TV's Dirty Little Secret

If you were watching the Super Bowl in Tucson, you may have been surprised by what you saw shortly after Larry Fitzgerald's touchdown in the 4th quarter. For 30 seconds, viewers of Comcast Cable saw images from a porno channel instead of the game. During that time, some adult "parts" were shown.

Comcast has apologized for the incident. In a statement the company says it's been, "working throughout the night," to discover the problem.

While there's a chance that there was some sort of high tech hacking of the Comcast system, I think I have a good idea of what happened as I've seen the same thing occur at TV stations where I worked. In the master control room, an operator is in charge of making sure that the programs are being correctly being sent out. The job can lead to some downtime and often the operator will watch some of the other programming to pass the time. But if that person gets confused and hits the wrong button on the router, the program that they're watching might be broadcast to everyone instead of just to them.

My guess is that the operator was watching the Super Bowl, figured he'd have a few minutes to kill during the post-touchdown commercials and switched over to some adult viewing.

I'll be curious to see if Comcast ever releases any more information on this Super Bowl blunder.

Is Super Bowl Ban Good for PETA?

NBC has announced that it will not air PETA's, "Veggie Love," commercial during the Super Bowl. The network says the 30 second spot, "...depicts a level of sexuality exceeding our standards." Always interested in a bit of controversy, I went online to look at the commercial. I've embedded a copy in this post. If you can't see it, use this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wDE9XpmDHE

'Veggie Love': PETA's Banned Super Bowl Ad
As you've probably noticed, the ad shows a several barely dressed women acting very, "fondly" towards a variety of vegetables. The message of the spot is that research shows that vegetarians make better lovers. The spot is a bit provocative but I don't think I would have spit out my potato chips if I had seen it during the Super Bowl.

I think PETA is overjoyed that the commercial has been banned. A visit to the PETA website shows that the organization likes to produce racy and controversial ads. As a result of being dropped from the Super Bowl, the ad is being talked about and people are watching it online. It's a massive amount of free exposure. Had it been in the Super Bowl telecast, I'm not sure if it would have received as much publicity. My guess is that the director was told to push the bounds of taste as far as he liked, with the knowledge that the goal was to create controversy rather than a commercial that could be shown on network TV.