I like the fact we get to see old shows on syndicated television. However, I don't like to see them cut. The original length to a sitcom is 25 min w/out commercials. A drama is 48 min. I have taped shows like Three's Company and the time is 22 min without commercials, with the exception of a few episodes. There are shows that have been 22 or 23 minutes that ran, according to Chris Mann's book. My question is this: If there are so many people sponsoring the program, then don't they have enough time to show the program at a half hour with a total time of five minutes of commercials rather than eight in the half hour?

Thats something I have always wondered. Every media outlet these days (radio, tv, even newspaper and magazines) are cramming more mintues (or pages in the case of print ads) worth of commercials per hour, thus causing show content to have to be editied to fit for time. Why is this? Common sense would say to just raise the ad rates to adjust with inflation, making more money on the same amount of time. The higher rate would make up the difference from the advertisers that would drop off.

For example: if you have a commercial break of 3 minutes (thats 6 :30 second spots) and you charge $100 a spot, thats $600 per break. Now what if you raised the rate to $200 a spot and made the break 1 minute :30 seconds instead. Thats cuts it down to three :30 second spots per break but you are still making $600 per break. The networks make the same amount of money but the viewers get more program content. It makes sense to me, so why aren't they doing it?

I absolutely hate commercials. You're sitting there, watching tv, enjoying yourself, when all of a sudden... "Hey America! I'm the new 99 cent BK value menu!" (I changed the channel and that was the first commercial I saw.) I think maybe a break or two would be good every half hour. Is it really necessary to have to many so often and so long? I figure networks should have a certain amount of commercials in a break with a time limit on them. Companies are always wanting to advertise more, therefore the commercial time would be more competitive and the tv networks would make more money, making them happy and us tv-watchers happy as well.