This is still being worked on, but it's a fun little thing that I've coded and is usable:

http://www.matazone.co.uk/animpages/thesimpsonstimer.php

The average years bit wasn't working (because I was being a bit silly with my approach to the maths, it looked like it would work but it plainly didn't) but I've fixed that now.

I'm going to add a 'email your hours to a friend' facility and a little bar graph to let people compare what they can do in the time they spent on the title sequence then it'll be done.

It hasn't been on the air for 20 years though, has it? So it's impossible to have been watching it that long.

*checks*

Nope. Wikipedia says it debuted as its own series in 1989 (1987 as a sketch on the Tracey Ullman Show). I'm just being nitpicky though.

They cut the title sequence almost in half in the reruns quite a lot here. I guess to make room for more commercials. The thingy thing told me that I've watched it for about 60 hours, though.

They do a similar chopage of the title here too...on sky at least...But they do show like 4 episodes a day or more...maybe. Anyway, lookit.

It hasn't been running for 20 years, but the chances of me bothering to add a new year to this thing every year is pretty remote (although I suppose I could code in a date checker... Nah, I can't be bothered) so I built in a bit of redundancy.

They do chop it a bit, but I haven't included the end titles in the survey, so I think we can safely assume that 60 seconds of titles isn't too extreme.

The Skyone trailer was what made me think of doing this; I linked to it in my blog a few days ago.

Okay, that's gone public now, and it has added scary stats now too. Hurrah!

That's a lot of time watching a theme song..How do you add it all up because i've seen 2 different versions of the theme song, one for the older versions and one for the newer ones..Heh can you do the same thing you did for the simpsons theme song to how much time we spend watching commercials? I'm sure that would be waymore scary...*grabs remote and turns off tv*.

I could do. There were a few bugs in the code initially but it's settling down to a slightly more sensible level now.

The adverts equation has probably been done many times before, and I think that The Simpsons is probably more amusing!

i...i just realized that you are right mata...i think it said i watch about 20-40 hours in my life. it was between there..im not sure... i need to cut down...

your program though..is rather brilliant

You have spent, so far, 208 hours of your life watching the title sequence of The Simpsons.

Woo!

Good gods! Do you do anything other than watch The Simpsons?!?

Yes, I do! I read about the Simpsons! But seriously, I used to be big into the show. I've probably seen all of the old episodes. The newer ones I don't grab.

Thing of it is, I "watch" 4 episodes of the Simpsons per day. I say it in quotes because I don't always pay attention, but it's on in the background. So, 4 times a day, 7 days a week, and then I've been watching it for 10 years, at the very least. That makes a lot.

Real life version of the opening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B82DpGZJiGk&search=simpsons

How very odd indeed.

It was that version that triggered me into thinking about how long I'd spent when I linked to it in my blog. I noticed it was one minute long and then started doing the maths, scared myself, so decided to scare everyone else too.

Currently, with over 2000 responses, the average time is around 50 hours. That is so tragic.

I've been watching it since I was born and I still have only watched in for 45 hours!

On Sunday, they used the live-action version of the simpsons to start off the episode!

It's good to be sure, I got a measley:

You have watched the title sequence from The Simpsons for 8.67 hours

Though there is the thing of the advertising slipped in there at the bottom

So far, 4543 people have put in their data.

The average amount of time spent watching The Simpsons' title sequence is 50.62 hours.

Blimey. I feel quite good about myself now!