Enough with all the clutter (graphics) on my HD screen! - Page 101

Today, shows don't even have theme songs in the first place. Apparently people's attention spans are so short they'll tune to another channel if a show "wastes" time by putting the main credits up before the episode begins. Of course, the advertising has become so pervasive that showrunners are probably trying to squeeze out every minute of screen time they can get in between the breaks, so they feel they can't afford to spend 60-90 seconds on title credits anymore. It's depressing.

Its sad that they support dumbed down television which will continue to get worse.

DVR and or DVD/Blu-ray wise it's a good thing. It gets old seeing the same opening sequence (until you fast forward) as you view one episode after another. A good example is Dexter.

I disagree. Any well designed opening sequence is worth watching before every episode.

I always watch the opening to Dexter. Its one of the best sounding themes of all time IMO, same with True Blood and Game of Thrones. Actually come to think of it, pretty much only shows found on premium cable have an opening of any length. Basic cable shows generally are shorter (ie Walking Dead or Justified), and broadcast shows have very short openings or none at all.

I do too... once or twice. Now if I'm running through a season worth or two over a weekend... no way am I sitting through it a dozen or more times. Same for True Blood. For watching once a week it's fine... other wise it's almost as irritating as seeing the same commercial on Hulu/Hulu Plus repeated endlessly.

Sadly, that seems to be the prevailing opinion these days. Thankfully for those of us who like theme songs, most shows on DVD were produced before that mindset became prevalent. Skjpping the openings of an episode of Star Trek, Stargate, or Buffy the Vampire Slayer would be almost blasphemous.

As far as shows nowadays, if I wanted to hear a song by The Who, I'd rather put on a CD and listen to the whole thing. 

I call it audio clutter.

MLB Network now has 2 promotional spam texts on the screen. On the lower left, one for an upcoming awards show, on the lower right,
a promo for "Hot Stove" (weekdays at 9am LIVE). Plus the usual ticker crap. Two more corners to go.

Man this on-screen clutter annoys me - I am at home a lot and have TV on in background while I do other things, like read this forum. Although the promo ads annoy me it is the product ads that really make my blood boil. Every time I see a product advertised I email the company and tell them how greedy they are to advertise during the "commercial breaks" as well as during the 5 or so minutes of program that I am trying to watch. I tell them that we now have a negative opinion of their company (I sure do remember which products have "popped-up" and annoyed me). I have received replies from many companies but more importantly their ads seem to disappear soon after I write, hopefully they receive numerous complaints and decide to opt out. The only ads that continue to appear are for the company that owns these specialty stations and my emails to them have been completely ignored. I am going to continue doing this and invite anyone else who is PO'd to please join me. BTW I live in Canada and I am talking about Shaw Media channels, obviously. Thanks for your support.

Ummmm... wow.

Nice straw man. You left out the critical part of the sentence, which says:

The point Juliescue was ostensibly making is that it's excessive to advertising during the program itself on top of advertising during designated commercial breaks and that advertising should not encroach upon shows themselves. It detracts from having meaningful discussions here to misrepresent people's positions by taking quotes out of context, so I hope that was not your intention.

I interpreted the "5 minutes" comment to be referring to the length of the commercial breaks, taking away from the program they were trying to watch. If it was just a hyperbolic reference to the length of the actual program content, and I was incorrect, then I apologize.

Sometimes a Program will run for five minutes.......

The Commercials will run for six minutes!

Thank you for correctly interpreting my meaning Aleron Ives, just a typo that should have read "advertising in addition to advertising during commercial breaks" - often I see a regular commercial for a product and then a couple of minutes into the program a pop-up appears for exactly the same product ie for dog food during Dog Whisperer. That is my point and this is what I mean by being greedy. Other times I have sent emails simply stating that the pop-up ads are irritating and distracting, and the ads (in most cases) eventually disappear. And I did mean 5 minutes of television program, no hyperbole there. Program segments run between 5 and 7 minutes, with some exceptions of course.

Don't you just love the Star Trek movies they are showing now on Syfy, with the stinkin' noticable text up (above the Syfy channel bug) that just stays throughout the movie "Deals from the Dark Side" "Haven"

The time is near for going all internet (no sat or cable to even compliment) with a Roku, and getting content from paid sources with no ads (Netflix, Amazon Instant Video).
Edited by mike1977 - 12/3/12 at 8:09pm

Don't worry; all those sources will start showing ads to boost their revenue as soon as they have enough subscribers to make spamming them worthwhile financially. Cable used to be a spam-free place to escape from broadcast TV advertising, after all.

I have all 11 Star Trek movies on DVD. One month's pay TV bill will pay for all of them. I have been pay TV free for 4 years. Don't forget to hook up an antenna and get your locals in HD and other subchannels.

That's the biggest problem, all the "Sheeple" who simply plod along, and continue to pour good money after bad for crappy programming. However, slowly but surely more and more subscribers are becoming disgruntled with what they are paying for, and are seeking their entertainment and informational needs elsewhere!

ABC needs to stop the screen spamming. This is disgusting.

Edited by icemannyr - 12/5/12 at 7:40pm

On another note, USA looks good now, logo is in the bottom right corner of the 16:9 frame, doesn't look like they use any clutter on the screen.

 

No one suspected at that time how horrible this trend would become.

 

The broadcasters are purposely and carefully shoving this up their viewers you-know-where graaaaaaaaadually.

I've noticed BBC America HD has been clutter free for the past couple of days.

Because, if a significant portion of the population really cared about not having garbage plastered on their screen, and voted with their wallet (and let their service provider know why they canceled), then it would disappear in a big hurry.

Edit: uhhh what just happened. I replied to a post that is now after the response, and slightly different....

I'm sure you've heard the tale about cooking a Frog. If you try to put a Frog in hot water he'll just jumpm out, but if you put im in cold water and Graaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadually turn up the heat, he won't realise he is getting cooked until it's too late!

Same thing with TV. They started soft at first with Norman Lear's first Sitcoms, including All in the Family. Then more and more "Mature" Subjects were entered in, pushing the envelope even further. Same thing with Commercials. Until the Mid-1970s the only Woman's "Personal" Products advertised were Bras and Girdles, then came the Feminine Hygiene Products. People did complain, but were shoved aside by the Networks and the Advertisers, both of which "Hid behind the US Constitution". Next came the Prescription Drug Commercials. and so on. The Station/Network Logos didn't appear until the 1980s, then the Pop-Ups and other screen-obscuring garbage came along.

But the Pendulum swings the other way as well. Cord-Cutting is taking place, and it too is happening at a slow pace. More and more people are quitting, becoming disgruntled by the high prices and the reduced quality. Sooner or later something is going to have to give, and I don't think the results are going to be pretty!

 

To think they're not prepared for that would be incredibly naive.

I do not watch primetime programming via the broadcast networks. Haven't done so for a while now.