Posted on 12/04/2011 5:22:36 PM PST by ConservativeStatement
I have been muting commercials for years.
The problem is the show often returns w/o me being aware of it.
I built a SageTV with comskip. I wasn’t aware TV still had commercials.
Sad to see so many on this thread supporting another fed power grab. So many big government Republicans and Conservatives nowadays is why I know the experiment known as the USA will soon fail.
Any inconvience is another excuse for a law and they’ll keep lapping it up.
Whenever I read something like this, I wonder what the early pioneers would think. I mean, just to travel 7 miles in a rickety old covered wagon, they had to brave searing heat, bitter cold, torrential rain, blinding snow, wild Indians, hungry mountain lions, vicious bears, angry beavers- and we worry about loud commercials?
‘__________a way to turn down________’
I’d like to invent a *Dialog Decoder* for all those times an actor utters a non-intelligible word or phrase.
Having DVR, I’ll go back again and again trying to understand what was just said.
Often, no matter how high I turn up the volume, I cannot make sense of the word, or phrase.
My ears are just fine, thanks.
This doesn’t happen often with the older offerings.
Hardly ever.
It’s all about sloppiness and mediocrity.
“Sad to see so many on this thread supporting another fed power grab.”
I own the network airwaves. So do you. They have a license to broadcast subject to the pleasure of the owners — the United States citizenry. We are the TV landlords.
It is well documented that the landlords — US citizens — have been writing letters and making phone calls to all the networks for years about this noise problem. They had every chance to make this right without litigation or laws. They chose to ignore the problem. Now they get legislation.
Like any landlord, we did what anyone would do with a noisy tenant.
They’re lucky we only passed a noise ordinance. We should yank all their licenses and make them reapply.
This isn’t a Federal power grab. It’s a rare example of US citizens exercising their rights as the true owners of national assets.
I’m amazed the networks haven’t done this voluntarily...they have pumped up the volume so much, a lot of people mute the commercials. Surely, they know this.
Maybe they could pass a law to cut commericals down from 42 minutes an hour. I simply don’t watch TV much at all anymore as it is 75% commericals. Even the enws is noting but commericals as they constnatly advertise “..and later, what’s coming up in our next segment...”, two or three times over. A half hour news show has less than 5 minutes of actual news. Programs are less than 17 minutes per half hour anymore.
All networks now have their annoying water mark logo on the screen at all times except commericals.
If it weren’t for the DVR and the abilityt to skip commercials and PPV to do the same, I would cancel cable; there really is nothing on but constant advertising.
So you admit to being PART OF THE PROBLEM. Hell, every stupid power grab law is put there by someone saying “there ought to be a law”.
I quit watching regular TV over 10 years ago due to the same things you mentioned. Most of the shows are crap anyway and I can watch them on DVD later if I find one good, at my leisure without the commercials and watermarks.
And I didn’t need a law passed to achieve it!
The wife and I have the same problem.
Then we decided to try the closed caption for shows that we had recorded and it works. Now when we don't understand something an actor has said, we simply rewind, turn the closed caption on, and replay. Then when we find out what the actor said, we pause, turn the closed caption off, and resume play.
But now that SageTV has been consumed by Google, what are we to do? Eventually my SageTV set-top box will fail and I'll be SOL. Too bad, I was planning on another media extender and another TV but didn't commit before the sale to Google occurred.
When you’re watching a show, the explosions are louder than the dialogue. Commercials are all at explosion sound levels. The peak levels are the same, but commercials are entirely near the peak. The problem until now has been how to define and legislate what makes the commercials “sound louder” even though the peak levels are the same. The difference between the loudest and the quietest parts of the audio is much smaller in the commercial than in the program. If you turn down the overall volume, and assume a certain amount of noise, that will reduce the signal/noise ratio.
The audio processing reduces the dynamic range of the commercials — something that audiophiles complain about in the engineering of a lot of music. If you’re listening to a good recording of, say, “Rhapsody in Blue,” turning the volume enough to hear the solo clarinet at the beginning will make it LOUD when the full orchestra comes in. Some modern recordings, in an effort to be more radio and headphone friendly, would shrink the difference between the two.
I don’t want commercials to be played louder than programming. Lots of people agree with me. We own the airwaves, so we get it our way.
You think Congressmen came up with this on their own out of the blue? No — it’s the result of constituents screaming. That’s called responsive government — responsive to what the people want.
Once again, I own the airwaves. So do you. We’re the boss.
It isn’t a “power grab” if you ALREADY HAVE the power.
Hsve you or anyone noticed that when a commercial for hearing aids comes on, the sound is “fuzzed”? I have excellent hearing, and am irritated by the deliberate obscuring of the sound whenever a hearing product is advertized.
‘______turn the closed caption off_________’
Don’t think we have closed captioning. Good for you, tho.
What I miss, but catch up with by re-winding over and over, half the time isn’t worth the effort. . .
Occasionally it IS a word or phrase that explains the plot up to that point.
I don’t think production hears what we hear, because they KNOW what the word to be, from the script. And that’s what they hear.
Same thing with a director at our community productions. They fail to advise the actor of the mumble because the director knows what it is, and he/she can “hear” it.
Repeat: Mediocrity.
< Listen to me all you directors out there: Invite someone in to watch a rehearsal (or editing) cold, and by taking notes, have them report to you what the dialog sounded like. >
Thank you.
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