There’s an obscure little bill floating around in Washington these days. At least I hope it’s still floating. It has to do with not allowing television advertisers to CRANK UP THE VOLUME on their ads. Then, as if that weren’t enough, the pitchmen on some of the ads yell (eg, Billy Mays).
Do I support this bill? Yes. Hell, yes! (Pardon my yelling.) I hate having my TV adjusted for the program I’m watching and then getting blasted out of my seat by the ads. Actually, I was under the impression a lot of TVs had some sort of volume governor that would prevent this. If not, they should. Are you listening, TV manufacturers? Or take it one step further; if the volume hits a certain predetermined level, shut it off. Yeah. An automatic mute for loud ads. That’s the ticket!
This brings to mind a related question of mine: Why do people (public speakers, campaigning politicians, etc.) with microphones in front of them and amplifiers on all sides still feel the need to YELL at large audiences? If the sound system is doing its job, is yelling necessary?
I don’t like being yelled at, thank you very much.
There’s actually a technical thing about that. My man explained it to me once. I forget how it works exactly, but it has to do with the producers of the ad putting all of the different pieces of the sound on equal (and maximum) footing. There are some TVs that will actually counteract that. I’ll ask him when I talk to him tomorrow. He’s a huge audiophile and he could probably tell me what kind of TVs have the setting.
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I just looked it up and my TV does have something called SteadySound that is supposed to keeps ads at same volume as the programs. And I have it turned on. But if this is how it works, then I really feel sorry for people who don’t have it. Billy Mays is still yelling!