddow and (sometimes) the Ed Schultz show, and there seems to be a new commercial break every time you blink, and they go on, and on, and on.

I always wonder who the guy was that actually watched MSNBC......

Hey, Rachel Maddow is awesome! And adorable.

 

[Starbreaker]

There's a 6 or 7 minute gap between Double Jeopardy and Final Jeopardy here while I'm watching... Jeopardy. Quit annoying when I'm watching live.

 

[Guartho]

I haven't watched broadcast TV in any real sense since 2005. If I'm at someone else's house and the TV is on I just can't believe how long and frequent the breaks are.

I'm glad I'm not a sports fan, because everything else I can just wait and watch commercial-free.

 

[Owain Taggart]

Would you rather have longer commercial breaks, or more frequent but shorter breaks?

More frequent but shorter breaks are ideal, because then if they're spaced out correctly, I don't mind them and they don't seem to interrupt the flow as much. Long commercial breaks though are just annoying and make me feel like I'm wasting my time.

As for the ratio, well, yeah, I realize that, but it still doesn't help the fact that I wanted to watch something and got to watch more commercials than the actual show. Peachtree comes across as a channel trying to get as many commercials out as it can without regards to timing and comes across as sleazy.