alt Hacker NewsThe American World Cup Introduced Ad Breaks–and Everyone Hates It
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You guys have no idea how bad things can get.
As an average IPL game of T20 cricket viewer can tell you.
Basically every over consists of 6 balls bowled, times 40(each team gets 20 overs)
And ads are sold on each ball, so 240 ad slots for sale, these are overlay ads, so basically the feed gets reduced to 70% of the screen and you see an ad for the remaning 30% typically for 5 secs.
On top of this after each over(6 balls), you get full screen targeted ads for 30 secs before the nexy over starts. This targeted ad is exclusively sold for your demographic account. Your friend or a family member will see a completely different sst of targeted ads.
A wicket(batter got out)? You dont need to watch a replay of how it happened here is 30 secs of more ads in the middle of the over while the new batsman walks on to the field. I wish this was sarcasm.
And on top of all this, you get a full 2min 30sec "strategic timeout" in between each innings to guess what? Run more ads.
And all of this just in the span of just over 3 hours start to finish.
Rinse and Repeat.
I became a baseball fan when I was nine years old and that lasted for thirty years. About 4 years ago I stopped watching the games because I couldn't stand the announcers reading ads during the inning, sometimes between pitches.
I don't mind a 3-5 minute commercial break I can mute and ignore or skip with a DVR buffer. Traditional TV commercial breaks are the most benign. But I can't listen to 5-10 second micro-ads that can come at any time. The fandom has left my body.
This is probably the most disruptive change that has been introduced to the sport. Every world cup has introduced something new, such as yellow / red cards, 3 points for victory, goal line technology, VAR, and so on. This year there is a time limit until you must perform a throw-in, among other things. But also these "hydration breaks". I think they have crossed a line. It is so obviously not for the benefit of the game itself.