http://www.jagular.com/primetime4nighthawks.shtml
November, 1997
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This is a proposal to rebroadcast television prime-time programs over-night (2:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m.) and to include a special set of commercials which will play back properly when people record the programs on their VCR's and play them back later and "fast-forward" through the commercials.
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A television executive in charge of prime-time programming has to deal with the following facts:
- Viewers have many simultaneous choices in prime-time (weekdays 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m.) but most of them can only watch one show at a time
- A show attracts viewers partly on its own merit and partly based on what other shows are on at the same time; a very good show can be ruined by a poor time slot
- Many viewers are not available to watch shows during prime-time but they are available at other times
- Most viewers have VCR's; many use them to record shows and watch them later
- Many people who record shows will fast-forward through the commercials
- It doesn't matter how many people are watching a program: it's the number of people who watch the commercials that counts on the bottom-line
- There is very little worth watching over night
- Few people use their VCR to record programs over night
- Not everyone is sleeping between 2:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.; any reasonably good show broadcast during that time would get a very high share
If I were a television programming executive this is what I would do:
- Rebroadcast my prime-time shows between 2:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.
- Realizing that most people would use their VCR's to record the over night broadcasts for playback later I would insert a special set of commercials which take advantage of slow, regular and fast playback speeds, including the fast-forward speed
- I would construct the commercial breaks in the following way:
- Split the television screen into 4 quarters and play a different thing in each corner (sometimes play 4 versions of the same commercial, sometimes different commercials)
- In one corner of the screen play commercials which take advantage of slow playback speed and freeze-frame; perhaps run contests or show phone numbers or other information which only plays for one or two frames
- Calculate the fast-forward speeds for different VCR's at different recording speeds (SP, LP, SLP/EP) and play, in two different corners of the screen, two versions of commercials which show at normal speed when the VCR is running on fast-forward
- In one corner of the screen play a normal-speed commercial with voice-overs; use this to tell the viewer what to look for in the other corners (tell the viewer when to use freeze-frame and so on)
- As the commercial break is drawing to a close, show a count-down in one corner of the screen so that the viewer can know when to switch from fast-forward to normal speed (the count-down should last about 3 seconds at fast-forward speed). You could show a picture of five Oreo cookies, then four and so on down to running the regular program just as zero cookies would appear. Think of different products to use for this count-down (you could show a potato chip being bitten to remove pieces until the chip is gone for instance)
Rather than wishing that people didn't use VCR's to record their programs and zoom through the commercials the television executives should take advantage of VCR's and the different record and playback speeds. "The Simpsons" is a good example of a program which people will record and then play back at slow speed in order to catch special jokes and information. "Dharma and Greg" has a screen created by Chuck Lorre Productions which is filled with text and played at the end of the program for about a second which begins with "Once again, thank you for video taping Dharma & Greg and freeze-framing on my vanity card." Rather than causing people to spend less time viewing commercials this could actually get them to spend more time than they would if they had not recorded the program. The ability to take advantage of this would be based on the imagination of the advertising agencies and the program sponsors.
There are a number of potential problems with this idea:
- It might be difficult to coordinate the commercial overrides which Canadian networks make on U.S. broadcasts
- It would require a new set of commercials
- It is not how things are normally done (this is either a problem or a benefit, depending on your perspective)
The problems with this idea can be overcome with a little imagination. I'm sure there is a way to deal with the problem of Canadian commercials on U.S. programming. The key points are that you have to face up to the reality of VCR's and the fast-forward button and you have to make commercials more interesting if you expect people to watch them.