Commercials make us like TV more (2010)
hbr.org
hbr.org
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Basically: "You think you don't like ads but we know you actually do like them deep-down."
> Jail is incomprehensibly horrible the first day. Eventually, it’s less awful.
> But if you let that prisoner out for a day…
> That’d be practically cruel. You’d stop the adaptation and retrigger those initial feelings about jail when they had to go back.
Yikes! "Don't mind being in jail for long, you'll get used to it."
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To me the only good point of this article is the last question by the interviewer:
> What are you doing next? Trying to prove we actually love the dentist?
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What was the meme'd phrase again from one of the press conferences years ago? Something like "you think you do but you don't"?
Yeah it was a Q&A session and the topic of adding servers to play original World of Warcraft. The full thing was
"You don't want to do that. You think you do, but you don't."
To to tell you how correct they were about this, Blizzard later added "World of Warcraft: Classic", which was popular enough to add "Burning Crusade Classic" severs, and will be adding "Wrath of The Lich King Classic."
To me, this appears to be rose tinted glasses. We can pause 'TV' now, and do stuff in between like dishes or toilet. But we don't have to. No more forced commercials. Both are features I enjoyed in past with this technology called VHS. One thing I miss is certain jokes at school/work based on TV commercials. But that too is likely those glasses being rose-tinted. Cause nowadays we got memes. Many memes, handle it.
I thoroughly enjoy the ability to have a video on my smartphone on the toilet, in bed or music or a podcast with my smartphone while doing chores/errands or either during commute. And the quality and availability and price of the streaming services is good enough right now (if it isn't I go back to piracy). Same with ebooks (though I use a Kobo; not Amazon).
One commercial I remember was for shampoo for women. The girl who tries it gets a "hello Betty!" from the high school hunk, and she preens.
For a while every Betty in my high school got that treatment :-/
I suppose the commercial didn't actually work, because I have no recollection of what that shampoo was.
Things such as “Don’t mind the explosions, it’s not my city block”, etc.
In the 90's, I had a Panasonic VCR that could detect superblack and use those markers to automatically skip commercials on playback.
After several months of using it, I found myself not understanding a lot of general cultural references that my coworkers would make around the office. It became increasingly hard to socialize with them between tasks because I was left out of a lot of what the rest of society knew about.
It's how I learned that commercials were a big part of our shared culture back then. i assume it's sort of like being the only kid in high school without Netflix today.
When twitch gets past my ad blocker, I reflexively close the tab. And those are only a few seconds. For the same reason I would be unable to watch a TV channel that has ads.
The article seems suspect to me. Possibly because I can't relate at all.
The title might as well be, "shows that are written specifically to have commercials are more entertaining when the commercials are kept in".
I agree that this observation doesn't nessecarily hold for modern media which was designed to be marathoned from the outset ad-free. Commercial Breaks now seem like much more of an afterthought instead of something actually woven into the scriptwriting, which only make commercials more offensive.
I'd much rather watch one episode per night (or week) and have something to look forward to and enjoy for awhile. Plus it's nice to have variety - an episode of this show, an episode of that one.
Yes, but... I enjoy certain youtube content, oftentimes it'll be ripped tv shows. Nothing more annoying (but thank you, rippers) than the cut adverts being so obviously cut, in that there's a 15min intro, a build up, and then a ridiculous summary of 'the predicament' (which would have been after the ads) and bujld up.
Did we really forget everything when adverts were shown?
US shows are worse, probably because they showe more adverts?
> US shows are worse, probably because they showe more adverts?
When the adverts are shown, it's a good time to stop and consider if anything else is on and worth watching. You may stop on a different show and need to be brought up to speed, or have burned your short term memory with 50-150 channels of ads and garbage. I think the US has a bigger percent of tv viewers with a pay tv subscription with a ton of channels, but I could be way off?
Of course, some shows really don't have that much content, so they spend a lot of time rehashing what they already showed you.
And then you've got online tv with commercials where they insert them almost, but not quite at the intended insertion points. Ugh, that's terrible.
That’s not necessarily the case - I remember growing up in Canada and having an extra 60-90 seconds cut from some of my favorite US TV shows to make room for even more commercials. I knew this because we’d vacation across the border and I’d get to see the full length original shows.
We had to move to it because our kids have not experienced commercials and would get upset every time some came on. They just didn’t understand interruptions to what they were watching.
Annoys the hell out of me that they continue to call it "Hulu (No Ads)". It really shows the level of respect they have for their customers.
Thanks for pointing that out! (And I should dig into those details the next time I share links like that)
Thoughts: Clickbait title. A better title would be: 'Interruptions make us like a TV show more'.
Note: The authors are "working with a large TV network, which is replicating the study in its market research".
I will go to extreme lengths to avoid commercials in any medium. They're a principle reason for my watching no television at all. Even sponsorship spots and various nags on noncommercial radio broadcasts will prompt me to change the station or put on a recording instead. I note that in listening to podcasts, I have an exceptionally strong preference for those without any advertising at all, with fixed pre- or post-roll spots (which I can skip automatically), or with specific timed slots with intro/outro audio cues (which I can skip manually). The worst are programmes where the ads appear frequently (several times per episode) and/or without notice. Ironically, it's several public-radio podcasts which seem to be among the worst offenders in this spot.
And on the Web I ad-block aggressively as well as remove distracting features from websites ranging from registration requests to interstitial recommendation to "link-litter" social icons.
I've a possible control experiment though for the suggestion that breaks or pauses might aid in enjoyment or appreciation of a piece.
I've listened to public broadcasting over several decades in multiple markets, some large/primary, some not. In primary markets, the various station breaks in programming tend to be filled with sponsorship slots, promos for other programming, and the like. In smaller markets ... not so much, and often interstitial music plays between segments (as part of the primary programme). I've noticed that where or when I'd had access to stations which did this, the news was less harrying to me, overall. Every ten minutes or so there'd be a small interlude, and I could reflect on what I'd just heard or attend to something else. Where programme follows spot follows programme, it's simply a constant sensory assault.
I do miss those breaks.
People from Western Europe (I know the UK and France, I'm not so sure about elsewhere) tend to remark on the pervasiveness and obnoxiousness of commercials on American private, ad-sponsored television. I wish we had had more government sponsorship and regulation of television here the way they did in the UK and France.
In the 80s and 90s there were actually awards for creative and well composed commercials that were interesting to watch. Now we have commercials that stoke fears of chronic illness, overly-extended commercials, and nonsensical commercials that try to sell us too many things we don't want or need. Commercials are targeted at us in very creepy ways as well. Companies now are regularly ruining their credibility just to make one sale in commercials, and it's also not sustainable... Many companies run huge/expensive marketing campaigns and then quickly burn out after initial hype (For reference, look up "pink sauce" on TikTok).
A big part of the problem in cheap advertising is that when it is available everywhere, it becomes inauthentic, low effort, and over-saturated... And the products and services are weakened by more emphasis on marketing than on quality and reputation.
Commercials are killing everything now because they are all over the place. When we saw Blade Runner years ago, it was a dystopian ideal, but now companies would put big screens playing ads for lawyers, doctors, and even pharmaceuticals on ambulances if they could. It's spam. Ad spots are also even subtly being placed in content and shows on TV, it all has the psychological effect of alienation towards ads when it is overdone to where there will likely be a movement to reject technology and entertainment if the oversaturation continues.
Commercials now are also far too repetitive and there are too many with each break. Back in the 80s, I recall a long stretch of time where there were only 3 max per commercial break. The price of ad space was higher, and only major companies sponsored ads. The bar is so low now that scammers and even influencers can buy ad space, and it creates far too much overload.
Probably the worst part is that if you pay money for cable TV, you're also spending tons of time watching ads. It's like buying a device that 50% of the time does not do what you expected it to do, and that constantly tries to encourage you and manipulate you mentally to spend more money.
Because the cost of living is high now, people are beginning to reject ads and desire more calm. If TVs and the Internet become spam machines, people will simply stop buying them and turn them off because there is a limit to how many ads people can tolerate, and companies really aren't properly respecting that.
This has been going on since TV started. Perry Mason's revolving assortment of cars were provided gratis by car companies. Bullitt's car chase was an ad for the Mustang and Charger (a very effective ad, I might add). 1950s shows were always "brought to you by..." and the show itself would pitch the soap or whatever.
I don’t remember most of the TV shows on watches, but I remember many commercials. Some of them were really awesome.
Commercials now are lousier, but streaming commercials are worse for some reason. I don’t understand why MLB.tv commercials are awful, but if you watch the regional sports network they are better.
Interestingly, they did control for the effects of TV that was edited with commercials in mind (cliffhangers, etc.) in "Study 2", where participants watched a 4-minute animation with and without interruptions.
Meetings are the interruptions lol, they make me appreciate real work all the more
Yes, a better approach would be to give a panel of test-subjects the ability to skip commercials and see how often they would use this feature.