Ad Nauseas

All together now, what's the one thing we all hate when it comes to watching TV? COMMERCIALS! Yeah, I know, we’re told commercials are a necessary evil. It’s what keeps so called “free” TV free. Advertising pays the bills for the networks to buy the talent and book the programs (no matter how lousy) so that we can all turn into obese couch potatoes and stare at a big screen filled with moving blobs of color until we morph into Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest right after he’s had his lobotomy.

But here’s the thing. Have you noticed the steady increase in advertising over the past year or so? Didn’t think so.  The sneaky bastards have incrementally been stealing our precious mind-numbing program time and using it to further imprint their products deep in our cerebral cortex (or wherever imprints are stored).

Let me demonstrate with the following data gathered by my painstaking research so that you don’t have to. I saw it as my duty as well as a public service. I think few other programs reveal the covert advertising plot for what is as well as the Discovery Channel. Here’s the breakdown of a random one hour show.

00:00 Opening credits and promo lasting until 01:43 into the hour.

01:43 to 11:11 Program

11:11 to 15:55 Commercial

15:55 to 25:36 Program

25:36 to 29:15 Commercial

29:15 to 36:35 Program

36:35 to 40:20 Commercial

40:20 to 46:36 Program

46:36 to 49:45 Commercial

49:45 to 50:32 Program HOLD IT! Look again at that time.  Programming was on for only 47 seconds before going right back to commercial. This has become a common practice. Sons a bitches.

50:32 to 54:00 More commercials

54:00 to 59:59 Program, but then, pay attention now, the DVR QUIT RECORDING!

 Yes, the machine stopped recording at the top of the hour just as it was supposed to, based on the program times listed on the guide, but the program wasn’t over! No, it ran for another two or three minutes past the hour, thereby cheating you out of the last three minutes of drivel. An anomaly? I think not. More like a plot to discourage you, dear zombie, from recording your favorite foolishness and forced to make the choice of missing the ending or sit through the commercials. How cold hearted is that?

And let’s not forget those annoying little icon ads tucked away in the corners of the screen, or worse, the distracting, scrolling promos across the bottom , or how about the little human figures that jump out with a sign saying “watch me?” OMG, where’s the gun?

Did you watch the OSU-OU football game last Saturday? Did you see the big net that came up behind the goal posts for the extra points and field goals? I saw it. It had a monster logo of the Allstate Insurance Company on it. These guys don’t miss a trick.

Now for the program to commercial comparison:  it came to roughly 25 minutes of commercials for every 35 minutes of programming, plus or minus a few seconds. This is a depressing change from the previous 20 minutes to 40 minutes ratio. You can see where this is heading.

There is one thing. Remember the 2012 Doomsday prediction, approaching fast, less than a month from now if you buy the date 12/21/2012 as the big cataclysm? And then…no more TV commercials. There’s that.