Blog 8!

One of the biggest controversies today is networks keeping up with the technologies of television. The new era of the television has made it more and more difficult for advertisers to get their point across. One example of this, is when t.v shows (especially live or reality ones) are having a very dramatic moment. They will advertise right in the middle in order to keep the audience watching and waiting for the results of the moments. Mostly competition shows do this (Biggest Loser, American Idol, Americas Next Top Model). This keeps viewers glued to the screen waiting, and allows commercials to sell to their viewers. For viewers there are a lot of different options now to not watch the dreaded commercials, they can go online and watch the show whenever they want, avoiding missing their show because they were busy, they can also tape the show through a dvr and fastforward through the commercials. Advertisements must find more affective ways of making advertisements more prevelent, on the show Fringe on Fox, they tell the viewer how long the comercial is going to be, often making the people feel like its a shorter time period and making them more willing to stay in front of the screen. I think this is the best way to keep people on the channel, especially in today's world, where there are so many options of not watching tv.

Blog 7: Open

American Idol is one of the most popular television shows today, and the most popular reality show. Watching it for the past four seasons diligently, I have become a huge fan of the show. By studying the show, I have observed a lot of what we have discussed in the class. First, it is a primetime show. It starts on at 8 p.m. on Tuesdays and Wednesdays each week, this is a large reason why so many people watch the show. It also does blunting, on ABC Dancing with the Stars competes with American Idol on Tuesday nights, American Idol and Dancing with the Stars are both reality shows relating to music, and have the same target audience. By being on at the same time American Idol sucks in a lot of Dancing with the Stars viewers. American Idol also does a "bridge" They often find reasons to make the show two hours or an hour and a half, by having performers on or having "special" nights in order to raise money or with special themes. This makes the audience not change the channel in the middle of the show. CBS does counter-programming against American Idol, by putting NCIS on at the same time as American Idol, they know they cannot compete with American Idol and its target market, so by putting NCIS on their target market is completely different, along with the interests of the people who watch NCIS.

American Idol also has a lot of "false drama" this season it has been quite obvious from the beginning who the AI producers want in the finale. Adam Lambert and Danny Gokey have been in the last 3 singers each week. American Idol thinks that everyone just wants to see these two perfom, and by putting them last, they create a climax and make everyone wait and watch the rest of the contestants, and creating drama within the last 15 minutes of the show. American Idol is an awesome show that I watch each week, and I think it is because they do all of the things I have listed, and it is being proven to work.