It's been a loooooooooong time since I did radio newscasts, but way back when the ads were scheduled by the ad department and sorted and stacked without a lot of labels on them (on tapes, which tells you how far back) and plugged into the system at specific times. The amount the advertiser paid governed when the ad was run, and how often. Some paid for specific slots: am drivetime, pm drivetime, lunch hour.
I suspect that even though the technology has undoubtedly changed the method of scheduling ads may not have changed much. It's very possible that the NPR guys were as startled by the ad as the rest of the listening audience.
It's not that uncommon. Last season there was an episode of Boston Legal, one of the ones in which Denny Crane is inappropriately having sex, or trying to, with the aid of a 'little blue pill', which he talked about at length. What was advertised immediately when they went to break? Cialis. The little blue pill. Product placement of the obnoxiously funny sort.
I seem to remember also an ad for the movie Towering Inferno, featuring OJ Simpson, during the Simpson murder trial. I think someone got yelled at for that one.
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I suspect that even though the technology has undoubtedly changed the method of scheduling ads may not have changed much. It's very possible that the NPR guys were as startled by the ad as the rest of the listening audience.
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I'm sure. It was just uniquely inappropriate.
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I seem to remember also an ad for the movie Towering Inferno, featuring OJ Simpson, during the Simpson murder trial. I think someone got yelled at for that one.
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