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Those annoying logo's on cable channels...

T

tothedj

Lately, i'm beginning to notice something on many cable networks that is annoying to me, those logo's that appear promoting
certain shows, like what "Lifetime" and "Lifetime Movie Network" did several days back for the season finale of "Project Runway", to go so far as put a countdown clock on the left part of the screen, especially when you try to watch a program,
between that and the network ID, this takes up almost a third of the picture, now i can see them running a brief promo for
the show, but to annoy viewers with this is just as bad as constant commercial breaks, when will this end?
 
I don't think there's an end in sight, actually. In fact, those logos you speak of are actually better known by what they really are: "promologos."
 
tothedj said:
Lately, i'm beginning to notice something on many cable networks that is annoying to me, those logo's that appear promoting
certain shows, like what "Lifetime" and "Lifetime Movie Network" did several days back for the season finale of "Project Runway", to go so far as put a countdown clock on the left part of the screen, especially when you try to watch a program,
between that and the network ID, this takes up almost a third of the picture, now i can see them running a brief promo for
the show, but to annoy viewers with this is just as bad as constant commercial breaks, when will this end?
Click to expand...

TLC did a crown/countdown clock thing before the Miss America Pageant a few months ago. Not only do they promo in the corner but they also do things to the logo for seasonal times and certain shows (colored eggs for Easter, all-green logo for St. Patrick's Day, flashing red/blue lights above the logo to promo the next Police Women of Whatever County, etc.). I even saw a SoapNet bug years ago with a check-mark over the "O" part to remind people to go out and vote. A while back, on Jim Cramer's CNBC show (I don't know if they still do this or not), they had a promo for either an upcoming show or segment (can't remember which) where Cramer's little red foam bull with the yellow horns comes "walking" out from the left side of the screen along the bottom, and the bull uncovers the lettering forming the promo. When the bull got to the end of the lettering, it slid back off the screen to the left, taking the promo announcement with it.
 
It's like what google does with its search page, just more self-serving and obtrusive if you're trying to watch a tv show.
Syfy has an upcoming show in the corner of their screen ALL THE TIME there's a show on.
 
Welcome to the brave new world of tv branding.

My petpeeves...I'm watching a program and see a logo on the side promoting another show. Or is it? Perhaps it is an I.D. for the show I'm actually watching, as I just tuned in. So I spend the next few minutes trying to figure out if I am watching the logo'd show, or something else. (Edit: I have since come to learn that 9 times out of 10 it is a promo, NOT the show I am watching!).

As far as the chroma-figures popping up in the middle of shows, I have somewhat gotten accustomed to them, but every now and then I am startled with these dancing chroma figures popping up and for a few seconds actually appear to be part of the show I am viewing, depending on the timing. It can be startling, and like the above-mentioned "title" logos ONLY serve to take my attention away from the show I was orginally watching. Is this really healthy for television ratings? I'm sure there are fancy focus groups that convince execs that these things work. However, if I was ever in a focus group I think my opinion would be quite different. In fact, I think I would probably get up and do a little dance in the middle of the focus group and see how distracting that might be to the proceedings. Just for fun, of course.
 
DToTheJ said:
I don't think there's an end in sight, actually. In fact, those logos you speak of are actually better known by what they really are: "promologos."
Click to expand...

At some point I'm wondering when the cable networks are going to start reacting to the fact that consumers around the country are dumping cable and satellite lately in droves. They are watching hulu.com, digital TV, and even just now doing something really strange...like reading books.

All of these irritations are just more reasons for people to drop cable, etc.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/apr/23/some-viewers-cut-cable-move-online/

http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/13/800000-households-abandoned-tvs-web/
 
Well, you can all thank the fine folks over at TBS and TNT for started this advertising concept around eight years ago. Channels like ABC Family have since ran with this concept and taken to the next level. There's really not much to say other than this sucks and we wish it would stop. But it won't stop. However, it's a very good thing that home video like vhs and dvds exist so that we can get away from this crap. There's also streaming the shows online, but at least you can try to control the pop-ups unlike with regular television.

Good luck trying to watch anything on ABC Family, especially around Christmas. ::)
 
searadiofreak said:
In fact, I think I would probably get up and do a little dance in the middle of the focus group and see how distracting that might be to the proceedings. Just for fun, of course.
Click to expand...
Not only for fun, but for science, and the future good of the American public! A benevolent focus grouper if there ever was one! :D
 
And so goes our annual 'annoying TV logo complaint' quota for the season. I was a little fearful we wouldn't hit it, but we did. :D
 
Don't forget the practice of "scrunching" the closing credits to a movie (or other TV show) into the corner of the screen while they promote something else, and that usually also involves tamping down the volume of whatever happens to be playing as closing credits, so if there is a movie-closing theme song, you'll miss that as well! :mad:
 
And if the film's credits were originally long, abandon all hope of seeing it legibly -- when NBC shown the film "Titanic" a few years back, the credits were so long and the promo time was so short, it practically shown a "page" of credits at a rate of one frame per page, which not only made the credits illegible, even for those who recorded and paused the film, but the split-microsecond credits might've been a health hazard for some.
 
firepoint525 said:
Don't forget the practice of "scrunching" the closing credits to a movie (or other TV show) into the corner of the screen while they promote something else...
Click to expand...

In TBS' case, once the credits start rolling, they will shrink the picture, and move it to the left side of the screen, while another screen on the right pops up starting the next program! I think TNT does this, as well. I wonder if TBS is going to try this scheme with Conan O'Brien. Hey, it might give George Lopez a good lead-in for about twenty seconds. :p
 
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