‘Sky should create a dedicated adverts-only channel’

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I fear I shall be traded in as part of Mrs Secret Marketer’s Christmas shopping. Not content with driving her crazy in supermarkets where I confuse the weekly grocery shop with work-related store check distractions, my TV viewing habits have now tipped her over the edge.

I suspect I am not the first bloke to be accused of being a total nightmare with the remote control, but I fear my habits will take some matching. The missus was delighted when I upgraded to Sky+ a while back. We can now watch 90 minutes of The X Factor in half an hour max whenever we want to view it with minimal frustration and absolutely no commentary from Louis Walsh. Perfect. That is, unless you live with me…

Sky+ has an even better role in my house – to speed through the programmes so I can watch the adverts

Sky+ has an even better role in my house and that is to speed through the programmes, thus freeing up quality time to watch the adverts.
It is just like going to the cinema where the ads are a real treat. In fact, it is better. From the comfort of my own sofa, I can pause, replay (several times) and add live industry analysis and opinion as to how bad most of the ads are and which agency produced them. And all in HD with red buttons for further digital content. What a joy. Well, for me at least.

Aside from marital tension, the only real problem I find with the new technology is that I have to record an entire programme to enjoy the advertisements that are within it. This is a poor use of space on my hard drive and often leads to further arguments as capacity is taken up by programmes that neither of us really want to watch.

Sky should create a dedicated adverts-only channel, which could be played on loop with video printer-style credits rolling across at the bottom – just like the ones you see on news channels.

Sky could even invite so-called industry experts to sit in the studio and commentate on the latest ads. I am available for regular slots and my wife would be delighted: not only would she get the remote control back for a few hours but if I happened to pop up on screen she could easily fast-forward and then instantly delete me.

Better still, this channel would save all clients a fortune as agencies would no longer be able to bill us extortionate sums for recording our own ads that we have already paid them large sums of money to produce.

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