Zapping Ads Into 8 Seconds of Blue

Jerry Iggulden of Santa Clarita had a tired fast-forward finger. So he invented a device, set to hit stores in June, to zap advertising from videotaped television programs.

The price: $199 for the box called Commercial Break that hooks up to VCRs, said Richard Leifer, president of manufacturer Arista Technologies.

Iggulden’s device lets a VCR record a program, then makes a map of where the ads are. You play back the tape, and the device fast-forwards the ads. All you see is eight seconds of blue screen.

The irony isn’t lost on Leifer. “When sales go up,” he said, “we’ll actually run a television commercial for a product that gets rid of television commercials.”