I am curious about Alan's comment "And do they exceed the amount of commercial time a program can contain?"

Not even considering promotional advertising within a show, but just regular commercial breaks, I have watched the advertising time go from about 8-10 minutes per hour in the days before cable, to up to 25 minutes per hour after the networks gained their captive cable audience. Isn't it strange how we have progressed from the days when TV was free, paid for by advertising, to a time now when we pay to watch commercials?

But getting back to Alan's comment, is there actually a legal limit to the amount of advertising time a show can contain? I wasn't aware anything like that existed.

Edgar replies: It appears that the FCC no longer has rules that limit the number of commercials, except with respect to children's programming on cable television. That limit is between 10.5 and 12 minutes per hour.