Cable Companies Shortening Ad Breaks In Response to Cord Cutters

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rgMekanic

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BGR is reporting that in response to more and more people cutting the cord, both NBC and Fox have announced that they will be drastically cutting the amount of ads on their channels. Broadcast ad times on Fox were 13 minutes per hour this year, in an industry event last week, Fox Networks Group ad sales director Joe Marchese announced the company plans on cutting ad times to just two minutes per hour. NBCUniversal announced that it plans to cut the number of advertisements in a break by 20%.

This is a great move, and I can only hope that more networks follow suit. I have long said I wish we could go back to the way it was when you were watching "Show" sponsored by "Product," and not have the constant commercial interruption.

Linda Yaccarino, NBCU’s ad sales guru, told Variety that the change was directly driven by the limited-ad model of streaming services. “There are more and more consumers, whether it’s from Hulu or the Netflixes or Amazons of the world, who are liberated via technology” from having to watch the sheer number of advertisements shown on traditional television, said Yaccarino. “TV networks would be crazy to believe that anything other than commercial overhaul was anything other than inevitable.”
 
Step in the right direction. As a cord cutter, I find watching broken broadcast at other households extremely distracting. With streaming and DVDs my focus is more concentrated.

Have noticed that shows for american market are typically 41-43 minutes long, whereas ones from other regions like BBC are 55 minutes or so.

Addressing content is whole other matter.
 
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With all the cable company shit I've gone thru this week with my ISP... won't be giving them any more business than I absolutely must. Man I can't wait until the day there are some fresh choices.
 
Ads are 1/2 the problem.
The other 1/2 is the subsidization (is that a word?) of crap I don't care about. Like ESPN or it's offspring.
A la carte, baby. A la carte.

(I cut the cord when Comcast had a special which glorified the "contribution" of illegal aliens. Snip. Done. Take your politics out of my house.)
 
Too little, too late. They had a chance to address this ten years ago. Possibly earlier than that.

Kids are watching content on their hand-me-down tablets.

Bonus is that you don't have to simply watch things with an interactive device. Close process, spin up STEAM or launch some educational games. Boom, done.
 
I always figured if I am paying for the tv service, why should they have ads. Cable or sat channels that have more than 15 minutes of commercials per hour should be free to watch just like over the air. If you are gonna charge, then cut the commercials, 5 minutes tops just to keep my price down is ok, but why should I pay premium prices for the same format as free over the air tv?
 
I would only go back if I could pick my own channels and reduce ads to under 4 min /HR. Fine before the show but inturrupting so much breaks immersion.

Like someone constantly annoying you with request while you play an online mmorpg.... "Jesus, I CAN'T PAUSE IT FFS"
 
Honestly I'm amazed it's taken this long for the cable companies to start reacting. I mean they had to have seen this coming a long ways off... right?
 
it took them decades to ban the commercials having a +50dB boost. im not terribly surprised they made this move waaaay after driving off the cliff of inevitability.

i dont even know anybody in my social circles who have even had cable in the last 5 years.
 
It might help make me come back. Commercials are the main reason I cut the cord back in '13. Shows were becoming unwatchable because there were commercial breaks literally every 4 or 5 minutes.
 
>Joe Marchese announced the company plans on cutting ad times to just two minutes per hour.

That can't be right. Two minutes per hour?

But I do wonder if the networks will start moving away from the standard and start competing to reduce ads as a way to entice viewers.


MacLeod said:
It might help make me come back. Commercials are the main reason I cut the cord back in '13. Shows were becoming unwatchable because there were commercial breaks literally every 4 or 5 minutes.
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SpikeTV was the worst, some 1hr timeslots would have 36mins of show and 24mins of ads. That's way more than the traditional 42/18 split.
 
Last time I watched commercials on TV (several years ago), every commercial break was 3 car commercials, 2 ads for drugs with a side-effects list a mile long, and some network ad for a show I wont watch. Next commercial break it was the same thing again, just in a different order. There's no reason to see the same ads over and over again. Charge 10 times as much for the ads and show them once. It will have the exact same effect from a marketing standpoint (or better) and cost the same.
 
I don’t watch TV so I don’t care if they get rid of all ads. I only use it to watch sports at this point.
 
brentsg said:
Unless it's Youtube..
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Pfft... my android tv box has built in ad block for YouTube lol.
hlfbkd420 said:
My kids watch the most awful shit too... Let's play videos????? Wtf!!

They don't play with the same goddamn toys when they have em
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What's wrong with let's play videos, they are no different than men watching sports. It's people watching other people play a game they COULD play them selves but can't or don't want to.
 
20% reduction is jack shit, nice try but no. But Fox has the right idea to two minutes per hour.

This won't make me go back to cable. But at 2 minutes per hour it will stop me from shutting other people's tvs off when I go to their houses if they are watching cable. LoL.

The reduction is a big step, but the quality of advertisements is also hideous, ditch the fast talking fake peppy voices that sound like they are on crack. One thing they can do is at least keep the volume levels the same.
 
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Is this by choice or because advertisers are leaving legacy TV? The article leads me to believe that it's by choice, but if legacy TV services (cable, satellite, OTA broadcast) are bleeding as many viewers as is often reported, then maybe advertisers are simply reducing how much they advertise on legacy TV and this is being spun as offering a better viewing experience. I've seen paid advertisements running in the evening when I'd expect prime-time TV show to be aired, it's kinda like when you walk into K-Mart and get that sinking feeling that business probably isn't good for these people.
 
It isn't about the commercials.. it is about the cost.

Time Warner wanted $80/mo for cable without DVR and $120 with 100/10 internet+ digital cable no dvr! I have Netflix and I have Amazon Prime with or without cable and that solves almost all of my TV watching needs. Plus, I have gigabit up and down at LESS than TWC charged for 100/10. I don't see how they can ever win my business back.
 
Spidey329 said:
>Joe Marchese announced the company plans on cutting ad times to just two minutes per hour.

That can't be right. Two minutes per hour?

But I do wonder if the networks will start moving away from the standard and start competing to reduce ads as a way to entice viewers.
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Maybe two 1 minute breaks plus a ton of overlaid ads during the show.
I personally hate when ad's or promos pop up on the bottom or the corner of the show I am watching.
 
they are still going to keep those banners and pop-in on-screen ads ?

and make the channel logo garnished with advertisers pref even larger?
 
Hate commercials, but 2 minutes/hour? I don't know how you make money. Even in the 70s there was roughly 10 minutes/hour and while IMDB says I Love Lucy is 30 minutes/episode, taking the running time of S1 dvd and dividing by 35 episodes puts us at 26.25 minutes/ep.

Maybe they'll increase product placements in the shows (which certainly helps when people use a DVR.
darrpara said:
It isn't about the commercials.. it is about the cost.

Time Warner wanted $80/mo for cable without DVR and $120 with 100/10 internet+ digital cable no dvr! I have Netflix and I have Amazon Prime with or without cable and that solves almost all of my TV watching needs. Plus, I have gigabit up and down at LESS than TWC charged for 100/10. I don't see how they can ever win my business back.
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No doubt it's too much, but the reality is that as we move away from cable, we'll end up paying more for these streaming services. Amazon might be an exception, simply because they get more sales form people with prime. Also, I think it's no inevitable that most studios and/or networks will have their own streaming service. Once that happens, you could easily be at 50/month. Add a fair amount more if you want sports and news.

But that' understates the cost, because as competition increases, so will the cost of programming. Nevertheless, I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts :D
 
I went to a movie in a theater the other night and had to sit through 20 min of freaking television commercials. If I hadn't just dropped almost 50 bucks for the wife and I to go and get a couple drinks and a popcorn I might have just walked out.

Not even giving me 100% free cable could make me sit through one commercial on a screen at home anymore.
 
I don't mind a commercial or two in between shows. About 2 minutes worth. (enough time to refill drink and take a leak) Then maybe have another similar in the middle of the show.
 
I cut the cord this week actually. Saves me $1000 a year and I still have 400mbit internet.

The real kicker is in their attempts to keep me as a customer, they said the deal I currently had was the best they could do.... the $1000 per year on top of internet deal I told them that was too expensive was the best they could do (it went up $40/mo 2 months ago).

Then I got an email "please stay we'll give you the same plan 40% off!". So I called knowing full well that was going to be some fuzzy math BS. They cut my plan down a tier and the price was.... 12% lower? Um, wtf are these companies smoking?
 
The satellite provider was showing ads on channels I paid for - and most of the ads were repetitive, loud and annoying in addition to being illegal (internet casinos) in my country. Then they cut the porn, allegedly due to complaints from muslim immigrants.

That broke the camels back and I've never looked back.
 
Do not forget that in the 90's they shortened the show's intro so that they can have more ad time! It was a big deal in the 90's, all over the news, and really a shitty move. They just do not get it. If the commercial is entertaining then it is NOT intrusive to the individual-it becomes a "brand, jingle, joke, something to talk about, etc." But they rather make it so it feels like you are being fed shit. The art was lost.
 
The one thing I do miss after having cut the cord, is the cute young woman who chooses to take some daily maintenance pharmaceutical to make her life that much better, and, while jogging and smiling, tells me about all the potential side-effects, including anal leakage and possible fatal events. I miss the classics...
 
On a recent trip, I watched some cable TV at the hotel I was staying at. I was watching Cops. I was floored at how many commercials they showed during the show! It was almost unwatchable. It's hard to enjoy watching someone get tazed with all the commercials.
 
ChadD said:
I went to a movie in a theater the other night and had to sit through 20 min of freaking television commercials. If I hadn't just dropped almost 50 bucks for the wife and I to go and get a couple drinks and a popcorn I might have just walked out.

Not even giving me 100% free cable could make me sit through one commercial on a screen at home anymore.
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For 100% free i would get it and keep it. Not one red cent i would pay. I would be questioning the health aspect of that many commercials though.
 
Firstly, they need to do away with those awful cable boxes. They eat electricity and cost $10 a month. For $50 I can buy a Kodi box and install the cable providers app to watch live streams of the channels for no additional cost. Except for FIOS, which their app won't install on the Kodi boxes. Its very particular. But in this day in age I shouldn't need a stupid box to watch TV. NetFlix works on Android, iOS, Mac, Windows, and Linux, so why don't the cable companies try to do the same?

Secondly, they should record all the shows so that a stupid DVR isn't needed. The DVR is like the additional warranty Best Buy asks you to put onto your $10 purchase. If I miss a show I can easily go online and find it for free. Cable companies should be able to record all the shows and put it on their app to download for free. Also, speaking of DVR, most of the cable boxes have empty bays for a hard drive, and a firewire port to transfer recordings over to your computer. They're all disabled and as far as I'm aware there is no way to turn those on.
 
Have to wonder about Fox's claim of 13 minutes per hour. I remember back in the 90's when I was taping one of the Star Trek series and pausing during the commercials that the length of show went from 45 minutes counting the credits to 43.5 minutes. So 16.5 minutes of commercials per hour. So either Fox has already scaled back on commercials to some degree or they are only counting Fox commercials and not the locally inserted ones. IIRC, the Star Trek Original Series ran about 53 minutes of show per hour.
 
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