It started with a discreet, transparent logo on the bottom right of the screen indicating what network you were watching.
Now on some networks an *animated *(no less!) ad often crawls across the bottom of the screen, taking up 1/4 to 1/3 of the real estate. This makes me nuts, as I usually have the captioning on, and it’s practically impossible to read through the ad.
Do we really need to know that tomorrow or in an hour or a week from now there will be an all new episode of <WTF>??
Large, animated graphics jumping across the screen are evil. Perpetrators should be served up in Hell with an undending supply of things getting in their way, distracting them at the worst time, and generally being harrassed and annoyed by constant in-your-faceness.
It’s why I’ve given up on broadcast/cable television. If a show is good, it’ll come out on discs and Netflix takes care of the need to see it nicely. True, it’ll be a year or two later so not quite so topical but it’s worth it.
You can get nearly all shows for about $2 an episode, which is reasonable if you’re selective about which ones you watch. You can subscribe to any 2-3 much cheaper than maintaining cable. And no ads. At all.
It’s been a while since I watched it but I believe there’s a scene in Idiocracy where a guy’s watching a big screen TV from his toilet/recliner and the screen is almost completely covered with ads, only a small square in the center showing the hit series Ow,My Balls.
It’s NOT a documentary!!! It’s not, it’s not, it’s not!!!