So you thought that advertising couldn’t be more intrusive than it has gotten in the past few years. Last week, I think I found a new low, if that’s possible.

At least once during two NCAA tournament games that were broadcast on KGAN in Cedar Rapids, the game screen was compressed vertically – not for score updates, but for a Papa John’s ad running across the bottom of the screen. A solid blue bar and horizontally scrolling text told me I could get a pizza for $10.99.

This was disgusting. There wasn’t even the decency to wait until the commercials. No, it has to barge in on the game. A somewhat more captive audience, I suppose.

Captive audiences, of course, are nothing new to the movie theater, and these places had heretofore only shown trailers after the movie was supposed to start – something at least related to movies. But then, at each movie I went to last year, I had to endure a new indignity – five minutes of commercials. Now, instead of the movie starting five minutes later than its scheduled time, it’s ten or more. I did not go to the movie theater to see commercials. I went to the movie theater to see a movie.

Either of these ideas would probably not have been considered five years ago. But now, with everything else saturated, new fields must be found to intrude upon the viewer, and the public is, to a large extent, taking this sitting down.

Remember when TV shows used to end with credits across the bottom, or at the side, while we got to see a show’s final segment or outtakes? The outtake idea had only been around since “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” and got to last about eight or nine years. Then the networks decided to bombard the public a little more.

Now in that space will be a promo for the next episode of that show or a different upcoming show. That might be fine – if not for the fact that many times it’s the same promo that we already saw during the last two commercial breaks. Movie credits are flashed on and off so fast we can’t read them while the network tells us (again) who will be on the late shows.

And now those promos are shoving themselves into the show itself! Cable started it, and now the networks are very close to following. After the break, often in the lower right hand corner, a small (and I use that word somewhat loosely) motion-filled graphic pops up announcing some show, either the next show or a show next week, and then disappears. No harm done, right? Except it’s intrusive and distracting, it blocked out part of the show, and it’s exceptionally annoying on tape.

The effect of these various promos is usually lukewarm at best and a severe case of hype at the worst. One guest on Letterman last week took a stab at the practice, saying CBS had done so much hype during the game, he thought Dave was playing Duke. NBC may end up having spent more time promoting “Watching Ellie” during the Olympics than actually airing it; plummeting ratings will put the show on hiatus after next week.

It doesn’t matter whether the show is from 10 days ago or 30 years ago; nothing is sacred when it comes to in-house ads. There is an online petition, linked from epguides.com, addressed to Nick at Nite and TV Land asking for removal of voiceovers and split screens. It’s sad to see shows that once used a full screen for theme music and credits get shoved over for one more blurb.

Speaking of music, how many new shows get real theme songs anymore? Today’s “themes” are in-and-out character introductions, the time sacrified to These Messages. The original minute-long “Home Improvement” theme song was in later years hacked to half that – so they could sell one more commercial.

A change back to the way it’s supposed to be, where the ads are ads and stay where ads belong, may not be able to happen. There is simply not enough outcry, and without a backlash, the advertising will just get worse. If it can.

Unfortunately, there really isn’t a way to fight back at all; it’s hard to walk out of a movie or change the channel because of ads when you still want to see the show. The public will roll over, because no alternatives exist, and new and even more intrusive ads will continue to be developed.

This column will be right back after these messages.

Jeff Morrison is a sophomore in journalism and political science from Traer. He is a copy editor for the Daily.