I hate commercial TV stations!!!

[MortonH]

For the last few weeks I have been happily reliving my 20s by watching Friends on Channel 10. However, on two or three occasions now I've been disgusted when a particular scene has been edited or removed. Why would they do this? Simple, so they use the time to advertise The Biggest Loser and So You Think You Can Dance, or whatever other reality show happens to be on.

Don't get me wrong, I've nothing against those shows, but why do they have be advertised at every single ad break??? And the Dance ads go on forever. Surely everyone knows about the show by now!!!

Channel 7 does the same thing. I've noticed entire scenes missing from old episodes of MASH. Why? So they can give us yet another news update that tells us nothing new, or remind us that Ian Ross will be with us in a few minutes.

I suppose the fact that these shows are reruns gives the stations some justification for cutting them, but do we trust that they don't do the same with new shows???

It just drives me crazy that these stations bombard us constantly with the same adverts for the same shows. They seem to be so desperate for us to stay tuned and not switch channels.

Some days it annoys me so much I'm tempted to switch off and buy the DVD box sets!!!

Thanks for listening. Feel better now!

Morton

[koputai (Jason)]

These days you get what you pay for. Commercial TV, you pay nothing, you get nothing. It's not worth wasting your time and the worlds precious resources on. All they seem to do is make mindless competition shows to give their contracted 'stars' something to do.
Pay TV on the other hand......hmmm, well, it's pretty bad with their self advertising all the time, but it's still waaaay better than the free-to-air commercial stations.

Cheers,
Jason.

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

Originally Posted by koputai

These days you get what you pay for. Commercial TV, you pay nothing, you get nothing. It's not worth wasting your time and the worlds precious resources on. All they seem to do is make mindless competition shows to give their contracted 'stars' something to do.
Pay TV on the other hand......hmmm, well, it's pretty bad with their self advertising all the time, but it's still waaaay better than the free-to-air commercial stations.

Cheers,
Jason.

...unless you're on Foxtel satellite - and it's raining - then, like me right now, you get nothing at all.

[Ric]

That's why I mostly live on Aunty ABC but even they have their moments.

Cheers

[MrB (Simon)]

Yep I hate the way they cut scenes too.
I also hate popup adverts during programmes, thats what ad breaks are for.
I hate not being able to read the credits because it gets squished into 1/4 of the screen or it's sped up to run thru in 3 seconds.
I hate American cop/law/fat/dancing/singing shows.
I just hate TV.
ABC and especially SBS are now not much better.

Seriously, the regulatory authorities(ACMA?) are to blame here for getting too soft: I thought there were regulations about the amount of advertising per hour.
Surely there are laws about showing credits legibly?

[Glenhuon (Bill)]

Now you know why I don't watch TV and haven't done so for over 10 years.
ABC, SBS OK. Commercial TV, forget it, more crap than a street full of toilets.

Bill

[leon]

Just dont watch TV, I really just look at the news and some current affairs show,s never watch any of the crap they call entertainment.

Much better things to do in our specially designed room for our hobbies.

Leon

[Terry B]

Originally Posted by MortonH

Don't get me wrong, I've nothing against those shows, but why do they have be advertised at every single ad break??? And the Dance ads go on forever. Surely everyone knows about the show by now!!!

The good news is I've never heard of the show til now or seen the add. Am I missing something or just lucky. Last time I watched anything on commercial TV was a few minutes of the cricket and turned it off when I found out the score.

[Zuts]

The only tv i watch is Disney Channel and Animal Planet coz that's all my little girl will let me watch

Paul

[madtuna (Steve)]

I'm a satelite tech and have in excess of 400 channels..I think I watch about 3....occasionally.

Chris, do you know off hand what your LNB frequency is? 11300 or 10700?

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

Originally Posted by madtuna

I'm a satelite tech and have in excess of 400 channels..I think I watch about 3....occasionally.

Chris, do you know off hand what your LNB frequency is? 11300 or 10700?

Oh.. I don't know Steve - I'll check when I get home though! I take it that this is available through the setup menus in the IQ unit...

[madtuna (Steve)]

ahhh..if you have the IQ unit it's 10700

It should only drop out in severe storms, if it is dropping out frequently or every time it rains it probably needs the dish or LNB tweeked.

The problem I found is too many techs when upgrading units to the IQ just replace the LNB but don't bother checking allignment of the dish etc.. they just whack on a new LNB, spin it to where it looks about right and fudge the figures

[cahullian]

Foxtel is getting as bad now. When it first started it was commercial free. Now its commercial after commercial. It costs more now than ever before and they are still taking money for commercials. When I phoned them to complain about the commercials( because I signed up with them because they advertised commercial free viewing) they informed me they didn't have a complaints department. I bet they will be saying soon that they have total customer satisfaction. He he he

Gazz

[ving (David)]

comercial TV... lol!

does everyone else have to turn thier TV down when the commercials come on because they are recorded at maximum volume?
bleeding annoying that is!

[RB (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by cahullian

When I phoned them to complain about the commercials .... they informed me they didn't have a complaints department.

LOL Gazz, that's a new one.
Sounds like a comic strip by "The Far Side".

[casstony]

My problem with ads is the threat they pose to children. Kids are so gullible. I've explained to our 5yo that bad people make junky kids toys to try to get him to spend his money instead of saving it in the bank; in effect they're trying to steal his money. I may have done my job a little too well though; upon hearing the ice-cream truck jingling along the street last week Max ran into the room shouting "They're trying to steal our money". I need to refine the message a little, but at least he won't grow up being a compliant consumer.

[AJames]

Originally Posted by MrB

I hate American cop/law/fat/dancing/singing shows.
I just hate TV. ABC and especially SBS are now not much better.

This is close to the truth IMO. What I really can't hate is the portrayed amount of medical and inflicted gore, gratuitous violence and killing , particularly in American programs like movies, CSI: Wherever and Law & Order: SVU - with Channel 9 is the worst. They are all rated "M", and many of them I think should actually be rated MA15+ or even R. Frankly these programs are actually sick, whose viewing are attributing to the current Society. Furthermore the proliferation of handgun and the (implied guilty of the viewer) treatment and the lot of "Black America." Regardless if it is justified or not has nothing to do with Australian Society.
One of the biggest issues is how the U.S. studios saturate the local market. In fact, the most popular U.S. programmes are purchased by the commercial stations, then as sweeteners to the deal are the second-rate, solitary season series - essentially using foreign bunnies to recoup the losses in making them. Almost half the crap local foreign programming makes up the weekly schedule - costing nothing to the commercial station - except the electricity costs for the transmitters. Worst is the local industry is starting to use similar ploys. This is also the reason why government should be insisting on greater locally made content for the commercial license.
Yet the fault here really lies with the viewers for putting up with the perpetual programming.
In the end, as stated by many throughout this thread, and don't watch the television at all. In my view you are better to watching the heavens on your own - and best of all its both commercial free and real.
If you must watch something, get your 8c a day's worth and view the ABC. Overall it offers much better variety with no hidden agenda in the commercial stations - whose sole motives is really to get you to buy something.
Too right. I also do hate commercial television...
Andrew


"What I hate is when you order pizza. I tell them to cut the pizza in four, because I don't think I could eat eight"
"What d'ya hate?" (heckler)
"...I could hate you easy!!!"

Rodney Rude : What d'ya hate routine

[Geoff-]

Originally Posted by koputai

These days you get what you pay for. Commercial TV, you pay nothing, you get nothing. It's not worth wasting your time and the worlds precious resources on. All they seem to do is make mindless competition shows to give their contracted 'stars' something to do.
Pay TV on the other hand......hmmm, well, it's pretty bad with their self advertising all the time, but it's still waaaay better than the free-to-air commercial stations.

I disagree entirely. Pay TV is every bit as worthless as free to air, they have just as many ads and although there are more channels there's still nothing I'm interested in on there. The documentaries used to be great but now they are so dumbed down to the lowest common denominator that it's very frustrating to watch.

No thanks.

[MrB (Simon)]

I've never really understood the appeal of PayTV(and believe it or not, never seen a second of it!).... ya gotta pay for it and then sit through ads?!!
I thought the whole idea was that the subscriptions paid for the content, not the advertising.
Crazy.

[rogerg (Roger)]

Originally Posted by ving

does everyone else have to turn thier TV down when the commercials come on because they are recorded at maximum volume?
bleeding annoying that is!

Yeap, I'm with you there!