Get your TV Brick ready: Fox adds infomercials

When over-the-air networks add an infomercial block, it's fair to say the American television industry has finally reached its point of collapse.

Infomercials (which are literally program-length commercials) used to violate FCC regulations against airing too much advertising - rules that were lifted by the Reagan regime. Many infomercials are outright scams, advertising get-rich-quick rip-offs and bogus weight loss drugs.

These days, individual TV stations fill much of the weekends, overnights, and even afternoons with infomercials. Cable channels have begun doing the same - and cable households have to pay for this shit. Occasionally a national political candidate will run a one-time campaign infomercial on the networks.

But no regular-assed over-the-air TV network in the U.S. of A. nation has ever aired regularly scheduled infomercials.

Until now.

Starting in January, Fox will replace part of its Saturday morning children's programming block with 2 hours of infomercials.

If I owned a station that was affiliated with Fox, this would be crying out for a local preemption. Even if I had to bring back those slides from 1983 and have a voiceover announcer just read the AP wire, there's no way in hell I'd show network infomercials. But TV stations apparently aren't so bright: Fox's infomercial block has cleared 95% of the network's affiliates.

Stations are so eager to preempt 'The Simpsons' for a college basketball game that has 3 viewers, but infomercials get 95% clearance?

Do Fox-affiliated stations even gain anything from showing network infomercials?

It gets worse. Fox plans to team up with major advertisers to create infomercials that resemble regular programs but are actually built around the product being advertised. This slick brand of infomercial is designed to blur the lines between programming and advertising.

It's time the FCC steps in and puts its foot down like it used to. Maybe when affiliates' licenses come up for renewal, the FCC might be interested in hearing comments from the public about how the stations are misusing the airwaves (which are supposed to belong to the people).

(Source: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticleHomePage&art_aid=95409;
http://www.variety.com/VR1117996360.html)