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Comment by bonoboTP | Hacker News Reader

When watching TV, I often switch away when the ads come. Then after a few minutes I switch back to continue watching the program. Do you think this behavior is also unacceptable? Or how do you feel about people who throw away promotional stuff found in magazines and newspapers?

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On U.S. TV you can pretty much watch the first 5 minutes of the show and come back and watch the last 5 minutes without missing anything of consequence... everything you missed was flashbacks, bullshit and advertising. This describes 90% of all American TV content.

Edit: I guess the truth hurts. Thanks for the downvotes. Whatever, I stand by my observation as a foreigner having watched TV in many other countries and I can tell you from first hand experience that U.S. TV is the worst offender by a HUGE margin.

Ok I know that's meant cynically, but watching is about more than determining 'who-done-it'? The journey is supposed to be enjoyable.

Which it totally would be if it didn't get interrupted for ads every 10 minutes and then have flashbacks to remind you what you were already told before the commercial break.

Yeah this recap dialog fad is going way too far.

Have you ever watched American TV? This reads like someone who turned on Bravo at 2PM one time and decided all TV must be like that.

I have lived (and still do) in Canada and spent the past 18 years with access to the full suite of channels that American TV has to offer. It is largely the only TV I have access to (though not solely because I still have the internet after all). In the past couple of years I've limited my consumption to the point of avoiding it because it has become so bad.

Ok, your edit makes more sense. I agree that American TV has way too much advertising and is the worst on that front compared to many other countries. I think your original comment was downvoted because it was just a handful of stereotypes with not much relation to reality.

Also, the shows themselves are generally quite good, it's just the networks that suck. When many Americans think of TV they're thinking of HBO and Netflix and friends, so advertising isn't such a big deal.

That's a matter of interpretation. HBO and Netflix aren't TV, and while perhaps many Americans may interpret these as TV, my perspective is that they're not TV shows, but movie formats.

My main point is that with "regular" TV, if you removed all of the flashback reminders and commercials, you've basically got a 15 minute TV show stretched over the period of an hour with as much drama as can be thrown in so as to keep you sitting there in front of as many commercials as they can squeeze in during that time. It's a disgraceful waste of your time as a viewer.

One of the main purposes of Netflix is to show normal TV shows without commercials, though. And seriously, have you watched anything besides reality TV? The Office? Breaking Bad? Any decently reviewed show in the last 10 years?

I think what they're commenting on is the sort of editing time-line encountered on such shows in the genre similar to "greatest ice-road vintage trucker sale digger catch".

These tend to be, in a 30 minute slot:

<2 minute highlight reel>

<2 minutes of original footage>

<1 minute of "coming up next">

<5 minutes of ads>

<1 minute of "previously on...">

<3 minutes of original footage>

<1 minute of "coming up next">

<5 minutes of ads>

<1 minute of "previously on...">

<3 minutes of original footage>

<1 minute of "next time on...">

<5 minutes of ads>

Which gives 8 minutes of original footage stretched over 30 minutes, with 15 minutes of ads and 7 minutes of rehashing.

This format, although now popular in other countries, is a "modern-classic" of US television.

> "greatest ice-road vintage trucker sale digger catch"

You'd better get on the horn to Discovery, I think you've got a gold mine on your hands there ;)

> a "modern-classic" of US television

If by "modern-classic" you mean "beyond irritating" :P

Plus: You nailed that edit real, kudos - though, you missed the 1 minute "> Previously on...whatever show it is" at the beginning. 8 minutes of content on a channel you pay for, plus 15 minutes of advertising... so you're basically paying more for the ads than you are for the content... there's something really really wrong with this from a moral perspective.

If you pay for a channel, you should be paying for the content on that channel, not paying to be advertised to with some content as a by-product just to get money from both ends of the donkey.

Which came first? This TV show format or the Listicle?

Either of which is beyond annoying.

Once in a while, I'll seek out a few Listicles with ad blocking off to see just what the state of the art of agressively deceptive advertisements is.

Yeah, I get that, but that's a fairly small sub-genre of TV. It's a common stereotype, and I agree it's warranted because that style is obnoxious, but it's not actually a problem if you live in the US and want to watch something different.

They do the same thing with sports - cutting out action to cut to commercial breaks... and I don't mean during timeouts or whatever. They cut off soccer to go to commercial break during play! Soaps are the same... educational shows are the same. Commercials every 10 minutes. It's a joke how much advertising is done on TV you pay to watch content - not ads.

While the UK isn't exactly a model citizen in this respect, at least on the BBC which everyone (arguably) pays a TV license for, there is content wall to wall... because you pay for that. On channels you don't pay for, there is advertising, and I think this is totally fair. But why should people pay to (mostly) be advertised to and not to be delivered the content that they're paying for?

Editors are cheaper than actors.

Obligatory Mitchell and Webb Gift Shop Sketch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MFtl2XXnUc

What's even more hilarious is when you watch these "documentaries" syndicated in Germany. Our usual ad format is one 7-minute ad break every 30 minutes instead of 2 minutes every few minutes. But you still have the artificial dramatic buildups before the missing ad slot, that you can see resolve into nothingness immediately.

My issue isn't really with ad-blocking. It's with people like the parent who act like it's a human rights violation but still take the content and don't offer an alternative. If you feel so strongly about it boycott companies showing you ads.

Speaking personally, I do. Internet ads are usually a sign of low-quality content, for instance they seem to have an incredible power to turn previously esteemed newspapers into clickbait factories.

The best content on the internet is ad-free.

Don't serve web pages to me if you don't want me to decide which parts are acceptable.

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