"Tonight," and other hit shows that were once much better

Today on KMOX, Paul Harris and I yakked about last night's "Sopranos" episode, the fate of "American Idol" as it approaches its finale this week, and Jay Leno's 15th anniversary as host of "The Tonight Show."

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Comments

[Charley Green]

Mr. Barnhart,

In my humble opinion you failed to address two of the key reasons folks are loosing interest in network programming.

The excessive amount of commercial interruptions, 20-25 minutes per hour. It’s more challenging and frustrating to stay into the plot with all the constant interruptions and I believe it also affects the quality of the programming. I don’t know about you, however, I don’t need that many bathroom breaks. The price being charged to the advertisers (and paid) along with all the subliminal advertising within the story, its obvious money is the factor not a quality product, consequently what we have are commercials being interrupted by a story.
The 5 minute wrap or conclusion on most drama programs is another factor as only 35 minutes is spent on the actual story with a 5 minute rush at the end (after commercials) to bring it to a conclusion which in many cases leaves us wanting and oftentimes short on details with the ending.

I know the guys sitting on the thrones responsible for programming think they are the only ones who can see the big picture. However, if they continue to focus on the money path they’ll continue to get the disappointing results, blame everything and everyone else and fail to realize they are the ones who’ve killed the Goose that laid the Golden Egg, not the viewer.

Thank you for this moment,

Charley Green

8424 West 85th Street

Overland Park, KS 66212

(913) 648-7408

Author and Speaker

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[Mark Jeffries]

Congratulations, Charley--guess someone hasn't told you that you don't put your personal address and phone number online. But I guess you don't mind that your E-mail inbox is already crammed with spam. Enjoy the junk mail and telemarketers!

[Marvin]

Spot on from my opinion Charley. I don't ever even watch network TV because of the insane number of commercial breaks. People blamed everything from Dennis Miller to the theme song for Monday Night Football going down. No one ever mentioned that the commercial breaks became intrusive. I used to watch MNF every week, now I only watch if the Steelers are playing.

Plus, the interruptions usually include promos for the networks' crappy shows. Bad combination!

In addition to the innumerable commercial interruptions, it's the constant "pop-ups" that are so infuriating!