Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Some thoughts on the Pacquiao vs Hatton coverage

I'm sure a lot of us here took the time to watch this fight. It's probably going down the books as one of the biggest win by our very own Pacman over a fighter who's rightfully hailed as one of the best in his division.

However short it was, I can very well say that I enjoyed listening to the fight. I would've loved to have listened and watched, but alas, I didn't want to shell out P500 (for what turned out to be a mere 359 sec. of boxing time) to watch at SM, and GMA 7 took too long to show it. Too long in fact that it was in youtube long before it was ever on my TV screen.

I know I already criticized GMA on one of my last entries, and while I'm not singling them out, they were after all responsible for the airing of Manny's last 2 fights (and doing the exact same things) that I couldn't help but call them out.

My problem? The commercials.

I know those ads are necessary, important even in keeping TV free. I understand that there's a price to pay for exclusivity. I get all that, but this is getting ridiculous! There were more commercials than the number of times I actually saw Pacquiao and Hatton!

They even took to breaking apart it in silly segments:
Hatton's entry. Commercial break (hereon referred to as CB). Pacquiao's entry. CB. Pacquiao getting to the ring and praying. CB. The referee giving instructions. CB... you get the point.

And not just the Pacman vs Hitman fight too! Even the undercard matches between whatshisname and whathisface whose outcome we couldn't care less about were given the same royal treatment! Further pushing back the main event!

I'm pretty sure that somewhere there's a law that states the proportion of commercial per actual programming. And I'm pretty sure it's not 1:1 (or in this case 2:1). Can't they think of a way to still credit their sponsors without messing up the program? Like have the commentators mention them casually every now and then. Or have their logos appear on screen. Anything but being left to the mercy of those texters who can't hold off knowing the results of the fight.

And really, does anybody even watch those commercials? I know I don't. Are they bombarding us with that many with the hopes that they can luck out on us accidentally seeing some of them? Won't it be better if they just show 2 or 3 short ads good for maybe a minute or a minute and half in between, thus encouraging us to watch them lest we miss the start of the next round. They can then charge a premium for those air time because those would be special. Something people actually watched.

Of course, its entirely possible that they don't care what we think. For now, I've decided that I won't be watching any of their future coverages until they sort this thing out.


joyfulchicken said...

BitTorrent is your friend :-P

philos said...

@JC: Well youtube works too...

Anonymous said...

All the long commercial breaks really sucked big time, but I did laugh my head off on many of them, especially the one with that sexy girl on a roof putting some kind of Vulca-seal. The commercial of Giselle Sanchez about Emil's secret also got me going. Lol. Poor Emil.

Bryce said...

Not watch until they change their ways? That's a statement. Hats off. =P

philos said...

@kat: I didn't really watch the commercials, it got irritating after 1 round.

@Bryce: Not that doing so would make a difference.