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The rise of streaming threatened to make traditional television obsolete, but those platforms have really just been responsible for ushering in a new era that’s produced more of the same old problems and complaints. That includes advertisements that have no business being as loud as they are, and California is cracking down with a new law that could benefit the entire country.
The cost of cable and the endless ads you were subjected to while watching it were key factors that contributed to the cord-cutting revolution that coincided with the rise of Netflix, Hulu, and other streaming services that offered a refreshing and on-demand alternative to getting your entertainment fix.
Unfortunately, things have essentially come full circle for many consumers who have to shell out the amount of dough they’d pay on a cable subscription to access the various platforms that host the movies and television shows they want to watch, including those that require you to fork over even more if you don’t want to be subjected to the commercials that have slowly but surely infiltrated them.
If you don’t pay that premium, there’s a good chance you’ll be subjected to ad breaks that are accompanied by a noticeable increase in volume. However, it’s only a matter of time until that stops being an issue in California—and, hopefully, well beyond.
California has passed a law that will ban streaming services from spiking the volume when they run ads
Every brand that pays to have its commercials run is hoping to garner as much attention as possible, and advertisers spent decades exploiting a lack of regulation on the volume of their spots before Congress passed a law requiring the FCC to address that issue in 2010.
However, that legislation was enacted before streaming took the world by storm, and those platforms were immune to regulations that only applied to broadcast and cable television.
According to The Verge, Tom Umberg, a Democratic state senator in California, decided to address that loophole by introducing Bill 576 after his newborn daughter was roused from her sleep by blaring streaming ads. It was recently signed into law by Governor Gavin Newsom, and those commercials will need to be the same volume as the content they’re accompanying beginning in July 2026.
There is a chance a similar bill will be passed at the federal level in the near future. However, it could end up being redundant when you consider most of the streaming platforms that will be forced to follow the law are based in California and could opt to introduce an industry standard as opposed to tailoring their offerings to only be compliant within its borders.
There’s no telling if that will end up being the case, but here’s to hoping that’s how things ultimately pan out.