2249 replies to this topic

[bmills]

Why did Spike fight out that lawsuit with Spike Lee? They could have saved themselves all kinds of trouble by just naming themselves, TABATTN, or The All Bond All The Time Network. They run these movies all during the week, they run a Christmas marathon, they run a New Year's marathon, etc. Cripes. Where's my Most Extreme Elimination Challenge?

[Brandywine]

This may have already been mentioned - and if so, sorry about that. It has bugged me for years how on the Today show they'll say Coming up next is so-and-so, but first, this is Today on NBC. What exactly does that mean? But first, this is Today? Maybe it makes total sense and, if so, someone please enlighten me because this grates on my nerves.

[iMissEthan]

I believe that alerts the affiliates that's it's time to go to their local mini newscast, doesn't it? Or do they say that before every commercial break?

[Delcia80]

I believe that alerts the affiliates that's it's time to go to their local mini newscast, doesn't it? Or do they say that before every commercial break?

I think both.

[lannie]

New Year's Eve, I was all set to watch Conan's Central Time Zone countdown. But instead, Channel 5 (in St. Louis) decides we'd rather watch some Forest Park countdown crap instead. I saw the countdown on Conan eventually, but only because the show was put on tape-delay. Damn you, Channel 5! *shakes fist*

[Shelwood]

Fox Sports gets another demerit today, for the Cotton Bowl. They decided to fancy up the on-screen score by forgoing the time-honored tradition of written language. Instead, they substituted the helmet logos. Which might have been okay, except that OK State and Ole Miss do not have very distinctive logos, they have tiny, graphically complex logos, with kind of similar colors to boot. But, hey, it's not like any casual viewers watch bowl games. I was probably the only person who didn't know 1. who was playing and 2. which reddish blob represented which team. Damn me for my non-rabidness.

[Gloworm]

I thought Today would have to hit specific times...surely they don't signal a local break by a codephrase???!? haha
I know that the Today crew may run over their time by a few seconds but I would be surprised if there weren't specific times that they must be out by.

[trainman]

I thought Today would have to hit specific times...surely they don't signal a local break by a codephrase???!? haha
I know that the Today crew may run over their time by a few seconds but I would be surprised if there weren't specific times that they must be out by.

I actually used to be involved with the closed-captioning of the "Today" show. There are indeed certain "hard" times that they have to hit or they're going to be cut off, mostly involving the commercial breaks before the local affiliate news segments, but in most cases, the times at which they actually take commercial breaks can vary quite a bit from what's on the official show rundown...and I don't think they even bother sending a copy of the rundown to all 200-some NBC affiliates every morning.

Therefore, yes, dearandgp is correct; they use "This is 'Today' on NBC" as a code to tell the affiliates that it's time for a local break. Before the national breaks, they say something else.

By the way, the local news segments are officially called "co-ops." For the handful of affiliates that don't do local news there (more prevalent on Saturday and Sunday than on weekdays), what they usually go to is just Katie, Matt, Ann, and/or Al sitting on the couch talking about Krispy Kreme doughnuts or whatever, although occasionally, they'll extend a guest's interview into that segment and then show that extra portion of the interview on the show a couple of days later. (The "here's what's going on in your neck of the woods" part of the weather segment is also considered a co-op...now that's a cue that local affiliates miss all the time.)

[iMissEthan]

I know it's old hat on TV, but last night HBO became a little more like TV by splitting the screen to show credits & previews at the same time for both Sex & the City and Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Of course they had to be a bit different, so they split the screen horizontally instead of vertically, but I still hated it.

[SVNBob]

HBO's been doing that for a long time. Usually during the credits for a movie they'll play some behind-the-scene info which was most likely part of the HBO "Behind the Scene" series. If not that, it'll be previews of what's coming up next, previews for their series, and at least one of their "It's not TV" promos. IOW, the usual filler between HBO programming, just now squashing credits.

Annoying? Yes. But new? No.

Edited by SVNBob, Jan 6, 2004 @ 1:38 AM.

[iMissEthan]

It's new for their original series, at least the ones I watch. I don't recall the credits for Oz, Six Feet Under, Sopranos, Carnivale, Curb Your Enthusiasm or Sex & the City (except for Sunday) being crushed over to show previews for their next episodes.

[caia1970]

Spike TV's commercials for 'Star Trek: UNCUT!!' are seriously starting to get up my nose. Asshats, if you hadn't cut them down to about 5 minutes with credits in the FIRST place...

[inanna]

Apparently NBC has changed the schedule for The Apprentice for next week. So now it is going to be following Friends again on Thursday. It's not so much the fact that the timeslot got changed again, but the fact that it takes Scrubs off the schedule again. With Friends going off the air this year, you would think that NBC would try to enhance viewship to its existing comedies, so that there is something to replace it next year. Instead they are probably losing the few viewers who as yet manage to figure out the Scrubs schedule in time to catch an episode.

[mtvcdm]

You. Game Show Network. It's not that I don't LIKE Games Across America, it's just that you completely ruined your Saturday night line-up with it. I like the concept: show some offbeat games and competitions from around the country (except for that little part where you went to Toronto, which, last I checked, isn't part of the United States). For the love of God, give it its own timeslot instead of showing a few minutes between every show, thus forcing odd start and end times throughout the evening. Do you really need a 5th or 6th airing of Lingo or Match Game that night? Tivos everywhere thank you.

[trainman]

Fox announcer, every Sunday at 9:00: "A new 'Arrested' in 30!"

Dear Fox promo writer: There are two words missing from that sentence...well, now that I think about it, it's not even a complete sentence anyway. But I'm willing to forgive the use of a sentence fragment if you'll call shows by their complete titles and tell us 30 what.

[bella1013]

Ok, what peeved me off this week on our national (belgian) tv;

1) Do we really have to watch Friends from the beginning? AGAIN?? Buy something new, ASAP!!!!

2)If you plan to show 18 wheels of whatever, don't announce Moonlighting instead, because well, it's confusing and annoying. While we are on the subject, don't change whatever programmed before csi miami on a weekly basis. Either show something good, or something consistant.

ETA; because we are getting Everwood 5 days a week, starting friday. And Without a Trace starts next weekend *jumps in delight over watching the pilot for the third time* i knew someone was reading these rants.

Edited by bella1013, Jan 17, 2004 @ 5:27 PM.

[mrschimpf]

They decided to fancy up the on-screen score by forgoing the time-honored tradition of written language. Instead, they substituted the helmet logos. Which might have been okay, except that OK State and Ole Miss do not have very distinctive logos, they have tiny, graphically complex logos, with kind of similar colors to boot.

This weekend's NFL games used the traditional 3-letter code for a city/state (i.e. CAR vs. STL and PHI vs. GB) and the main team color in the Fox bar, probably because viewers of the playoffs last week were confused as heck to who was playing and which score was which because they just used the logos. It might screw up their whole presentation, but my eyes thank Fox because before this weekend I had to use the football field logos most weekends to figure out who was home and guest (the team with the big logo on the 50 is the score on the right).

Edited by mrschimpf, Jan 12, 2004 @ 2:24 PM.

[Kev]

That pisses me off too. On my digital cable guide it said it was the SNL special. What was weird was when I tuned in they were showing the SNL skit with Mike Myers, Madonna, and Roseanne when Barbra Streisand showed up, then they showed something totally non-SNL related. I was like WTF?

[emace]

I hate how Law and Order always jumps right into the episode direct from the commercial without any little announcement. I always wind up missing a sentence or two because I mute the commercials.

Also dislike how TV guide messes up viewings, specially the Sunday night ones. Sports and news usually pushes Ebert and Roeper back an hour, and there's always two identical ERs showing at the same time but with two different starting times.

[Pete]

Re: The SNL thing...NBC is suing E! for unauthorized use of the clips, hence the not-airing.

[LinaBo]

ABC needs to bend over and kiss my ass right now, for what they're doing to Alias. We went for 5 weeks between episode 3.10 and 3.11, we get 3.12 on Sunday, and then there's another break... 3-4 weeks long... before we get 3.13 on either February 8th or 15th, god... I don't know, because the sources are conflicting (Zap2it versus ABC). What the hell? In between, we get a repeat (after the Golden Globes, supposedly), Nothing after the stupor bowl, and I hear that they're doing an airing of Pearl Harbor, for god knows why.

*sigh* Yes, it's normal, but it still seems like too long... Why must my interests be preempted by sports. Why must everything be preempted by something so redundant and uninteresting? I need to buy my own vcr and tape eps, so I at least can watch repeats when I want to...

Edited by LinaBo, Jan 16, 2004 @ 4:17 PM.

[bella1013]

I'm a bit late to this party, but i was reading these messages upthread about how shows get interrupted for the viewing of some vip arriving?

Well, be glad you do not live in Europe! Be very glad! Everytime there is a major occurance in our royal family, like a wedding or a funeral, it is broadcast live. Not that i have a problem with that, but whenever it happens, the newsreaders are on my to kill list. Programming will start early, like 6 or 7 am (the occasion is at ten, but anyhoo). They have "special" broadcasts every half hour or so. And they constantly show the same images! People getting off the train to catch a glimpse of the wedding (with some shots of confused foreign businessmen), people freezing their asses off, or getting a bad sunburn, waiting for the carriage to pass them by (for about a blink second), expert opinions, and a guest list.

I know this may not sound very annoying when you read it, but it is annoying when this scenario keeps on repeating itself, over and over again! It's annoying when i have to work on those days, thus getting up early, catching all the reports, but never the actual event.

Edited by bella1013, Jan 18, 2004 @ 4:52 PM.

[kswat]

Attention Channel 5 in Vermont: Howard Dean came in 3rd in Iowa. This means that I do NOT want Average Joe to be pre-empted just before the hunks arrive to see a live concession speech. The first two minutes were just his supporters cheering and him standing there smiling. Fine, go ahead and give us final numbers, but clips of this speech could have easily been shown on the 11 o'clock news which is Only.15.Minutes.Away. You could have called it "live" then and no one would be the wiser! Damn its still on! You people are killing me! Not everyone in this state loves Dean! Get him off my TV and stop interrupting important shows!

[LittleEddie]

Kswat: I can top that! Richard Gebhardt came in fourth, and KSDK, the local NBC affiliate here in St. Louis broke in at 9:52 just as Larissa opened the second note, to bring us Gephardt's "I guess I'm a looser" speech. (Hey Dick, we've known that for years!) Of course, just as you said, the speech couldn't have been taped and run as the "top story at ten" just eight minutes later.

[JRV]

Last week there was a big fire that destroyed a historic church in our metro area. Of course, the 4 news stations in town had to pre-emp programming for this breaking story. What made me giggle later was how each one played up the fact that they were "first" to bring you something. One was first to bring you an interview with the pastor, another was first with helicopter views of the fire, another was first with.... well, you get it. Just another reason why I seldom watch local newscats.

[Jeebus Cripes]

So I'm watching E! and they interrupt the broadcast to announce that Jen & Ben have officially split. WTF! I mean, I know E! is infamous for having retarded news scrolling down the bottom of the screen, but this was a full-out interruption. Dude, I was expecting something serious like, oh I don't know, a terrorist attack maybe? Don't get me wrong, the Jen & Ben split is a joyous event if ever there was one, but this is just fucking ridiculous.