I probably should preface this by saying I’m not a big football fan to start with. I generally don’t get the concept of watching sports on TV, but I’m more than willing to take in a game live of just about any sport. There is something just a little bit more real about the experience when you are there. I would say that probably applies to most things. So what does the Super Bowl have to do with escaping the 9 to 5?
I heard a statistic on the radio the other day that caught my attention. During the game, the ball will only be in motion for somewhere between 12 and 14 minutes. So what is going on for the other 9 plus hours? First we have the pregame show which is 5 hours long. Then there is the game itself divided by multiple $3 million dollar 30 second commercials. And who can forget the half time show. There’s another 30 minutes. And for good measure there’s another 30 minutes tacked on to the programming calendar just in case. The fact that they haven’t needed it in 46 years doesn’t stop network executives from planning for the inevitable (Just in case your DVR stops before the end of the game). Last year 111 million people watched the Super Bowl making it the single most watched television program in history. Over 1/3 of Americans spend almost the equivalent a working day each year watching this single event.
Yes – anyone who loves football will counter “but it’s the Superbowl!”. It’s almost un-American not to watch it. Much like the world cup in the rest of the world. It’s not quite the event that the cricket world cup is in certain parts of the world, but for those of us in North America, it is “the” sporting event of the year. Getting back to my 12 to 14 minute statistic, the Superbowl has been stretched into something deliberately intended to suck up your attention for the purpose of advertising. I don’t remember how long the Superbowl was on TV in the 1960s by I’m guessing it was far less than nine and a half hours. It’s just one more example of how things in today’s society expand based on someone else’s agenda. Am I going to watch the Superbowl? Yes. Am I going to do on the network’s timeline? No thanks to our DVR. I’m hoping to get through the whole game in about an hour. If you are going to escape the 9 to 5, you have to be able to set your own agenda.
