Pop-Up Ads on TV! No way!

[KevinG]

Don't look now, but TV ads suddenly have found a whole new way to invade our space.

All of a sudden, not even the programs themselves are safe.

I'm not talking about the ads interrupting the shows, which have been a staple of broadcast network TV for half a century. I'm not even talking about the increasingly annoying practice of product placement, in which characters on TV shows drive vehicles that conveniently pop up in ads during the next commercial break.

And I'm not even talking about those annoying network promos that pop up in the lower third of the screen while a show is in progress - the ones that interfere with the enjoyment of what watching one program in the hopes of enticing us to watch another one later.

No, this is something new, and sinister, and, if it catches on, terrifying. And like so many things that drag TV down instead of elevating it, there's no reason it won't catch on, unless viewers complain.

What is this sudden new threat to quality TV viewing? Monday night on NBC's "Heroes," just as the action switched from one scene to another (not to a commercial, just a different part of the narrative), one of those lower-third-of-the-screen interruptions popped up.

The promotion, pulling attention away from whatever was happening on "Heroes" at the time, was there to deliver to viewers the following written message: "'American Gangster' - In Theaters Friday."

Not another NBC show. Not a news flash. An ad for a movie - one distributed by NBC Universal - right smack in the middle of a program.

NBC has also done this with "Bee Movie."

But "American Gangster," shilled in the middle of the action of "Heroes," is difficult to miss.

Which, of course, is precisely the point.

Now that TiVo and DVR technology allow viewers to time-shift their favorite shows and zip through the commercials, product placement within shows is way up, and newly released Nielsen ratings confirm the common wisdom: Give people a chance to skip commercials, and they will. Since broadcast TV is a commercial medium, what's a network to do?

Stick ads right into the shows, where they can't be fast-forwarded through, that's what.

NBC has a term for these: "snipes," a word borrowed from construction-site papering of ads.

Here's an even more sinister-sounding term, and one with a noble TV history: "blipverts," which suggests both the quickness and pervasiveness of an advertising message. The term comes from an episode of ABC's "Max Headroom," and was coined almost 20 years ago.

If we don't complain now, and loudly, blipverts are destined to be our future.

Source: NY Daily News

I think ads can be annoying, but people also have to make a living, and some of them happen to depend on ads to do so.

This author's opinion doesn't take commerce into consideration.

The smart, market-oriented solution would be for cable and dish companies to offer another level of service where you don't have any ads, but you have to pay more for your monthly cable or dish bill.

[Jace]

i saw that ad on heroes and it was NOTHING, i barely noticed it...but I DID notice it, more than I notice commericals now with my tivo, haha

besides they have been doing those for years

many a late night I have sat coked up and edgy trying to relax and watch tv at extremely low volume when a little ad comes into the corner of my screen at a higher volume than the program that is playing and I poop myself and cry at the same time....

see, nothing new!

[KevinG]

LOL Jace!

[Forest]

pop up ads have been on tv for a while now

i remember last years when some new show was comming out they would pop a live ad along the bottom 1/3 of the screen over the show i was watching

fucking annoying as hell. I refused to watch the advertised show just because of that ad

[EmporerEJ]

Originally Posted by Forest

pop up ads have been on tv for a while now

i remember last years when some new show was comming out they would pop a live ad along the bottom 1/3 of the screen over the show i was watching

fucking annoying as hell. I refused to watch the advertised show just because of that ad

I'm with you...and, I go one further......
I call the advertisier and tell them why. (When it's for G&S)

[EmporerEJ]

Originally Posted by Jace

many a late night I have sat coked up and edgy trying to relax and watch tv at extremely low volume when a little ad comes into the corner of my screen at a higher volume than the program that is playing and I poop myself and cry at the same time....

Damn near fell off my chair laughing!!!!!!!!



I'm sure I sprained something.......something important too.....

[RawAlex]

Integrated advertising is the next frontier for prime time TV. The idea is that while people may skip 30 second commercial on their TIVO or edit them out when the file share, they won't delete actual content. Making the content and the advertising interdependent pretty much makes it impossible for people to get away from it.

It can be as simple as a prominent ad for a soft drink or something clear in the background for an extended period of time, and can go all the way to characters going to see a specific movie, talking about another TV show, or eating out at a specific chain restaurant. All of these things are unavoidable ads that people have to deal with.

The more advanced systems replaced that soft drink ad with a computer "blank spot" that can have different ads on it during re-runs or in syndication, or potentially different ads for different cities.

Anything to make the income to pay to make the shows.

[EmporerEJ]

Originally Posted by RawAlex

The more advanced systems replaced that soft drink ad with a computer "blank spot" that can have different ads on it during re-runs or in syndication, or potentially different ads for different cities.

Baseball and football have been doing this for years...
And product placement is nothing new.

What we're talking about here are the obnoxious little animations that run across the bottom 3rd of the screen right in the middle of what you're watching. And if you ask me, they've crossed the line.
It's bad enough they had 10 minutes of commercials per star trek episode in the late 60's
Now, it's down to 35-43 minutes of program hour.
But then they have to add an overlay pop-up?
I don't think so.

[RawAlex]

Did you happen to catch the one on the family guy involving Quagmire and Marge Simpson? Fucking hilarious (although not exactly in good taste http://youtube.com/watch?v=q345mRhrrJU ). Fox has always been very aggressive about using the bottom third of the screen for running promos for what is coming up next, specials, etc. I am suspecting that with HD TV, someone will start using the right hand side of the screen for stuff, especially when they are re-broadcasting older non-HD source material.