Digital On-screen Graphic

A digital on-screen graphic (originally known as digitally-originated graphic) (known in the UK and New Zealand by the acronym DOG; in the US and Canada as a bug; and in Australia as a watermark) is a watermark-like station logo that many television broadcasters overlay over a portion of the screen-area of their programs to identify the channel. They are thus a form of permanent visual station identification, increasing brand recognition and asserting ownership of the video signal. In some cases, the graphic also shows the name of the current program. Some television networks use an on-screen graphic to advertise upcoming programs (usually programs scheduled later the same day, but can also be for "significant" upcoming programs as much as a week in advance) — this is generally displayed after the opening, during in-program credits, and when returning from a commercial break.

The graphic identifies the source of programming even if it is time-shifted—that is, recorded to videotape, DVD, or via a digital personal video recorder such as TiVo by possibly station identification. Many of these technologies allow viewers to skip or omit traditional between-programming station identification; thus the use of a DOG enables the station or network to enforce brand-identification even when standard commercials are skipped. DOG watermarking also helps minimize off-the-air copyright infringement (for example the distribution of a current series' episodes on DVD): the watermarked content is easily differentiated from "official" DVD releases, and can help law-enforcement efforts by identifying not only the station an illegally copied broadcast was captured from, but usually the actual date of the broadcast as well.