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Information overload on TV
If you watch TV, you've seen this. In the middle of an important scene, a whirling logo appears on the bottom of the screen: it's the promo for the show coming up next! In the age of TiVo, since so many viewers skip commercials, it's the only chance the network has to get your attention. Welcome to the new frontier of information overload.
Today the New York Times reports on TV screen clutter:
Viewers of MTV, VH1 and sports channels have come to expect frenetic programming. At ESPN, there has been a conscious effort to pump up the visual excitement of the viewing experience, said Norby Williamson, executive vice president of programming. “The key word in television these days is engagement,” he said.
Id o hate when FX has the snipes that make sounds. Especially really loud sounds during an intense or quiet scene in the show I'm watching. One snipe for Rescue Me make the entire screen look like it was burning at the edges. While that is creative, it is extremely distracting.
As an adult who watches several of the cartoon networks, there is nothing I find more annoying than having an ad for an upcoming show pop onto the screen and take up literally a THIRD of my television. Actually, I can think of 1 thing more annoying, when the show I am watching is new.
“The key word in television these days is engagement,”
no..the keyword is annoyance. But the shirts will never get it.
Aha! One of the reasons I don't watch much television these days. I tend to watch shows on DVD instead...
It's bad enough when the pitch takes up the bottom third. I also object to program promotion masquerading as content masquerading as "news". We're in for it over the next several weeks, as every character that ever spent a few weeks in any city comes to every local news station to say how much they miss living in [insert city here] and that they're the "local angle", and that everyone should watch their new show on [insert network and time here]...Typically, the quality of the show is inversely proportional to the hype machine's effort.
This is also happening in the UK, even on the BBC. I don't think there are any TV executives left who care about customer experience, they are fixated on maximising viewing figures at all costs. Unfortunately the viewer often doesn't have a choice.