10 minutes' commercials = fraud
 

7:10 start-time for movies + 10 minutes' commercials = fraud

Moviegoers are suing theater chains for suckering audiences into their auditoriums for a 7:10 show and then showing ten minutes of commercials instead. They're asking for minimal damages -- $75 each -- and focusing on getting theaters to start the trailers, if not the movie, at the advertised start-time. I am so down with this.

"They deceive you into thinking a movie starts on time in order to create a captive audience,'' Weinberg said. "People are actually paying good money to watch commercials.
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-film19.html

This is awesome, I hate rushing to get to a movie on time just to sit through television commercials - these guys are pioneers :thumbsup

I couldn't agree more. I love the previews and didn't mind so much when there was 1 or 2 ads before the movie, but its getting insane now. The volume of ads they play now should justify the movie being free. Ban the damn ads!

WG

Watching commercials at home is fine because that's how the TV shows pay their bills. We're not sending a check to Comedy Central every time we watch The Daily Show.

We ARE, however, sending money directly to the theater and the movie studio when we pay to watch a movie.

But then again, if you were running a theater, wouldn't you throw commercials in before the show if it meant you could buy a new house? We really have no choice but to watch. And no one is going to stop going to the movies because of it.

Right, just let your neigbor to earn money... in anyway, you won't be seriously damaged by watching a commercial

:)

I want IN on this! Who lives in the Cleveland area and wants to do something like this? I hate, hate, <B>HATE</B> the Coke commercials and the car commercials and the television series commercials they force down your throat at the movies these days. It amazes me that, with movie viewership down like 60% in the last few decades, they are so ignorant as to pull this crap after charging your $8 to get in.

Oh, man. I hope these people get their way. I would be thrilled to death to hear that they won. It's only a matter of time until things are like they were in the Stephen King book "The Running Man" (not the game show part, the commercials part).

SpaceAce

Right on, paying $10 to see a coke commercial is such bullshit. The worst is when you get right fucking stoned before walking in, then burn out halfway through the commercial marathon. :321GFY

I don't mind seeing that commercial sideshow before the movie start time, but when its time for the movie to begin I want to see a few previews then the movie. Not fucking ads, previews, movie.

"She said she sat through commercials for Coca-Cola, Cingular Wireless, Fandango and one for the NAACP, which delayed the beginning of the movie by four minutes past its advertised starting time."

HAHAHAHA

You have got to be kidding me.

I can't wait til some website gets sued for having an FPA now.

You might get your way. Could very soon be paying $15 to watch a movie without commercials. Big chains could handle it but I doubt most small ones could. They pay a fortune to show these films and they do lose money on some bombs.

Yeah it would set some interesting precedents if the "moviegoers" were to win. Not that they aren't right.

What an idiotic thing to do. The result will be putting the theatre chains out of business or higher ticket prices. Somebody should put a stop to that suit ASAP. Our local theater chain (Regal Cinemas) is well-known to have financial problems, and I'm sure running the ads helps. The theatre customer can simply go in 10 minutes after the scheduled start time if it's such a big deal to them.

Maybe I don't like going to your websites and seeing banners and blind links and shit when all I want is free porn. I think I'll sue your asses.

Blind links in TGP's are fraud even more than 10 minutes of ads in a movie theatre.

They aren't right. This is as stupid as people suing McDonalds cuz they're fat.

So a movie starts 4 minutes later. Instead of leaving your house at 7:00p to see a movie would you have left at 7:04p if you knew there would be 4 whole minutes of ads?

I really wish the day would come when the loser of a lawsuit has to pay the winner's legal fees. All these retarded lawsuits would disappear in a heartbeat.

I disagree. I'm paying to see a movie, not to see an ad for Coke or some car dealership. It's bad enough I have to sit through the previews.

Are you not being allowed to see your movie?

I guess all the people with significant upsells in their paysites will have to take them all down. People are paying to see your content, not look at ads for other services.

This is not entirely the issue. Its 10 minutes total including movie trailers. The actual commercial times for one of the named parties, (loews) was three minutes not ten. 7 minutes were for matrix/t3/hulk etc trailers that the suit specifically says they are not complaining about.

The snack bar is where the profit comes in. These commercials are just greed.
Its horseshit telling me a theatre is going under if they can't play extra commercials.

What about the damn ads playing before the start time? Used to be neat celeb facts, now they are gone too.
Lower the ticket price if we're being subjected to these ads. Fucking rip!

You're not paying to see the movie. You're paying to have access to the theater, which they control.

I pay my AOL bill, but still get those silly pop-ups advertising something or other delaying my online access 20 seconds. Those fuckers! I'm going to sue them! I'm not paying $24 a month for Sports Illustrated advertisements!

Same thing goes for cable, AND the whole Internet. Every time I go to Pink World or some other site, I get suckered into some false advertising. Pink World always gives the best descriptions to the blind links. Fuckers! How do I sue this bastard?

Again, that would be silly. Yes I'm paying my monthly cable Internet bill, but I'm paying it for the access to the Internet.

Have you ever ran a movie theater? You speak with such authority, I would assume you have. What's it cost these days to start one up?

Besides, how can you make a case for fraud when EVERYBODY KNOWS there are commercials and trailers before the movie? Only someone who hasn't been in a theatre in 2 or 3 years doesn't know that.

What movie theater do you own?

I suppose this is horseshit, too: http://www.naplesnews.com/00/08/naples/d459799a.htm

I love to watch the trailers, and I don't mind like 2 minutes of commercials... but 10' would suck !

And, how about we sue Cable TV while we're at it. My favorite shows never start exactly at 8 or 9, they're always running late 2-5 minutes. I'm even paying $36 a month for those!

Sue a business because they don't run exactly how you want them to. Haha. You'll all be laughing when you get sued by The Hun for having too many advertisements on your galleries.

Yet another stupid American law suit.

Everybody loves to make fun or complain about trivial lawsuits, but here's one that really will have no major impact on anyone's life (boo-hoo, you have to watch 10 minutes of commercial), and everyone is willing to jump on board. A bunch of guys with nothing to do but jack off, even if only mentally.

If it bothers them that much they should stop going to the movies.

My younger brother and his girlfriend both hold jobs at a movie theater.
I don't know the startup cost to open one up. Not pratical with the silver cities.
The little theaters are dying.

One of my employees managed a movie theater for 10 years and now it's out of business. The only time they make any money on the actual movies is when they get a movie for relatively cheap because no one thought it was gonna make any money (a "sleeper") and they make money on the tickets because they didn't have to pay that much to get the movie in the first place.

Usually they LOSE money on the movies and make their money with the snack bar, that's correct. They actually bid to get the movies in their theaters...they have to compete against other area theaters. It's pretty crazy.

I agree with everything FATPad, Sly_Rj, and Unseenworld have said.

Do like I do... just don't go to the movies if you don't like something about them. Me, I hate paying $4 for a soda, so I don't go. Easy.

Everyone knows if a movie says start time is 7:30, it won't really start till 7:40. Its been that way for as long as I can remember going back to the days when you could see a Saturday matinee for .50 cents.

I hate going to movies anyway. Just get a nice home theatre system and the DVD and its a way better experience and the popcorn won't break your wallet when you pop it yourself.

MOST of the profit from a movie theatre comes from popcorn

The theatres can't win. As their profits sank, they tried not to raise the ticket price by charging ever more for snacks. However, now the snacks have become so expensive that people walk into the theatre with soda, nuts, and candy in their jacket pockets or backpacks.

And I can't tell you how many fine little movies I've gone to see where there were only a half dozen to a dozen other moviegoers there. The advertising, the costly popcorn and soda...all that stuff helps the little movie get out there where otherwise it wouldn't be seen.

movie studios charge obscene amounts of money for the films, thats why small theaters never have new releases.

I am surprised it took so long for someone to do something. If the first time that ever happened everyone left the theater and demanded their money back. The practice would of stopped but they tested and the people just sat there. So they figured they could do whatever they wanted and for the most part its true we are so numb to it lol.

I just thought of another comparison. Many people pay for 'Extended Cable', where they get channels like Discovery Channel, and ESPN, etc... there are commercials on all of those channels...

might as well sue the studios for showing movies with ads embedded in the movies. look out MGM!

these people are probably the same people who argue for cellular blockers in theaters. (c'mon, if you don't want to hear other people, stay at home)

a) That'll never happen; b) the economics of the the theatre industry today would mean you would have to pay more money than you are now for the privilege of seeing films without adverts.

Yeah, why isn't cable free?

I still find it hilarious that so many guys who probably operate sites with blind links, etc., get so upset about one of the things that's keeping the theatre industry afloat, and really isn't "fraud" because everybody knows by now there will be ads on the screen.

The movie theater industry is going to take notice of this. Now movie theaters have been put on notice that they can only push so far. In a few years, the commercials would have been over an hour unless someone somewhere put their foot down. Who cares if they win the lawsuit or not, the point has been made. Theaters know there are limits now.

Unseen and the others can cry a river, but these people just made your life better in a tiny way. :1orglaugh

That's like saying "I pay $30/m for my internet service. Why aren't pornsites free?"

A tv channel produces shows, and then sells those feeds to cable companies, who then sell it to us. They charge us a nominal fee for access to the service, take a profit off of it and then pay the tv channel. The TV channel then sells commercial space in order to pay the salaries/costs involved in producing a TV show.


Get it?

You are almost unbelievably dumb. I mean, I have toenail clippings brighter than you. "In a few years, the commercials would have been over an hour"...yeah, right. And I think you're probably dumb enough to believe that.

The theatre industry is suffering badly. Removing a source of income that's relatively painless (after all, you can go out of the theatre for fresh air or a smoke while the ads run) will not make their need for income go away. Expect higher ticket prices and higher-priced popcorn and soda. If you think their response will be to simply shrug their shoulders and live on even less income, forget the toenail clippings...I have skid marks in my underwear smarter than you.

Whatever...It doesn't make the ultra-idiotic idea of suing theatres over the adverting any less silly. Especially when there seems to be such enthusiasm among webmasters who routinely deliver less than their customers expect, serve up blind links the way a theatre serves up popcorn.

Are all you TGP operators listening?

I never said it was silly. I think it's absurd.

Some questioned the fact that we pay for cable AND have to see commericals, and I gave them the reason.

What are *you* talking about?