

CALM Act passed, will quiet loud TV commercials within a year - mikeknoop
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/12/calm-act-passed-will-quiet-loud-tv-commercials-within-a-year.ars

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Groxx
When _both_ democrats and republicans agree on something, you can almost
guarantee it's been requested for _decades_ by the population they supposedly
represent.

Still. Better late than never, I guess.

~~~
_delirium
The other case of overwhelming bipartisan support is when it's something that
nobody actually wants.

~~~
randallsquared
...or that only a specific industry wants, which I think is by far the most
common case.

~~~
Groxx
I think that fits with what they said.

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metamemetics
Do HNers still watch TV? I stopped paying for TV ~ 2 years ago and find it
mildly nauseating when I visit relatives and they want to have it on in the
background.

~~~
sophacles
I like my push TV service (i.e. cable) for the following things:

1\. sports -- there is no viable alternative at the moment.

2\. Sometimes I just want to veg and channel surf (be passively entertained).
There is no good way to do this with online services or recorded stuff.

3\. Sometimes I need push infotainment because I don't know about the
existence of something to actively pursue interest in it. While HN and Reddit
(and so on) are rapidly replacing this niche, there are some things they just
don't do well, somethings are just more interesting when presented as a video
first, rather than as a link (cooking stuff comes to mind...).

That being said, having the TV on in the background is different than "still
watch TV", and I agree, it is a bit annoying and sad.

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pdx

        FCC has received complaints about loud commercials since the 1960s
    

Nice to see that if you ask your government for something, within 50 years,
they will deliver it.

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ams6110
If this isn't fiddling while Rome burns, I don't know what is.

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ynniv
Limitig volume (decibels) has little impact on the perceived loudness of
sound. This is easily demonstrated by listening to a sine wave and white noise
at the same volume. For a practical demonstration, see
[http://www.propellerheads.se/substance/discovering-
reason/in...](http://www.propellerheads.se/substance/discovering-
reason/index.cfm?article=part3&fuseaction=get_article)

~~~
icegreentea
Ah yes, but the text of the bill uses the word 'loudness' which maps more
accurately to dba's, which is perceived sound intensity. This takes the ear's
frequency response into account as well.

~~~
ynniv
_the text of the bill uses the word 'loudness'_

... that's nice? Are you expecting people to call up their senators and
explain the subtleties of audio perception and how the commercial that they
just heard exploits the differences between perception and audio level to
actually be louder than the primary content without reading any differently on
a decibelmeter?

Here's my prediction: this bill will have absolutely no effect other than to
make running a television station more expensive.

You can't solve this through legislation because you can't efficiently fine
offenders. If you care about the loudness of commercials, stop watching
television or start building a commercial solution.

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nodata
"Rep. Anna Eshoo's (D-CA) bill will require commercials to be at the same
decibel levels as programs during which they play."

I'm not sure if this will solve things. See
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression#Marke...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression#Marketing)

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marknutter
My question is: why haven't the tv manufacturers figured out a way to
automatically regulate the volume to prevent loud commercials? It doesn't seem
like it'd be impossible to solve and it'd be a great selling point.

~~~
epochwolf
Some TVs do have this feature. It's called Smart Sound on my grandparent's TV.

~~~
ohashi
That's something you rarely hear, grandparents having better technology than
the HN folk.

~~~
jonhendry
Makes sense though - older folks probably watch more broadcast/cable TV the
old fashioned way, with commercials, as opposed to using a TV to watch movies
or streamed episodes.

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civilian
One of Heinlein's stories had a device that would automatically mute the TV
when it got too loud. It effectively worked to mute the loud commercials.

It's too bad no one ever made that technology. :(

~~~
Jach
It would be a simple project, but the problem is that it would probably mute
explosions and gunfire too.

More on the article, it's nice they're doing this and all, I don't care so
much since I don't watch t.v., but I don't think a simple facepalm expresses
my feeling that _this_ is about the best our government can do over the past
few years when it comes to making the lives of its citizens better.

~~~
jamesaguilar
> I don't think a simple facepalm expresses my feeling that this is about the
> best our government can do over the past few years when it comes to making
> the lives of its citizens better.

A few problems with this statement:

\- Many people probably feel you are discounting some of the work the
government has done over the past few years. The stimulus and healthcare
(depending on who you ask) both significantly improved the lives of large
sections of the citizenry. And there are probably countless minor laws that
fixed various problems that weren't quite as important to you.

\- I don't like the assumption that the government's primary role is to make
the lives of the people better in ways it is not already doing. This leads to
government expansion and often fiscal irresponsibility and economic
inefficiency. To put it concretely: a lot of the things you probably believe
would "make the lives of [the country's] citizens better" cost money. That is,
other people's money, people who might not value these things as much as you
do. The government could I'm sure give every citizen a pair of roller skates,
and that would "better" the lives of the citizens, but it also has a cost.

~~~
Jach
You're right my comment can be troublesome, nkurz expresses part of my
position more clearly.

People are free to feel I'm discounting the stimulus and the healthcare
package, personally I believe those to be insufficient and a mess, whether
they will ultimately really improve everyone's situation is still to be seen
and debated (elsewhere). I admit I'm likely ignorant on many minor laws that
were passed that are useful to certain groups of people.

My assumption on the government making lives better is not that it should come
up with more ways to do so, or less ways, but that it should simply focus on
the big things and not these little things, which would include giving
everyone some rollerblades. I'm also aware that everything has a cost, I don't
see how stating that is an argument for anything. Of course government should
weigh costs and benefits before rolling out some plan.

More concretely and with respect to this specific problem, it's something the
government should keep its hands out of. This problem is easily solved by a
free market solution of buying a sophisticated (i.e. capable of distinguishing
commercial from program) device to do this for you without failing on the
obvious cases (as the top comment suggested), the lack of which suggests it's
not all that important a problem in the first place. (And in fact, it seems
like _advertising_ is the more significant complaint, which is why things like
Netflix and TiVo exist.) Plus a good-enough solution exists already: the mute
button. If government should be providing any sort of service to better
people's lives, it should be weighted such that only those services which
provide the best improvement for the best costs should be implemented. Let's
talk about the costs of eliminating national poverty, not making sure everyone
with a scraped knee can go to the store and receive a free bandaid.

Edit: (Yes, I also realize that a failure of the free market doesn't mean
there's no problem, but in this case, I think there really is no big deal and
the government can stay away.)

EditEdit: On the other hand, the government nearly controls public broadcast
anyway. Not straight-up censorship controlling but e.g. the recent force-
upgrade to digital over analog, the list of words you can't say on public t.v.
There are so many issues with this that it's hard to get a clear picture.

~~~
loewenskind
Shortest job finishes first. Big things will have big debates, big
compromises, filibusters, on and on. In that time thousands of "little things"
could have made it through.

Personally, I would try both. Get big things in the pipeline but get as many
quick wins as possible. To do as you suggest leaves you in a position of
having accomplished literally nothing after years in office.

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alanh
I love when the system actually works

~~~
nkurz
I feel the opposite way. This strikes me like having hearings about steroids
in baseball --- blatant pandering for votes instead of dealing with real
issues with real consequences. I have no problem with individual networks or
stations deciding that they want to better serve their audiences, but can this
possibly be the best use of time for our nation's highest governing bodies?
Going further, what's the positive national interest in encouraging Americans
to watch yet more broadcast television?

~~~
jamesaguilar
> Blatant pandering for votes instead of dealing with real issues with real
> consequences.

I think this is probably one of the things the government can do that is
unambiguously good and will touch the lives of many, many Americans. It's also
an example of a market failure where there is no market for the product or
service demanded. It's a textbook example of the tragedy of the commons where
the gain on the TV signal is owned by no one and thus not protected. It seems
like a perfect thing for the governing bodies of the country to spend time on
if that's what it takes to get it done.

I do not buy your theory that this is pandering for votes. I doubt very many
people will chose their elected representatives based on this issue. Instead,
I think that is just a convenient rhetorical device by which you are
discounting the value of this measure.

> Going further, what's the positive national interest in encouraging
> Americans to watch yet more broadcast television?

Personally I don't think it's in the national interest for the government to
decide for its citizens what they ought to be doing with their time. Instead,
it should observe what the citizens wish to do and, where appropriate and
efficient, facilitate those activities.

~~~
_delirium
_It's also an example of a market failure where there is no market for the
product or service demanded. It's a textbook example of the tragedy of the
commons where the gain on the TV signal is owned by no one and thus not
protected._

I can buy that it's an example of market failure, but I'm not sure about the
second part. According to the idealized free-market theory, this sort of stuff
should be taken care of by the market just fine, by people changing the
channel away from the objectionable ones, thus commercially penalizing them to
the point where running quieter ads becomes the right business decision. That
doesn't appear to have happened, probably because while people dislike loud TV
ads enough to write to the FCC, they don't dislike them enough to actually
meaningfully change their TV-watching habits (so channels with quieter ads
don't really gain a commercial advantage).

~~~
jackowayed
But it is a market failure. The market for television shows is very far from
perfectly competitive.

The products are _very_ differentiated, and there are only a few companies
providing the products. But the differentiation is really what matters in this
case.

As much as everyone hates loud commercials, channels can't actually gain
significant viewership by quieting them down--no one is going to watch a drama
with quiet commercials when they really want to be watching the football game
with loud commercials.

This means that there's no incentive for a channel to piss off their
advertisers by doing this on their own.

This is what governments are for--mandating the socially optimal strategy when
the dominant strategy is something else.

~~~
jerf
Actually, I don't think that's the source of the market failure. The source of
the market failure is that there is no real feedback to the advertisers when
the recipients are disgruntled or annoyed. The only people that matter are the
Nielson raters, and I don't think there's a slot on their forms for being
annoyed by volume. If advertisers saw a big dip every time the commercials
came on, and could ask the customers why, and then could run an experiment
with more level volume and find out people don't tune out so quickly, they
could learn and the market could correct, but due to the nature of the
technology not a single step of the requisite path actually existed 20 years
ago, and still mostly not today.

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DeusExMachina
As far as I know we have a law like this in Italy, but still commercials are
too loud, not complying with regulation.

I hope this will work in the USA.

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alex_c
I can't quite articulate why, but it bothers me that passing a new law was
necessary for this.

~~~
thwarted
Agreed, I don't know how much sense it even makes from an advertising
perspective. When loud commercials start, we mute the TV and ignore it, not
the least of which because it's loud enough to wake the baby. We are not being
exposed to the advertising.

Someone from Big Advertising a few years ago asserted that skipping
commercials, even going to the bathroom during commercial breaks, was
stealing, same as piracy. I find it odd that advertisers would actively
discourage watching like this.

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aneth
I'm all for this but unclear what "average maximum" refers to.

~~~
_delirium
The text of the bill doesn't contain any actual definitions
(<http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s111-2847>), but instead
instructs the FCC to make mandatory the document _Recommended Practice:
Techniques for Establishing and Maintaining Audio Loudness for Digital
Television_ (A/85), published by the Advanced Television Systems Committee, a
standards body. That document is open-access here:
<http://www.atsc.org/cms/standards/a_85-2009.pdf>

It contains a method of setting the loudness of a program via a volume
control, which is based on some sort of average of the underlying waveform
(not peak sample value), and then "recommends" that during changes between
program and interstitial content (like advertisements), the same loudness
setting be used.

It seems broadly similar to something like Replay Gain
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replay_Gain>), which sets volume based on an
average that's intended to capture perceived loudness.

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jrockway
How long until they start regulating the ads in my podcast?

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XxionxX
I work at a TV station in the bay area, this is total bullshit. I have a dial
that controls the volume of both the TV shows, and the spots. Fuck the TV
station, I CONTROL YOUR TV!! Jk, I just don't care to turn the dial down every
commercial break (we have really old equipment). Every spot and show has a
slightly different volume, except the British comedies. Wtf is up with that?
Those things fucking blow up my airwaves. Why do you do that to me BBC?

