[Kunst]

Does anyone know the history of the ad rules in the UK.   Pretty sure when ITV started it was just two spots per ad break (although ads could be a minute long), and it feels like as a kid they were generally 2 or 3 minutes in the late 80s/early 90s before the standard 3:30 + 0:20 promo came into play around the turn of the century.    Think it was 2001 the additional break came into hour long programmes and longer, with another break added to programmes 70 minutes or longer towards the end of the decade.

Believe it used to be as low as six (or eight?) minutes per hour at one point, probably back in the sixties, eventually rising to the 12 we have today.

The "three breaks per hour long programme" thing is relatively recent, probably 2006 I believe, don't think it was as early as 2001.

No, posts clearly demonstrate it was in 2000-1 changes occurred, as commercial PSBs went from an average of 7,5 mins per hour between 18:00-23:00, to an average of 8 mins, so minutage increased, and broadcasters were able to "digitalize" their main channels, with 3 breaks per hour.
This was because of ITV asking something in return from ITC for the News at Ten return.
ITV benefited of this the most, clearly.

Initially, until 2009 (?), Internal breaks used to be placed at strange times, as the infamous 20:mins rules occurred in the EU, where you had to wait 20 mins between each interval on the internal and breaks.