It seems to me that I might watch more TV series if they showed them multiple times throughout the night. Why show infomercials and other nonsense in the middle of the night rather than the big expensive TV shows you only show once? I'd think more night owls or second shift workers would watch first run TV series at night than the latest infomercial.

Many of the other cable channels like AMC run their programs multiple times making it much easier to schedule your Tivo to overcome conflicts.

local stations get the most $$ from the late night info shows where they don't have to share with the network.

AMC doesn't have a full line up of original shows so they can show things multiple times.

My guess as to why they show all those infomercials is that the local affiliates probably control the airtime after 1:00 am or whatever. As to why they (TV networks) do a lot of the things they do, I think it's because they are still living in the past, before cable, then DVRs, then streaming, changed the entertainment landscape.

Why show infomertials? Because local affiliates get paid, probably very well, to air them.

Yeah, local affiliates. I'm assuming they also get paid very well to air network television shows financed by giant corporations. These same corporations would be willing to advertise on the second showing as well, I'd assume. I'd think they'd pay just as much as a mesothelioma attorney too.

But these networks need to realize that giving the viewer one shot to watch a show sucks. I never even heard of half the shows on the Emmys because I'm too busy watching TV sows from cable and premium channels.

Yes, but if you turn overnight over to the networks, then the local affiliates lose a bunch of slots for local ads. That's why the infomertials are gold for local affiliates -- that's straight cash that goes 100% to the affiliate without them having to do anything except hit 'play.'

I should note my prime example of my frustration.

The Amazing Race. The fall season is annoyingly delayed EVERY SINGLE Sunday because of football. I got so sick of adjusting the time and padding the end that I just bagged it the last season entirely. And in the spring, it often gets preempted by basketball. They either need to adjust the times of these shows or rerun it. No, I'm not going to watch TV like its 1974 and not change the channel when the football game is over.

Why not allow them to sell local ads on the reruns of the primetime lineup? After all, one has to assume the motherships are happy with what they haul in on the first (and currently only) showing.

I understand your frustration, but at this point affiliates are showing infomercials on Saturday afternoons. When I was a kid that was prime TV watching time, at least in Winter - sports and old movies.

Because selling a few minutes of time for local ads during reruns wouldn't make the station as much as selling a whole block of time for an infomercial. I understand your frustration. I, too, wish there were easier ways to record things, but that's simply the economics of it. I like that networks are starting to put some content available for on demand, though. That's likely the future.

They can do that (and they do that in primetime). But the difference is that the affiliates gets all the ad sales currently in the overnight hours. If you turn overnight into a national block, local and national will split up the slots.

The simple fact is that if the networks and affiliates thought they could make more money collectively doing repeats overnight, they'd likely be doing it already. And if the network did make such programming available to affiliates, a lot of them would probably decline thinking they won't make as much money.

I always just recorded the show after T.A.R. Never had a problem. And you can blame 60 Minutes and the big ratings it draws for that CBS approach. The primary demographic that watches 60 Minutes does watch TV like it's still 1974.

Basketball only delays it on 2 Sundays (the first 2 weekends of March Madness). Golf sometimes delays it (definitely the Masters).


Yep. That's further proof that infomercials are gold to local affiliates.

Proctor and Gamble and Coca Cola wouldn't be willing to pay a discounted rate to fill those advertising dollars lost? I have no idea of the economics involved.

On Demand is a joke requiring you to have A) a major cable conglomerate and B) to have a proprietary cable box. No dice for me either way. Even HBO Go is frustratingly not available to all HBO subscribers, just those that have HBO on a major cable company. (Not that HBO has a problem showing repeats. )

The answer is for the lesser watched cable channels to pay for the right to air the shows at alternate times. They would be able to sell ad space to recoup their money and you'd be able to catch the shows at a different time. Plus it might bring more eyeballs to their channel to watch some of their other shows. Some shows have done this in the past where they are a week or so behind the original airing.

I also recorded the show after TAR but it's a pain to match up and it wastes valuable space on the Tivo. Maybe I'll give it a try and not concern myself with wasted space. But once you start recording 9:00 and 10:00 on Sunday nights, you are bound to have conflicts with HBO and then there is nowhere to watch football if you have a dual tuner Tivo.

Aren't a lot of network shows available as on-demand type things? During the very brief time we had Time Warner cable I noticed several shows that were available that way.

The audience for overnights is miniscule compared to primetime. Like orders of magnitude smaller. What a big company would be willing to pay for that time is nothing compared to what informericals and paid spots (which are just like hour-long ads instead of 15-30 second ads) can generate for a station.

I produce a TV show that airs live during the day and reruns at night, so I look at those ratings every day. We get a good audience at that overnight slot but the dollars are nothing by comparison.

At the end of the day, they don't really want to make it easier for you to watch the shows. They want you to watch it on their network during their time slot to see their ads...period. TV is a business and that business needs to make money...everything else, including the talent awarded at the Emmys, is completely secondary.

If you punish yourself by having a cable company box or DVR. I've never even seen my cable company's hidef box but I'd assume it would have some on demand stuff.

I understand that and it's the reason why I primarily watch HBO and now channels like AMC where the programming is not only much higher quality but it convenient to watch.

The whole subject of your thread is about DVRs, and now you're saying you wouldn't get one. That makes me a bit confused. So, you don't want a DVR and don't want OnDemand and don't want to subscribe to a cable or satellite company ... you just want the networks to air the shows you like on a loop, I guess.

HBO repeats their shows several times a week, including usually later in the evening, so that's a solution right there. And that's not even including the HBO west coast feed if you get that too.

I'm watching less stuff off broadcast nets because 1) they are more difficult to record if you have conflicts, 2) the quality of the programming is vastly inferior to cablenets, and 3) the business model forces them to cancel underperforming rookie shows w/o giving them any real chance with audiences.

Huh? I've repeatedly referenced my Tivos. I wouldn't get a piece of shit cable company DVR, no. I see RCN removed their head from their ass and now offers Tivos as an alternative. Not sure if they offer On Demand service through them. I didn't think cable cards were two way.

True. But when it comes to Game of Thrones, True Blood, Curb Your Enthusiasm, etc, I want to watch them as soon as possible. At least I try. You also have to get the repeats in HD...

TIVOs don't work with satellite dishes. If you punish yourself with cable then you get what you deserve.

Satellite doesn't have Comcast SportsNet. Epic fail, as the kids say.

But your statement doesn't follow. I may punish myself with cable (but it doesn't go off in a rain storm and I can actually watch the Phillies and Flyers) but I'm certainly not punishing myself with Tivos.

Plus Tivos used to work with DirecTV and then DTV yanked them for some reason.

Frankly, I like the DTV DVR much better than my TiVo. Now when I was with Comcrap.....their Scientific Atlanta DVRs were pieces of crap (and the VOD interface sucked). However my mom has Comcrap and her receivers are Motorolas which seem much better (and the VOD is great). To me that's the one thing where cable has satellite licked - VOD....if I was ever forced back to cable, I'd definitely use that a lot.