Just watched the pilot for Switched at Birth on ABC. Damn show runs about 2 minutes after the hour and the Direct TV recorder misses the last 2 minutes.
Anyone else have this problem? Does the network do this for some weird reason?
All the networks do it at various times for various programs, because they don’t want you switching over for the beginning of the next show on another network. They also want you to set your DVR to record a little extra at the beginning or end, so you don’t have a chance of recording the other network’s show, either.
Modern Family often goes over by 1 minute as well, but the program guide on my Verizon DVR has the correct end time - it usually lists it as 9:00-9:31.
It sucks, but luckily Tivo supports + or - on recording times.
IMHO, it is mainly to screw up DVR users.
It does not have to be this way. IIRC, even back in the mid-80’s, German broadcasts included a special ‘show is starting now’ flag that VCR’s recognized and used to start a recording. (This was done because live shows so often ran long and it might have been a legislated solution).