General - Dueling Graphics

One of the most annoying trends in recent television history has got to be the proliferation of onscreen graphics.

I blame VH1's Pop-Up Video (too which I was addicted in college) for ushering in the era of too much visual information sprawled across the TV screen.

Of course, the invasion really began with those subtle network logos in the lower left or right hand corner of the frame. Those barely-there insignias in a washed out white color that made them seem like ghosts lurking in the background of the program.

Soon enough, the news networks were mimicking ESPN's scrawling box score (at :25 and :55 past the hour, as I recall) by running top headlines along the bottom of their screen. As the internet age of instant gratification moved on, twice-hourly updates were not enough and the scroll of information became a constant fixture along the bottom of the screen.

It wasn't long before E! Followed suit and gave us a constant barrage of celebrity insight like "Jessica Simpson Spotted Eating Lunch In Beverly Hills!" as a supplement to the red carpet interviews on screen.

Late to the party, but more invasive than the rest are the promo graphics for upcoming shows, which I believe FOX started using with gusto before the others eventually caught on. Now, it is impossible to enjoy the program you are currently watching without being reminded that there will soon be another coming down the pipeline to distract you from the real world outside.

The end result of this information overload has been that networks don't even care about how many graphics they put on the screen, or whether some of them are even visible. I watched in awe the other day as the Food Network logo in the lower right hand corner was covered up by a factoid that Americans crave potato chips more than any other snack food. This fact was obscured before I had even finished comprehending it by a promotional graphic for the Iron Chef show which was coming up next.

At that point, I had completely lost track of what network I was watching, why I was so hungry for chips and why the little Iron Chef dude was flipping his skillet across the face of the poor, unsuspecting host of the current program.

All I needed to completely fry my brain was a news scrawl with information about Jessica Simpson attending a Lakers game and watching Kobe Bryant drop 43 points on the Toronto Raptors.