OLN Tour coverage: commercials and plugs

[graf zeppelin]

Anyone else find OLN's coverage diluted even further this year? Seems to me that there are so many commercials, so many segways features I'd rather care not to see, so many plugs for Survivor and other OLN programming notes that I am having a really hard time watching it. Would kind of like to see the Tour. Every few sentences poor Phil seems obligated to throw in a plug for something, only to follow it up shortly thereafter with the announcement that we need to take a commercial break. I literally had to stop watching it today. I may resume simply reading about results later in the day online, possibly taping and fast forwarding through some of the mountain stages to see highlights of interest. Sad I know.

Anyone else finding the same, or has my impatience with the commercial aspect of TV viewing simply increased over the past year?

 

[whiteboytrash]

Yep I know what your saying... EuroSport only broadcasts four and half hours live cycling a day with two 30 minute bookend programmes to discuss the finer points and if that’s not enough they reply highlights at night.... and finally its on cable TV so there is limited advertisements....

Anyone else find OLN's coverage diluted even further this year? Seems to me that there are so many commercials, so many segways features I'd rather care not to see, so many plugs for Survivor and other OLN programming notes that I am having a really hard time watching it. Would kind of like to see the Tour. Every few sentences poor Phil seems obligated to throw in a plug for something, only to follow it up shortly thereafter with the announcement that we need to take a commercial break. I literally had to stop watching it today. I may resume simply reading about results later in the day online, possibly taping and fast forwarding through some of the mountain stages to see highlights of interest. Sad I know.

Anyone else finding the same, or has my impatience with the commercial aspect of TV viewing simply increased over the past year?

 

[graf zeppelin]

Yep I know what your saying... EuroSport only broadcasts four and half hours live cycling a day with two 30 minute bookend programmes to discuss the finer points and if that’s not enough they reply highlights at night.... and finally its on cable TV so there is limited advertisements....

Nice. I dont see it in the lineup for my area but I am going to call to inquire about it. RAI was wonderful for Giro coverage for the same reason.

 

[Treky]

Anyone else find OLN's coverage diluted even further this year? Seems to me that there are so many commercials, so many segways features I'd rather care not to see, so many plugs for Survivor and other OLN programming notes that I am having a really hard time watching it. Would kind of like to see the Tour. Every few sentences poor Phil seems obligated to throw in a plug for something, only to follow it up shortly thereafter with the announcement that we need to take a commercial break. I literally had to stop watching it today. I may resume simply reading about results later in the day online, possibly taping and fast forwarding through some of the mountain stages to see highlights of interest. Sad I know.

Anyone else finding the same, or has my impatience with the commercial aspect of TV viewing simply increased over the past year?

Yeah you are right about that. Too many plugs. I'd hate to sit through those. I am getting very efficient detecting when a commercial is coming up I hit the FF twice before he even says "see you on the other side of this" Thank god I have a Tivo

 

[Eden]

Yep I know what your saying... EuroSport only broadcasts four and half hours live cycling a day with two 30 minute bookend programmes to discuss the finer points and if that’s not enough they reply highlights at night.... and finally its on cable TV so there is limited advertisements....

and wasn't it you WBT who was telling all of us Yanks that we wouldn't like EuroSport, minimal coverage, terrible commentary yadda yadda, last year when we wanted to watch the Vuelta.......

I'm with Treky - love my Tivo. What's a commercial?

 

[Ryagon]

From a commercial/news report thingy I saw. OLN was bought out or something and will be "Vs." in a few months. I wonder how this will efect the coverage, good, or bad?

 

[lwedge]

Yep I know what your saying... EuroSport only broadcasts four and half hours live cycling a day with two 30 minute bookend programmes to discuss the finer points and if that’s not enough they reply highlights at night.... and finally its on cable TV so there is limited advertisements....

and wasn't it you WBT who was telling all of us Yanks that we wouldn't like EuroSport, minimal coverage, terrible commentary yadda yadda, last year when we wanted to watch the Vuelta.......

I think Eden is right WBT. WBT speak with fork tongue.

Anyone else find OLN's coverage diluted even further this year? Seems to me that there are so many commercials, so many segways features ?

You know, there shouldn't be any commercials on SAT or Cable TV. TV on such media should be more like PBS since we pay for the service.

I don't watch TV that much to warrant a TiVo so I live with the commercials, I generally jump up and do something else.

lw

 

[ATM]

From a commercial/news report thingy I saw. OLN was bought out or something and will be "Vs." in a few months. I wonder how this will efect the coverage, good, or bad?

They will be focusing on sports and eliminating the outdoors programming. In theory, this should mean better coverage of cycling but you never know.

 

[lwedge]

They will be focusing on sports and eliminating the outdoors programming. In theory, this should mean better coverage of cycling but you never know.

In theory, Hallelujah !!!

lw

 

[sydsyd]

I hope they continue coverage, despite all the plugs and commercials. Actually, I wish that cycling.tv could cover it like they did the Giro. That coverage was really great. The TdF ratings are down 40-something percent this year over last year, but OLN said they expected that as the casual fans who turned in for LA have tuned out and the core cycling fans have stuck around.

I've watched the coverage on OLN every year since they started. The commercials have definitely increased, but at least there is some variety now. I can still hum the Mercury Mountaineer commercial music they played it a dozen times each broadcast.

 

[tcklyde]

Anyone else find OLN's coverage diluted even further this year? Seems to me that there are so many commercials, so many segways features I'd rather care not to see, so many plugs for Survivor and other OLN programming notes that I am having a really hard time watching it. Would kind of like to see the Tour. Every few sentences poor Phil seems obligated to throw in a plug for something, only to follow it up shortly thereafter with the announcement that we need to take a commercial break. I literally had to stop watching it today. I may resume simply reading about results later in the day online, possibly taping and fast forwarding through some of the mountain stages to see highlights of interest. Sad I know.

Anyone else finding the same, or has my impatience with the commercial aspect of TV viewing simply increased over the past year?

Record the morning live coverage and watch that instead of the terrible "Primetime" coverage. The morning coverage is much better, much fewer stupid features and best of all no Al Trautwig.

 

[tcklyde]

Yep I know what your saying... EuroSport only broadcasts four and half hours live cycling a day with two 30 minute bookend programmes to discuss the finer points and if that’s not enough they reply highlights at night.... and finally its on cable TV so there is limited advertisements....

Yeah, yeah, we know mate. But we have to work with what we get. Which, unfortunately, is not good.

 

[discobean7]

Yeah, yeah, we know mate. But we have to work with what we get. Which, unfortunately, is not good.

On another thread someone mentioned listening to the Eurosport audio while watching the OLN coverage. It works pretty well and the Eurosport audio will carry you through the commercials.

 

[Mansmind]

From a commercial/news report thingy I saw. OLN was bought out or something and will be "Vs." in a few months. I wonder how this will efect the coverage, good, or bad?

I've seen it also, it's going to be called "Versus" instead of OLN, makes sense considering what they cover most of the time. The blurb says they're going to have exclusive coverage of sports.. like the tour, PBR, Hockey.. etc. etc. We'll see I guess.

 

[graf zeppelin]

On another thread someone mentioned listening to the Eurosport audio while watching the OLN coverage. It works pretty well and the Eurosport audio will carry you through the commercials.

Doing this today. Its working really well. I recommend it very highly:

http://www.eurosport.com/cycling/tour-de-france/2006/

In one browser, click on "Live" in the LiveScore box to get an auto refreshing page for comments and positioning on a stage profile etc. In another browser click on the box to the right of that for a popup that loads the live audio. The combination is great with the OLN coverage on mute.

 

[TrekDedicated]

I HATE SAAB vehicles... "16 jet engineers" blah blah blah.

ahhhhhhhhh.