On-Screen "Snipe" Ads Clutter Fall TV Programs

New York Times:

Kyra Sedgwick, star of "The Closer" on TNT, walks under a police tape and scans the screen with her flashlight. And every time she does, she makes Gretchen Corbin, a technical writer in Berkeley, Calif., irate.

The promotional ads for "The Closer" run in the bottom right of the screen during other TNT programs -- a graphic called a snipe. But for Ms. Corbin, who sometimes watches movies that have subtitles, the tiny images block the dialogue.

"Some ad just took over the entire bottom of the screen so I missed what the characters said to each other," said Ms. Corbin, describing a recent experience. "And it's TV, so you can't rewind."

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[Stranded]

12:08 PM on 09/25/2007

FINALLY someone has spoken up about this phenomenon! It amazes me that people are really the cattle for corporate will, seemingly so oblivious to the content, much less quality, of what they invest their attentions in.

So many times now I've complained to people I know that TV has become unwatchable because of all the pop-ups and nobody seems to know what I'm talking about. You haven't NOTICED that between every commercial break there's someone jumping up and down on the screen, waving their arms to divert your attention from what you're supposedly there to watch? It's absurd watching 60 Minutes doing a serious report and having a "snipe" advertising Cold Case Files coming up next.

But that's just the point--there seems to be no sense of how utterly absurd it is, like we're all just here to bathe in the glory of desperate attempts for our attention, while diminishing the quality of "downtime." When I get home from work and sit down to relax, the last thing I want is someone ringing my bell constantly.

What's happening is that the corporations have finally integrated advertising and content into one product. I'm SO TIRED of having ads thrust at me CONSTANTLY, EVERYWHERE (take a hint, HuffPost!). I live in a Nielsen household, and when those things pop out at me, I just change the channel. Has it made a difference? Nope.

It really is the end of TV. It's actually driving me away. Now they're not only placing a logo on the corner of the screen THROUGHOUT the shows, they've started placing ads next to the logos that stay onscreen.

It's easy to say we should just turn it off, but I like to be able to watch movies and documentaries. What this phenomenon says about people of all ages is truly sad and frightening. There's no such thing as civil entertainment left. We're all just here to be used by our corporate masters. There's the bell, now SALIVATE!

Ugh.

Diatribe completed. Don't miss Ugly Betty, coming up next!

[DrPaulProteus]

12:17 AM on 09/25/2007

cancel cable and wait for the DVD release?

hard to sympathize with people getting "irate" about some lame tv show being interrupted with ads for some other lame tv show. the world is going to shit. turn the tv off and get irate about something that matters.

[kellygrrrl]

04:41 PM on 09/24/2007

paging Lewis Black!
sounds like an issue best suited to Back in Black commentary

[JScott]

02:10 PM on 09/24/2007

Oh please it's just f**ing annoying and all this so called 'research' about 'younger viewers' find it more acceptable-I think it's total BS-it's just like when they offer new AV equipment with ALL those dials and switches and stuff-at first folks buy it but then later research shows folks never use half of the stuff on it and then a stripped down version is introduced because the previously cluttered model has slow sales, I see the same thing happening with autos, too bad TV execs don't see this comin.

[mediamarv]

01:45 PM on 09/24/2007

Simple: Don't watch!

And tell everyone you know that you don't watch. Viral non-watching should be the goal. Eventually that will make it to those weird Neilsen families who are dictating what goes on tv.

[faboofour]

01:24 PM on 09/24/2007

Except for baseball (where the director knows not to obscure an important play with some idiot CG) I've stopped watching real-time television (commercial and public) altogeter specifically because of these "snipes" or "bugs" or whatever the heck they call 'em. DVDs of TV shows offer the same content without the distraction. And y'know, BitTorrent applications are pretty easy to work these days, even for us "silver surfers." There's lots of DVD rips out there for the taking.
So obscuring the screen with jumpy graphics grabs a few casual viewers? Is it worth the cost of alienating everyone else, driving them to pirate video?
Seems short-sighted to me.

[aintnogod]

10:42 AM on 09/24/2007

I think it's funny that we used to have an expression which perfectly reflects the kind of brain pattern a multi-tasked youngster might develop. We used to call people whose multitasking habits created concentration problems, "scatterbrained". I think these "I gotta make a buck" sort of TV execs who push "snipers" (i.e. brain killers) are already mostly brain dead if not scatterbrained themselves. But I'm 69 years old, and it's obvious to me that younger people are already brainwashed to accept that they are nothing more than pieces of meat, docile little consumertoids, who aren't expected to be able to concentrate hard enough to see through what's being done to them and the nation they live in. So I just note what's happening and laugh and remark to friends about the decline in America's power and place in the world. Don't forget, it's a nation of sniper targets who have given us the Bush regime. It's a nation of sniper targets which needs to import people from other nations to even keep up it's technologies. But who would expect TV leaders to care about America? They've still got an entire world to turn into targets for snipers. Given their loyalty to the buck alone, would you expect them to care if they destroy America?

[gala1]

01:30 PM on 09/24/2007

Isn't that odd?
As soon as I read this scatter-brained was what popped into my mind, too, appropriately enough.
What I find truly remarkable about the frat bunch that has taken control of network TV is that they have no actual visualization of who it is that is watching. And no comprehension of what their audience either prefers or dislikes. And why.
Overstuffing ads is probably the fastest way to make you go HBO.

The older you are, as in boomer years, the more likely you are to spend your predictable nights plopped in front of the tube.

The younger the demographic the more likely that your are either out and serendipitously about or at the computer.

But since all this garbage has started appearing on screen, I made the happy realization that some shows, I found I can catch on computer with less clutter, and way less ads.
I use the ad time to check in on anything else when it does how up.
And if you wait a season and rent from Netflix or your library, you get the whole season at once and none of the visual pollution that goes with it. For some reason , it is far more entertaining to see everything at once than in weekly gaps.

And since the cable news channel have gone kaleidoscope, I find it is easier to just run around listening, rather than watch.
Wolf Blitzer may be personally responsible for the resurgence of knitting in this country, and exercising in front of the news is a great way to make the indignation you feel translate into some extra push.

If I ran a network, I'd make sure every single decision was made by someone over 40. At least, then I could feel secure in the knowledge that product and consumer were on the same page. Not to mention issues like taste, imagination and insight.

I dare a network to try.
What on earth do they have left to lose?

gala
[e-mail]

[BearsGrl8]

02:35 PM on 09/24/2007

I find it interesting that you accuse me and my generation as "already brainwashed to accept that they are nothing more than pieces of meat, docile little consumertoids, who aren't expected to be able to concentrate hard enough to see through what's being done to them and the nation they live in," when you and your generation are responsible for doing the brainwashing. Seems to me like a case of blaming the victim. If you do your research, you'll see that it is not myself nor other young people who paved the way for Bush and his cronies but the older generations who have been voting for years. More older people voted for Bush than younger people. With more than 50 years of voting eligibility, I think you bear more responsibility than I do with less than a decade.

Myself, as well as all my friends, are politically active voters who don't miss an election, even the "minor" ones like referendums and local positions. We are not brainwashed nor are we apathetic.

I am perfectly able to multitask while watching TV. In fact, I prefer to multitask. I can crochet a baby blanket for a friend while watching the news or whatever. Look back 20 years and you'll see that Babyboomers were doing everything they could think of to be better multitaskers and my generation was raised in that culture. Simply because you can't (or won't) doesn't mean I am a bad person for doing it.

TV is a business, not a public service. They are in it to make money, no different than shoe companies or backpack importers. If you don't like it, you are not required to watch. Read a book instead.

[gala1]

09:19 PM on 09/24/2007

Not at all.

I'm blaming programmers who slant every viewing choice to some mythic clutch of American Pie Three Stooges, can-crusher slacker mentality with an extremely limited attention span and the maximum demand for sex and violence.
Thereby boring and desensitizing an entire culture to the subtleties of sex and the moral implication of violence.

One of the cable TV dramas hallmarks is the intricacy of plot level that cannot be sustained on networks since the execs insist on it being so dumbed down that it's becoming Adult Teletubbie Time. Including the tabloidization of the news.

I applaud how thoughtful your post is and it surprises me that you can find the time, or even want to add TV to the sort of multitasking younger families require.

Don't blame my generation for Bush. It was 40 percent of single women from 20's to 45 that didn't even go out to vote at all.
I expect all age groups bear equal responsibility for that sort of folly.

But since you are going to be around longer than we are to suffer the consequences, it puzzles me that there is so little protest or demand for accountability for what is in store for your own old age and your children's maturity.

One reason the media shone so outstandingly during the Vietnam era was that the popular culture pushed for it to do so.
Much as I enjoy Stewart and Colbert and Olberman,it should fall to more than comedians to hold our attention.

Network TV is in it's death throes as long as it continues to be about showing you the money instead of being a showcase of talent.
When TV was its infancy in the 1950's it was far more intellectually stimulating. The idea being to raise the bar, not to find the lowest common denominator.
And it is still some of the best TV that ever was.

I'm so pleased cable TV has come into the fore. It has so easily outpaced the networks that I realize months go by without me even remembering to watch them at all.

gala

[dadw5boys]

08:50 AM on 09/24/2007

Why not an hour devoted to NAFTA or what cuts took place when they cut taxes.
What bridges or support infustructures were put at risk with tax cuts.