Don't be surprised if 50-55 minutes becomes the norm over the next decade. Networks and their advertisers need to find a way to reach the TiVo generation. From what I've read they feel the golden goose may be product placement. I would even suggest that they may go too far and throw in a scene or two on each show that shows the characters watching an ad with some commentary before they find the happy medium. Two of my favorite shows, FNL and Heroes have been pretty in your face with product placement. Applebee's is all over FNL....hell a couple of the characters work there while they usually have the name in dialog once or twice an episode. Heroes had the big vehicle product placement with HRG giving Claire a new SUV. And let's not forget the Coke gets a good 15-20 minutes of their logo on screen every time American Idol is on.

Only stuff I can think of today that is 50 minutes long woudl be fringe and the upcoming dollhouse.

Yeah that fridge show, and that doghouse one coming up.

I'm not sure how they think this will help. When I watch "Fringe" and the ads start, they are always preceeded by a "Fringe will return in 60 (or 90) seconds" warning. I then know exactly how many times to hit the "skip 30 seconds" button on my DVR: 2 or 3 times. With other shows, I always skip 2 minutes and usually end up fast-forwarding thru or watching any ads which start after the 2 minute point.

Wasn't Once More with Feeling from the
Buffy tv series 1st airing like ran
70 minutes or so?

OK, so rather than have every poster mention Fringe and Dollhouse, does anyone know what the first 42-minute show was? I would think if the internet was around at the time, there would have been mass hysteria as people complained about 18 minutes worth of commercials.