It’s TV Turn-off week. (April 19 to 25th).

How much of citizen action will it take for television to clean up its act? Boycotts have worked with mixed results, but there is more evidence now that advertisers are sensitive to being branded as unethical and family unfriendly. (Abercrombie and Fitch is just one example )

A new approach being taken by CleanTV is to document the ‘raunch’ that appears on local stations, and make it easy for people to fire off an email to the advertiser. Not the station, mind you, but to the advertiser.

It’s a neat idea if it can mobilize people. The logic being that profit-hungry networks will not simply listen to viewers, but will certainly pay attention when advertisers hold back their money. CleanTV sends a daily log of the unfavorable content to the local advertisers “so they are aware of what specifically they are supporting.”

However, the site takes itself a bit too seriously, and attempts to mix a bit of street activism with morality. Does a housewife with a toddler and a mortgage really have the time or the inclination to become a ‘digital commando’ as the site urges? My toddler/mortgage juggling ‘commando’ firmly believes that all you need is a remote, not a mouse, to make a statement –any week of the year.

CleanTV, it must be said, is the creation of Steven De Vore, who claims the project was started in response to the LDS church urging its members to ‘do something’ about television.