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Uploaded: Thursday, December 13, 2012, 1:04 PM
New law calms loud television commercials
Law authored by Congresswoman Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, goes into effect
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A law authored by Congresswoman Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, that turns down the volume on TV commercials went into effect Thursday.
The CALM Act, or Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, requires TV providers to keep the volume of commercials at the same level as regular programming. The congresswoman, working with Rhode Island Democrat Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, pushed for the legislation after she discovered decades of consumer complaints to the Federal Communications Commission about "earsplitting television ads," according to the congresswoman.
At a news conference held Thursday morning, Dec. 13, in Washington, D.C., Eshoo lauded the implementation of the law helping all Americans no matter their political affiliation.
"This is obviously a relief to consumers," she said.
Quieter TV viewing has arrived nearly two years after President Obama signed Eshoo's legislation into law on Dec. 15, 2010. At Thursday morning's news conference, Eshoo recalled how her bill came into existence.
At a family gathering four years ago, a commercial that she called a "blast" came on while her family watched a sporting event. After muting the ad, her brother-in-law told her to do something in Congress about the loud disturbance on the television, Eshoo said. The FCC approved its final rules of the law last year and widespread implementation began Thursday, the end of a grace period to accommodate any financial hardship on TV providers to comply with the law, according to Eshoo's spokesman Charles Stewart.
The FCC will be charged with regulating commercial volumes. According to the FCC, they will rely on consumers to monitor industry compliance with the new law. Complaints for any violators can be filed at www.fcc.gov/complaints.— Bay City News Service Are you receiving Express, our free daily e-mail edition? See a sample and sign-up for Express.
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Posted by Ronnie, a resident of the Midtown neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 3:23 pm CNN Tweeted about this yesterday with the hashtag of "#firstworldproblems
I #totallyagree.
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Posted by loud loud loud, a resident of Los Altos, on Dec 13, 2012 at 4:04 pm I Totally Agree! I think it's awesome; what took so long to fix a problem that's bugged folks for decades?!?
Thanks, Ms Eshoo!
Three, two, one... here come the haters with the usual comments: "why aren't they working on bigger problems, etc...
Good question! Why doesn't the Speaker of the House make congress work five days a week?!?!?!?!?!?
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Posted by Geez pleeze, a resident of the Downtown North neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:18 pm Good heavens, my father complained about this in the Fifties! What took so long?
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Posted by Hmmm, a resident of East Palo Alto, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:19 pm Many of the problems we have can't be easily fixed by legislation. This one could be, and it was. Yay!
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Posted by Anon., a resident of the Crescent Park neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:29 pm Just as no one watches regular TV anymore.
I am a lot more irritated that there is no regulation
of Internet advertising.
I hate it when the advertising videos go off if you do
not click on them.
When web page ads are louder than the programming.
When the commercials do not turn off.
The web sites like You-Tube make the videos small
so you have to watch a huge number of ads per
minute of programming - much larger than TV ever
was.
This is welcome, but pretty much useless, and I
did not even mention radio.
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Posted by Anon., a resident of the Crescent Park neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:31 pm The other thing is ... who can do anything about it?
Where do you report an ad being loud, how do you prove it.
What is the penalty and who enforced it?
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Posted by voter, a resident of the Adobe-Meadows neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:33 pm What happened to freedom of speech? First, she is trying to reduce the effectiveness of advertising. Next she'll to to restrict corporate political donations. Doesn't she understand that corporations are people, too?
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Posted by iamhmmm@yahoo.com, a resident of East Palo Alto, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:36 pm Um, Anon, I watch "regular television." So do some of my neighbors. Guess what? Not everyone can afford cable - I know you know that - but moreover, not everyone WANTS cable. W/Hulu, Amazon, Netflix, etc., plus local channels, we're just fine w/out cable.
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Posted by Loud-TV-Ads-Are-Not-A-Pressing-Problem, a resident of Another Palo Alto neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 6:37 pm 20+ years in Washington, and this is about the only thing that Eshoo has to show for her taking up space on Capitol Hill.
> I am a lot more irritated that there is no regulation
> of Internet advertising.
If advertising on the Internet offends you--don't use it. By the way, would you guess that there is more advertising in one of the local newspapers, or Youtube? The answer, of course, is that there is more advertising in print media. Ready to have the Federal government regulate the advertising in newspapers?
Eshoo is a waste of time and space.
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Posted by loud loud loud, a resident of Los Altos, on Dec 13, 2012 at 7:13 pm "What happened to freedom of speech? First, she is trying to reduce the effectiveness of advertising."
Not effecting freedom of speech, silly, just the volume. It was bi-partisan.
"The other thing is ... who can do anything about it? Where do you report an ad being loud, how do you prove it. What is the penalty and who enforced it?"
Geez, try READING the article!!!
CALM Act: Web Link
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Posted by Anon., a resident of the Crescent Park neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 9:34 pm Hey iamhmmm@yahoo.com
I don't have cable ... but I do have Amazon Prime ... which is no substitute. I don't think there are many watchers of regular TV around anymore
I do watch regular TV, I think most people do not any more. I just get really crappy reception - worse than I ever used to get years ago when that was all there was to watch. I'm think they do it on purpose.
My point was relative to all the other assaults on citizens in terms of advertising, now regular TV advertising is almost moot.
One example are the commercial AM radio stations that routinely have louder commercials than programming, AND they do things like feature alarms, telephones, car horns, etc in them to annoy and get attention.
On the Internet, go to a public site like You-Tube or Huffington Post or others and notice how when they show videos they push more and more advertising at you, and then lower the volume of the actual content, sometimes it does not even play so you have to reload the page and sit through the commercials several times, then when the shorter and shorter segments of video are done we are treated to more and louder commericals that autoplay - often without any control to stop them or turn them off.
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Posted by Anon., a resident of the Crescent Park neighborhood, on Dec 13, 2012 at 9:38 pm > Loud-TV-Ads-Are-Not-A-Pressing-Problem
What offends me is your thoughtless knee-jerk reaction. If you don't like my posts, skip them, don't read them and by all means do not respond to them.
And by the way brainiac, print media does not have a volume or loud obnoxious commercials, yet. what is with people like you that you have to always toss those kind of snide comments into the conversation. Obviously obnoxious programming does not bother Fox News viewers.
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Posted by David, a resident of the Palo Verde neighborhood, on Dec 14, 2012 at 10:44 am Thank you Anna!
NEXT: put some teeth into "Do Not Call"; its widely ignored, even by For Profits.
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Posted by stretch, a resident of another community, on Dec 14, 2012 at 4:33 pm All previous whining aside, my husband and I thank you, Anna Eshoo.
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Posted by Nora Charles, a resident of Stanford, on Dec 14, 2012 at 4:52 pm I've been complaining about this for years. A big thank you to Congresswoman Eshoo.
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Posted by Geez pleez, a resident of the Downtown North neighborhood, on Dec 14, 2012 at 5:18 pm Now that Anna Eshoo has finally done something worthwhile, she can resign in peace.
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Posted by MIdtown resident, a resident of the Midtown neighborhood, on Dec 16, 2012 at 9:25 am Thanks Anna, Next how about banning advertising that target kids? is outrageous that impressionable and immature kids are played upon to turn them into consumers so some fatcat executives can make a pile.
Ya, Ya, I know all about freedom of speech but this concept is being abused - just look at the "citizens united" decision. wake up!
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