Forum Discussion

Stallpepper's avatar
Stallpepper
New Contributor
4 years ago

Why does Cox always blare the volume on their commercials?

This practice is not only is this aggravating and in violation of the spirit of the law, but it's abusive to your customers.

Yes, the actual law relates to average volume throughout the commercial, but you're getting around that by having zero volume at the very beginning and then turning it to 11. 

Does this really help you out that much that you want to do this to your customers?

  • JonathanJ's avatar
    JonathanJ
    Former Moderator
    @Stallpepper


    The FCC's launched the Commercial Audio Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act on December 13, 2012. The CALM Act is intended to ensure TV commercials have the same average loudness as the TV programs they accompany. Cox actively works with programmers, advertisers, and equipment providers to ensure that commercials that run on our channel lineup are compliant with the new CALM Act regulations. I'd like to get a few more details from you so I can report this to our programmers and advertisers. Please email my team at cox.help@cox.com with the following information: full name, full address, the date, time, and channel you were watching, a brief description of the commercial, and your full address. Thank you very much for your help!

    Jonathan J
    Cox Moderator
    • Stallpepper's avatar
      Stallpepper
      New Contributor

      I'll try to remember to write down all those details the next time one of your commercials comes on in the early morning and wakes up the entire house. But in the meantime and to save time, please refer to any commercial airing in your inventory, and especially any advertising your services. They all do it.

      And I realize you're just cutting and pasting your canned reply and probably didn't read my post, but I addressed the requirement in the CALM Act that you quoted for "AVERAGE loudness." You work your way around the letter of the law by having a few seconds of zero sound at the beginning of your commercial, and then BLARING the rest of it. So while your average loudness may comply with the letter of the law, it not only violates the spirit of the law but also abuses your customers.

      So back to my question, which I wish you'd actually address, is raising the volume of your commercials to such a degree so effective that it's worth abusing your customers?

      • ChrisL's avatar
        ChrisL
        Former Moderator
        I can certainly understand how annoying this whole situation must be. Once we have some examples of this occurring as JonathanJ indicated we can submit that information to be investigated further.

        -Chris
  • OldMainframeGuy's avatar
    OldMainframeGuy
    New Contributor III

    In particular, your commercial with the obnoxious kid who thinks he won a million dollars on the Internet, running through the house screeching and screaming is beyond obnoxious.

    • Bruce's avatar
      Bruce
      Honored Contributor III

      I don't know which commercials pander the worst:  Subaru or Cox.  "You're a super-smart single mom and that's why you rent our Panoramic!"  There should be a mitigation law for excessively fawning over whatever the Virtue-of-the Month.