Re: TV commercial timing?

On Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:09:56 -0500, msb@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 (Mark Brader) wrote:

>"Andy":
>> Do all channels go to commercials at the same time? Seems so on my
cable TV.
>
>I think it's mostly that a certain length of show naturally falls into a
>certain number of acts.  For 30-minute sitcoms you usually have a short
>teaser (i.e. prolog), two acts, and maybe a short epilog; for 1-hour
>dramas it's four acts (remember those old Quinn Martin producitons that
>numbered them in Roman numerals?) instead of two.  There's variation in
>the lengths of individual acts, and sometimes the prolog and/or epilog
>are skipped, but the typical result is going to be that if two channels
>are showing the same sort of show, they're likely to have a lot of
>simultaneous commercial breaks.
>
>And even if not, the amount of commercial time these days is large enough
>that random chance would produce commercials at the same time on
different
>channels.
>
>Of course this is about North American TV, with almost all shows starting
on
>the hour or half-hour.  Elsewhere may be different.  It often is.

I can watch a one hour show in 40 minutes on my DVR. So most shows are
about 1/3 commercials. 

-- 
Neal

"I love deadlines. I especially like the WOO****NG sound they make as they
go flying by." - Douglas Adams