Comments on: 3 Really Annoying TV Clutterers

By: Julia

Julia — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 18:51:59 +0000

@rzklkng, I actually had that idea a couple years ago, but no idea actually how to implement it. I’d also like a la carte cable so I wouldn’t have to pay for channels I never watch, but they’ll never do that and anyways I got rid of my cable alltogether anyway.

By: G

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 16:36:31 +0000

@n2y2
I recently saw the new Indiana Jones movie, and before the movie started (before the movie previews) they turned on the lights and an employee addressed the crowd. They told everyone to turn off phones, etc. And they had employees periodically come into the theater to make sure no one was talking on their phone or distrubing others. It was really nice.

Regarding tv, get rid of it. I watch everything online. They still have ads but very few and no snipes, etc. Just traditional 20-30 seconds ads. Also Netflix is another solution. You can get a whole season of a show and have a “marathon”. I end up watching 4 episodes in one night but then you don’t have to wait weeks for part 2. =)

By: bas

bas — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 15:53:37 +0000

I was watching Family Guy the other night when Bill Engvall showed up. He paused the show, said something stupid, and at the end he said something to the likes of “Be sure to watch the new season of my show, it’s coming soon.” As soon as he un-paused Family Guy, Peter Griffin said “crap” in a very dejected, “you-just-killed-my-spirit” kind of way. It was so perfectly timed for a minute I thought they’d modified the episode to fit in with that advertisement. It was so freakin’ sweet!

By: Jan

Jan — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 15:13:30 +0000

I, too, was so annoyed by the crawling tickers, I created a product to cover them up and started a business around it. I find them really distracting.

By: heather

heather — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 05:27:38 +0000

Aw, man, I HATE these things! I saw the Bill Engval thing too and it really ticked me off. It almost made me hate Bill for doing that voluntarily. Almost.

There has to be someone deep in the annals of these ad agencies thinking “Y’know, having half of the TV screen pirated to cram even more advertisements into a 30-minute slot might just be pushing that ‘annoying but effective’ method we’ve been using.”

By: gibson8or

gibson8or — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 22:42:00 +0000

Re: Credits

There’s lots of information about a movie (especially an older or more obscure movie) that is difficult to find on the internet. It would be akin to buying a book with no publisher, author, or reference information in it.

Also, everyone involved in film and theater has to follow (and pay substantially for) specific union rules. This includes strict credit guidelines. And yes, knowing who the key grip is or whether or not the movie employed stunt doubles, or whatever, can be really interesting and important to lots of people.

By: Em

Em — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 21:20:00 +0000

Florida – there is a line in the opening credit sequence of “The Great Muppet Caper” Fozzie asks why we have to see all the names of these people and Kermit says “They all have families too”.

I’m sure the gaffer works hard at his or her job and deserved credit for it, hence “the credits”.

By: Melissa

Melissa — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 20:48:39 +0000

I agree with rzklkng that it would be nice if tech reached the point where the things on the screen could be more tailored to your individual interests. If you could either select your own feeds (like RSS for your tv?), or if it did it through it’s own intelligence like Tivo or netflix does their recommendations? I wouldn’t mind the advertising and extra info and such if it were more likely to be relevant to my interests. And it probably would do a better job as advertising that way, actually generate more viewers or buyers if it were better targeted.

I also agree with the idea of hating the squinched up sped up credits. The regular size, regular speed, legible credits are okay. Sometimes you want to know who did things. The people who do things deserve recognition. That’s all fine. But the unreadable credits don’t serve anyone any purpose. If you want to know who did something, you don’t know from those. And it’s not respectful to the cast, crew, etc,either. Their hard work isn’t being honored by being illegible at the side of the screen. I’d rather not have credits than have them done that way.

By: adrian

adrian — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 19:22:40 +0000

I got rid of my TV 4 years ago and haven’t missed it since.

By: Li

Li — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 19:05:59 +0000

I also saw the Bill Engvall thing. That has to be the worst idea the marketing gurus ever came up with. Unfortunately, it got our attention, so expect to see it more often.