Why do viewers avoid ads? I cite two reasons. First of all is the time consumed. 30 years ago whenever the program breaked you were sunjected to three or four ads at the most, the total time per hour was about 9 minutes. Today (2007) you are apt to see as many as TEN Commercials per break, and the amount of ads per hour can exceed 20 Minutes!
Second is the Contents of the Ads themselves. It seems most Advertisers believe the best way tp sell a Product is to insult a viewers intelligence. Subjects that were Taboo a Decade ago are now commonplace on Ads. Complaining to the Networks is of no avail, unless you are a member of a "Minority" Group you will most likely be told "We have a Constitutional Right to air these Ads."

I have news for the Advertisers, We have Constitutional Rights too! You cannot force us to watch your Commercials, and if we chose to avoid watching them by Recording a Program and Fast-forwarding through certain segments or watching Home Video, so be it! I stopped watching Cable TV at the beginning of the year, I decided if the Networks are going to make more money by selling MORE Commercials, why shoukd I have to pay for them?

Strike 3, We will BOYCOTT

I understand commercials help pay for the production of shows, sports events, athletes salaries etc. However, when shows start to interrupt a string of adverstisements (upwards of 8 in a row) during televised golf tournaments, I find it over the top. Less advertising might equate to less prize money, lower salaries for actors and athletes, etc...Do you really care if a golfer wins $900,000 or 1,200,000 or if an athlete makes $8,000,000 Vs $10,000,000? I don't mind watching 2 or 3 ads in a row, but that's it. I've decided to boycott any products advertised by companies that choose to be #4, #5, etc. Companies might think twice before signing up if they knew, we the viewers have had enough.

Dear advertisers: If I see an interesting commercial, I will stop fast forwarding to watch it.

P.S.: hot chicks works every time.

This I can guarantee: if I don't have the option to skip commercials, I will watch less television.

I don't skip all commercials, but I do skip most of them.

The genie's out of the bottle. Get over it. Find another revenue stream. Here's a hint: HBO.

Honestly, TV needs a damn good culling.

Did anyone see the Indy 500 on Sunday? ABC finally figured it out.... at least for sports. When they went to commerical they split the screen and left the picture of what was happening in the race on the left while the ad ran on the right.

This would make sense in so many sports, especially hockey.

yeah, fuck you commercials!!!!!11111

$250 a year for 8 tv channels, 10 national radio stations and about 40 local ones, all without commercials? Makes me wish I was back in the UK.

Otherwise I hardly ever watch tv as broadcast - as glassfrequency said, it's the continuity (or lack of it) that's the problem, not the commercials themselves. That plus being shouted at by local car dealerships every five minutes....

Marketers have no one but themselves to blame for this. People are going to learn how to tune out or actively seek ways to avoid advertising if they are constantly being bombarded by it.

IN SOVIET RUSSIA ADS WATCH YOU!!!!!

I think they should just say what the product is then explain what it does and convince us in just 15 seconds. I don't car about how the commercial is done or who is in it. I care more about the tv show I am watching. They should make a channel for each major tv company and just show the ads on there and not even have ads on the actual channels. A thirty min show isn't even thirty minutes anymore...unless of course you count the ads. Heck even do some kind of weather channel thing and just scroll text ads every few minutes.