ITV and Adverts

littleowl

It seems to me that recently the ad breaks in ITV programmes have become wearingly longer.

I find it increasingly frustrating when a drama is interrupted at such length by advertising. To enjoy a drama one has to engage with the programme - become involved - this involvement is destroyed by such long interpolations.

I know that ITV is having financial problems but increasing the length and number of advertisements interpolated into programmes is surely more likely to lose viewers?

However much I really want to watch a particular programme, if it is scheduled for ITV I find myself increasingly reluctant to do so. The irritation is just too great and, however good, any enjoyment is destroyed for me.

Once or twice this week I have watched Midsommer Murders in the afternoon and have been struck by the relative shortness of ad interruptions. Perhaps daytime viewers are not regarded as good enough targets for advertisers and they overload the evening schedules.

Whatever the reasoning I believe that the commercial channels which are pursuing this policy are on a hiding to nothing and they are achieving little for their advertisers. I am not persuaded to buy whatever they are pushing - in fact I am more likely to NOT purchase any of the products.

daveboy

I'm sure I'm not the only one that thinks the adverts would be more interesting than Midsommer Murders. ITV has always had adverts so I don't really see what the point of the post is.

You have a remote control and possibly buttons on the TV itself. Turn over if you don't like it. Moaning on here will make little difference as people will watch what THEY want to watch. I like football.....adverts at half time and around the side of the pitch and it doesn't bother me in the slightest.

Halloway

The extent to which ad breaks have increased is notable in older dramas such as 'Inspector Morse'. When shown originally they lasted two hours with ad breaks. Now when they are repeated they are often cut and last two hours five minutes or more.

This is the nature of commercial TV. I have some Stargate SG-1 episodes on DVD and they last a shade over 41 minutes. When Sky show them they last an hour. Go, as the Yanks say, figure.

littleowl

daveboy wrote: »

I'm sure I'm not the only one that thinks the adverts would be more interesting than Midsommer Murders. ITV has always had adverts so I don't really see what the point of the post is.

You have a remote control and possibly buttons on the TV itself. Turn over if you don't like it. Moaning on here will make little difference as people will watch what THEY want to watch. I like football.....adverts at half time and around the side of the pitch and it doesn't bother me in the slightest.

Midsommer Murders was merely given as an example as I'm sure you are aware.

Yes, of course I can silence the television, I could go and dig the garden read a book etc etc. My point was that excessively long breaks during a drama (which I want to watch) are destructive and alienating and that they are getting longer. The result, as far as I'm concerned, is that I will watch fewer programmes on commercial channels. Counter-productive as far as the seemingly cash-strapped companies are concerned I would have thought.

This board is for venting and I am doing just that.

mrsmortenharket

SKY Plus, lol!

tape & then FF the ad's

BargainGalore

Or a freeview or freesat pvr around £80+

I have to agree I noticed they are getting longer, I seem to recall that they are changing the way adverts are being shown in the near future which will be more evasive advertising

Anyhow ITV are loosing money very quickly and are making large cuts due to the down turn, so maybe things will get worse

Also I just read advertising revenue is well down and they get less now and its back to 1992 levels, so expect things only to get worse unfortunately

I actually put off ITV a lot for 1 most programs are rubbish, the news is no where as good as BBC and adverts are a real turn off, but I realise they have to have them just a shame the programs are rather poor. Thank God for BBC

mrsmortenharket wrote: »

SKY Plus, lol!

tape & then FF the ad's

I found this

Between 6-11pm they can run 40 minutes ad time with a maximum of 12 minutes in any one hour, so they can run several hours nearly ad free if they play 12 minutes ads in any 3 hour sequence.

broonbear

i just don't watch adverts EVER, flick through the channels till the programme comes back on

before_hollywood

do what i do- record films and comedy and play them back through sky+ or put them on dvd

it costs about 40p a disk, most of my stuff comes off bbc (the late films on bbc 1 are quite good, there are usually 3 or so good films a week), film 4 has good stuff but a lot is repeated over and over and itv2 has big name stuff but typically its repeated loads, a big box of disks is about £7 and i just keep them for when i want to watch them, cos usually i dont want to watch a film at gone 11pm

brightonman123

ah, the wonders of freeview/sky+ etc! record, and skip the ads!

oldagetraveller

brightonman123 wrote: »

ah, the wonders of freeview/sky+ etc! record, and skip the ads!

Yes, Humax even have an "ad skip" button on their remote control which is adjustable to 30 second increments. Most ad breaks are 3 -4 minutes long so I just set the skip for 1 minute increments and press the button 3/4 times.
I always make sure, if possible , to record the ITV etc. programmes with adverts and watch the non advert programmes e.g. BBC.
Or at the start of an advert content programme, press the pause and go to do something else for 15/20 minutes then resume and by the time the programme has ended the time is all synchronised again due to advert skipping.
The broadcasters must hate these Sky+ and pvr boxes?
I have noticed the breaks seem to be more frequent and longer than they used to be.

Always_Harassed

ts_aly2000 wrote: »

Take the aerial down. Stop the Sky. Cancel your television licence. We have.

Our entertainment now comes from the constant stream of threatening letters from TVLA, ...they've actually started coming round and putting the letters through the door personally. Ironically they only seem to do this DURING THE DAY when we're at work... Their replies to my letters follows the same mantra of 'You own a television, you pay.' Actually I bought hubby a new 32" for his Playstation and XBOX, and they've now gone into overdrive, ..they spelt my surname wrong. Now there's two lots! Even if you inform them they just carry on...

You honestly won't miss it after a month or two. Anything we want to watch we buy on DVD; Father Ted, BlackAdder Goes Forth etc. etc.

But be warned, you will have to put up with the TV licence people hounding you to death and accusing you of being a criminal for not watching the Government's mind control propaganda. "There is no recession. All is well. We are in control. Life is good. You are safe."

I think you should check licencing rules quickly. If you have a pc ar TV whether you watch tv or not you are still due to pay as they are capable of receiving tv.