Thursday, October 20, 2005

Why Do I Refuse to Watch TV Commercials?

This is a strange question for me. Why do I refuse to watch TV commercials. I say "TV" specifically, because it's not like I rip out the ads from a magazine when I reading it, or that I shield my eyes from billboards on the side of the road. But TV commercials just irk the heck out of me.

I mean, I'm a businessperson. I completely understand that these are just other businesspeople who want to communicate their products and services to me. I also understand very well that these ads are paying for the production of the TV shows that I love. I do love TV. I love a lot of TV shows, these come to mind:


  • Veronica Mars

  • Daily Show with Jon Stewart

  • South Park

  • Rome (series on HBO - no commercials!)

  • The Simpsons

  • Commander in Chief

  • The West Wing



I love these shows. I mean, really love them. So why won't I support them??

I have a TiVO connected to my DirecTV satellite dish. It allows me to record my programs and watch them whenever I want. I can pause live TV, and I can fast forward through commercials of recorded information.

When I'm watching live TV, I watch one channel until the commercials come on, then I pause that feed, flip to the other feed (my satellite can handle a maximum of two incoming feeds simultaneously) and watch that until the commercials come on, then flip back and fast forward the first feed through the now-recorded commercials.

I just friggin' hate them. Why? Don't I understand that they are just "to pay the bills?" My beloved shows would not exist without the commercials?

Maybe it's because commercials have become so poorly done. Loud music, fast voices, flashing images - it's really an awful combination. The most successful commercial this past year, or infomercial, I should say - is the Natural Cures infomercial with Kevin Trudeau. I've even watched parts of it.

But I must try to dig deeper to find out this aversion to commercials that I have. Even when my wife is watching TV in the other room and I'm in my office working, I'll yell out to her to fast-forward through the commercials (she always forgets). Why do I do that?

Just my thoughts.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

amen about commercials

Frostbite said...

I understand they're paying the bills so to speak, but if I'm already paying to watch something I'm not about to let it be interrupted every, what feels like, 5 minutes to hear about crap I don't care about. I don't feel bad for it at all, I can't remember advertisements even in apps I constantly use because I don't CARE about them. If I want something, I don't need some soulless corporation paying a drone to tell me about it. Networks need to get with the modern age, Netflix does it right. I don't care how long it takes them to get stuff, doesn't apply to me, but I watch what I want when I want and they get money. Works like it should. They're just traditional dinosaurs trying to force feed their old agenda down everybody's throat, and they usually accept and pay for it anyway.