[HPFGU-OTChatter] Commercials in the US (was: Movie: SS on ABC encore?)

[Lita Beck]

On Wed, 28 Apr 2004, Przemyslaw 'Pshemekan' Plaskowicki wrote:

> In Poland commercials can not exceeds 12 minutes in an hour, and
> commercial breaks in movies can be inserted once for every each 45
> minutes (thats after 1st May 2004 -- EU regulations. Now commercial
> breaks can be inserted only after each 20 minutes of a movie).
>
> So those 28 minutes is quite enough for me - with legal limit of 36
> minutes in 3 hours.
>
> So, does that mean that US tv networks are more full of adverts than
> European?

Well, that's what my husband (who's from Germany) always
says. :)

As I remember (it's been quite a while since my Business of
Broadcasting class), network television has 12 minutes of
commercials per hour. Not a limit of 12 minutes--12 minutes
is the standard. (Made up of spots that range in length
between 10 to 30 seconds.)

So, three hours of a movie on American television would have
36 minutes of commercials.

Commercial breaks can be inserted anywhere. Most networks
try to make an effort to insert commercials in during
natural breaking points in the movie, but I don't think
there is any regulation on how long there has to be between
commercial breaks. (TV shows are written to naturally break
for commercials.) I'm pretty sure there isn't, actually, as
I know I've watched movies that only had 10 minutes or so
between commercials.

Lita