almost nothing

Someone's listening

I've received a sort of satisfactory response to my question about the volume at which ads are broadcast from Geoff Russell, the IPA secretary and director for media affairs. I've posted his comments below, but in short it seems like there maybe some new regulation in the pipeline. I only hope someone is still watching TV when the consultation paper turns into action...

You may be interested to hear that BCAP (Broadcasting Commitee of Advertising Practice) is about to issue a consultation paper in this area.

Clearly it is in no-one's interest to upset viewers by making commercials excessively loud - and I am sure that you know that there are rules in this context, with the ASA actually censuring broadcasters when they believe a break has been significantly louder than the surrounding programming.

Having said this, we are all aware of occasions when ads do seem to come over as particularly strident.

In fact, between 1 September 2005 and 1 December 2006, the ASA received

245 viewer complaints about the perceived high sound levels of TV advertisements. Viewers supplied transmission details in 43 cases and, of those, 11 were felt likely to have breached rule 6.9 of the BCAP TV Code.

This is clearly not a large figure given the '000's of commercials likely to have been transmitted during this period, but it is nevertheless something which needs to be looked at.

As indicated, at present, volume in commercials is governed by rule 6.9 of the BCAP Code.

This currently states:

6.9 Sound levels in advertisements

"Advertisements must not be excessively noisy or strident. Studio transmission power must not be increased from normal levels during advertising.

Note:

The peak level of sound at the studio output should not exceed +8dBm.

To ensure that the subjective volume is consistent with adjacent programming, whilst also preventing excessive loudness changes, highly compressed commercials should be limited to a Normal Peak of 4 and a Full Range of 2*4 (measured on a PPM Type IIa, specified in BS6840:

Part 10, Programme Level Meters). A fairly constant average level of sound energy should be maintained in transitions from programmes to advertising breaks and vice versa so that listeners do not need to adjust the volume. A perceived loudness meter may be useful where sound levels might cause problems."

BCAP is aware that broadcasters with otherwise excellent records of compliance with the BCAP TV Code have been found in breach of rule 6.9 on more than one occasion.

According to them, this indicates that the existing rule is leading to confusion among broadcasters; particularly regarding an uncertainty about what constitutes an appropriate sound level for a TV advertisement

- other than (and here it gets technical!) somewhere between PPM 4 /

+0dBm or lower (for highly-compressed advertisements) and PPM 6 / +8dBm

(the peak level of sound at the studio output).

It may be then that the present rule relies too heavily on perceptions of "loudness", rather than providing an objective method for measuring the loudness levels of the broadcast output.

Given this, BCAP has proposed to revise the current rule to provide greater certainty for broadcasters - while maintaining the consumer protection afforded by the existing regulation.

However, while this might mean that advertisements should not peak over the normal subjective loudness levels of programmes, it may not be possible to eradicate entirely the effect of advertisements seeming louder if they are aired during a programme with mostly quiet content (such as a period drama with extended sections of softly-spoken dialogue) than if they are aired during a programme with a mostly loud content (such as motorsport).

In a nutshell - what this all means is:

- we recognise that there is an occasional problem in this area

- no-one is deliberately doing it

- steps are being taken to address it.

I'm not deaf, you know. Yet.

Earlier this week, unable to locate the remote commander for the PVR, I found myself exposed, unusually, to some advertising; an experience that reminded me of Ivor Hussein.

In the dim and distant past (1995) Ivor, who was the then researcher in the then media department of the then Lowe Howard-Spink, conducted a delightfully elegant analysis of the BARB panel, in order to quantify a phenomenon we’d observed qualitatively, that of Ad Avoidance – the tendency of some people to flip channels during the commercial breaks.

Ivor’s analysis involved examining the viewing patterns of each of the c.5000 members of the panel over a five year period. For each person, he quantified the total number of minutes of commercial television watched and then established the proportion that was to the commercials themselves. He then compared each panel member’s ratio with the ratio that had actually been broadcast and was thus able to classify people in accordance with how much advertising they were avoiding.

Remember this was back in the days of (mostly) only 4 channels and incomplete remote penetration but even then, the analysis revealed that only a third of the population were not engaging in some form of avoidance behaviour. At the other end of the spectrum, a third of the population were classified as Extreme Ad Avoiders, avoiding, on average, 29% of the commercials they ought to have been exposed to.

(Incidentally, Ivor now works as a freelance consultant, so anyone wanting similarly elegant analysis should contact him here i.hussein@btinternet.com.)

One would clearly expect the incidence and extent of avoidance to have multiplied considerably since 1995, with the increase in the number of channels, penetration of remotes, PVR’s, entertainment choices, clutter, etc on the one hand and decline in ad liking (see ‘Are we doomed?’ post below) on the other. But there might be another factor at work too.

EXACTLY HOW LOUD DO THE COMMERCIALS NEED TO BE?

Surely the response of any normal human being to having Michael Winner entreat them to “Calm down, dear” at 135dB, is to do the opposite and begin to frantically scrabble amongst the half empty beer cans, copies of the Sun, piled up plates, children’s toys, dogs, cats and other detritus, in search of the remote for the vital protection of their tympanic membranes. And, once they’ve done that, well they might as well check what’s on channels 6 through 965, mightn’t they.

So here’s an idea, for anyone who shares my pov. Let’s start a campaign to lower the levels at which commercials are broadcast in the hope that, as a result, more people will hear (and see) them.

Where do we start?