T.v. Laugh Tracks - Good, Or Bad?

[rob86 2]

Do you think hearing laughs on a T.V. show is annoying, or even insulting? Does it depend whether it's real laughter (live audience) or fake canned laughter injected into the show? Networks often use big laughs from one live show in other not-live shows. It's always made me wonder, because there are very few people, whether viewers or a creators of a show who admit to preferring laugh tracks. I've read many interviews with people who say "I didn't want no stinkin' laugh track in my show" but the network forced it. I've heard people often comment that laugh tracks are insulting, implying the viewer is too stupid to choose when or not to find something funny.While I find laugh tracks very annoying and distracting, I quickly get used to hearing laughs, after a few episodes, but if I just block them out, what's the point of having them? I watch comedies without laugh tracks, and they're just as entertaining, if not more so. Are laugh tracks just popular in America or have they spread to other parts of the world as well? Like I said, I block them out, so I can't remember which shows have them to be honest.

[Spyda 0]

It depends.. sometimes I like them especially if the show is already funny, but I think they suck when the show isn't funny at all yet you get the funny laugh tracks going on. I think the point of having them is to get you to laugh at more parts of the show, or to laugh at parts you wouldn't have know n you were supposed to laugh at.

[SaraInWasteland 0]

I don't mind watching shows with laugh tracks in them, as long as the show is actually funny. I know when something is or is not funny so the laugh track doesn't bother me. I usually don't even pay any attention to it. Now admittedly, there is something good to watching comedies that don't have a laugh track or a live studio audience because the silence can make the moment even funnier. Most of my favorite comedies though were filmed in front of an audience and therefore had a type of laugh track, and it never detracted from the entertainment value of the show for me.