• Marketplace, Tuesday, April 20, 2010 12:30 PM

The latest experiment in creating a zap-proof commercial is something of a reverse product-placement play, Stacey Vanek-Smith reports. As commercials roll on CNN's new evening new show, "John King, USA," a little window at the bottom of the screen stays focused on what's going on at the set, from paper shuffling to hair grooming.

"People are so much more media savvy than they used to be. I mean, there's almost nothing that they don't know. So we just wanted to let them in a little bit more on everything," says Erik Rydholm, executive producer of ESPN's "Pardon the Interruption," which has been airing 10-second snippets of behind-the-scenes footage during ad breaks for about a year now.

Katz Television Group's Bill Carroll applauds the trend. "If you're fast-forwarding on TiVo and you see program content, that's going to force you to check that out," he tells Vanek-Smith.

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