[Technologist]

There were a number if instances where the top of the hour junction slipped and thus the broadcaster exceeded the minutage and got told off by OFCOM .
But more practically with hour long slots …. Do you want your viewers to channel surf triggered by adverts …. And so your next programme is not viewed ?

[Kunst]

Yeah, of course I realize that the flow technique (en.wikipedia.org ) is a thing and I understand why broadcasters do that.

Flow (television) - Wikipedia
Jump to content Main menu Main menu move to sidebar hide Navigation Main pageCon…
  Source: en.wikipedia.org

It's very common across many countries now, although the tendency started in America: e.g. German commercial channels often go from one show to the other without a sting or an ident.
Different countries have different tendencies of playing advertising: e.g. in Italy at times breaks are less frequent, but they can be slightly longer. In France and Germany even more.

A neat 1 hour/30 mins based schedule is not always possible, but it's practical for many channels when it comes to planning advertising blocks of course, you do not risk exceeding the 12 minutes limit most of the time.

[Brekkie]

Even if they ditch the ads I can't see them ditching the promos at the top of the hour.

[Kunst]

cleanfeed.thetvroom.com 

Decision on PSB advertising rules due soon - Clean Feed
Ofcom is expected to confirm this month whether it will make changes to the adve…
  Source: cleanfeed.thetvroom.com

it seems we might get a decision this month

[Brekkie]

I'm hoping for common sense but I doubt we'll get it - OFCOM will just cave in as always and we'll see a very noticeable 50% increase in advertising in primetime, something which really won't help them at a time when they're struggling and ad supported streaming is seeing people presented with much lighter ad loads.

The sensible move would be to split the difference between the current situation (7 minutes an hour on average, with a maximum of 40 minutes in primetime from 6pm-11pm) and what is proposed (9 minutes on average, max 60 mins in primetime). I think a rise to 8 minutes an hour with 10 minutes on average in primetime (ideally 9, but in the spirit of compromise we'll say 10). In reality that means an extra 24 minutes across the day, most of which would probably be in the 6am and Midnight hour - with an extra 10 minutes across primetime, which would basically mean 4 hours with a full ad quota between 6-11pm instead of 3 hours.

[Kunst]

I don't think any counter-idea would be considered by OFCOM at this point... or, would work in today's media climate.
It's just much easier to "control" PSBs with a 12 mins based minutage at all time of the day instead of some relatively silly "averages".

Like it or not, aside from advertising being popped up in the middle of news, these are no big changes in the grand scheme of things.

All these commercial operations are screaming out for a possible relatively light change, in my opinion

[Kunst]

I'm hoping for common sense but I doubt we'll get it - OFCOM will just cave in as always and we'll see a very noticeable 50% increase in advertising in primetime, something which really won't help them at a time when they're struggling and ad supported streaming is seeing people presented with much lighter ad loads.

The sensible move would be to split the difference between the current situation (7 minutes an hour on average, with a maximum of  40 minutes in primetime from 6pm-11pm) and what is proposed (9 minutes on average, max 60 mins in primetime).  I think a rise to 8 minutes an hour with 10 minutes on average in primetime (ideally 9, but in the spirit of compromise we'll say 10).  In reality that means an extra 24 minutes across the day, most of which would probably be in the 6am and Midnight hour - with an extra 10 minutes across primetime, which would basically mean 4 hours with a full ad quota between 6-11pm instead of 3 hours.

But is Teleshopping (being used as a loophole) any better though?

[Brekkie]

Teleshopping is on top of any permitted ad allowance.

[Brekkie]

The lack of ads in Dispatches last night showed why it's important not to have the full 12 minutes of ads per hour quota every hour during primetime (as proposed by OFCOM) - the current 40 minutes over 60 hours means there is the flexibility to go ad free for a couple of hours and run content such as this which may not be advertiser friendly.

Yes, the proposed rules could see displaced ads run outside of primetime again but far less appealing to broadcasters to run ad free content in primetime getting the ad time back at 1am in the morning than moving the ads within the 6-11pm slot.


The same goes for live sport too - especially with whistle to whistle from the beginning to end of the match in both football and rugby now touching the 2 hour mark. With an 8pm kick off current rules means they can get their 40 minutes in with up to 12 minutes in the 6pm, 7pm and 10pm hours and 7 minutes during half time, but relaxing those rules would likely mean they'd only be able to air 43 minutes of ads during primetime meaning any decision to air live sport in primetime needs to be offset with losing up to 17 minutes of ads in primetime - although as ads during sport can usually be sold at a higher value hopefully that keeps it worthwhile.

[Neil Jones]

Must be remembered there is no obligation to run ads at all if the broadcaster doesn't want to...