I think that people tend to watch more TV with less enjoyment when it's just a cable stream into your house. I think that people don't end up tending to things like channel-surfing. It's hard to plop down on the couch and watch whatever happens to be the 'best thing on' when the video is on-demand and you have a choice in the matter. This is the same reason that so many people felt liberated by things like TiVo. It allowed them to just tell TiVo what they liked to watch, and they didn't have to worry about gathering around the TV set at a time specified by a channel's scheduling selections.
I’d argue that, for at least some people, streaming/TiVo/etc. can lead to more deliberate TV watching rather than plopping yourself down and begging out. I guess the counterpoint is there’s all this TV just sitting there for the watching but I’m honestly not sure which predominates. Many
People historically watched a lot of TV, of whatever type happened to be on.
Streaming services probably can and should cater to that more.
I think sometimes the psychological aspect of it isn't appreciated. The whole point of plopping down on the couch and turning on the TV is to decompress. It's great that streaming services allow you to choose what to watch when, but if you've been figuring things out and making decisions all day, that's what you want to get away from.
Traditional broadcast TV and cable keeps delivering something even if you do nothing. You can override it (by changing the channel or using the DVR), but you need only exercise as much control as you feel like at a given moment.
The allure of channel-surfing and just leaving something on in the background seems to be huge for some people. Getting stuff on demand is great, but it does require a bit of thought.
"Which is what a large amount of people already do, who own a TV."
I don't necessarily agree with this statement. I do not believe people are as selective with what they watch if they own a TV (yes, I know, there are always exceptions). When you actively seek out the content when/where/how you want it, as well as probably paying for it in some cases, you are much more selective with what you watch and how much time you spend watching it.
If people own a TV, they are using the hundreds of channels they have to suck up time rather than providing them true entertainment. People who own TVs, in my opinion, are much more likely to channel surf and just find a boring show to fill up their time because they find nothing else to do. This gets even worse with the increasing use of DVRs.
It turns into not filling an interest/entertainment need but rather providing a diversion.
"Internet users don't want to watch TV shows online" != the truth.
Back in the dawn of Youtube I used to watch all The Daily Show I could fit into my over-sized head. I still love watching old episodes of Hockey Night in Canada and I have bookmarked a non youtube site that let's me watch South Park. I can't count HOW many times in University people would download, myself possibly included, episodes of Lost, Family Guy, America's Next Top model.
I'd say TV shows online are BETTER than on regular TV because you can watch them when you want. Hence the amazing popularity of TIVO I would assume since I don't have that service.
I barely watched TV as a kid/teenager living with my parents (it helped that cable isn't that popular in France, where I'm from- most people are content with the 5 free national channels, which are now completed by 15 or so more through the free TNT service); so when I moved out, I never missed it and as such I have never had TV since.
Semi-exception to that, an ex-girlfriend of mine moved at some point in an apartment with cable TV- the difference in the quality of our relationship with or without the TV was noticeable. Without TV, we'd go more out of our way to cook, find things to do, play games, etc.. With TV, a lot of evenings were spent just on the couch staring blankly at the screen (well, I would be programming on the couch while she would be watching TV).
It's a very subjective experience, of course, but all of that makes me feel that TV watching is inherently pernicious and to be avoided as much as possible.
I think a lot of the phenomenon is due to the fact that you can't watch TV in a discrete fashion- as soon as something ends, something else starts and you do not have to do any effort to keep watching. When you watch something like a movie, the activity is clearly defined in time, and as such you don't get sucked in like you do when watching TV.
Because Cable Television with "57 Channels and Nothin' On" had already taught us about channel surfing. Subsequently couch surfing became part of the vernacular.
I've found some truth to this in my own experience. I've actually given up on having cable/satellite/some other system where I can just turn on the TV and be inundated by crappy content. However, I still have a few shows a week I must watch in a timely fashion (via non-cable sources) and then a large DVD library of past seasons that I can use if I feel I need some sort of background activity.
My productivity is huge with this set up but I still get to watch my favourites.
I really don't get people who use broadcast TV. You have to plan your life around anything you want to watch -- which is the oppostite of Netflix, which adapts to my own schedules and free time. It just seems crazy!
For me, the culture has shifted. With regular cable TV, we definitely had the TV on more often and just in the background with maybe nobody paying particular attention to it. I actually found it quite helpful when working from home to have that sort of background noise.
However, in the time of streaming this has gone completely away in our household. The TV is only on for the time it takes to to watch a show and then is immediately turned off.
I watch very little TV, so I can confirm your idea that you get used to doing more creative things if you cut it out. I do watch DVDs which I rent from Amazon, but that's different because I get to choose the shows and when I watch them. A lot of it is very non-mainstream so I get something more out of them as well. And no time wasted watching ads, what's not to like? :)
I also find most of the Internet very boring, until I start putting something back in. I've recently grown a bit tired of my main project for the last few months (surftrackr.net) so I'm starting another one as soon as I get a break from work, which has been tough recently.
I think the "Here Comes Everybody" guy has a real point about changing patterns here. I only hope there's a lot more to come and we haven't peaked already. Sometimes I feel not so optimistic.
A lot of the argument would apply to normal network TV too - that it is basically a waste of time. Well maybe, but at least when I watch Netflix I'm watching something I've read reviews of and have a good idea if I'd like it. When I'm visiting my father he just channel surfs watching five minutes of this and five minutes of that because he is looking for something interesting and not finding anything - that seems far worse of a waste of time.
>Maybe it's a generational thing. Maybe it's laziness (i.e. let them decide what I watch, I don't want to pick). Maybe it's the convenience of the interface (it just works, no connecting, changing channels is near instant, etc). Maybe a combo of all of those.
That's all likely true to some degree. Personally, I've probably become more and more a very intentional (and occasional) TV watcher and I've never been one to flip the TV on in, say, a hotel room for background when I walk in the door. I still have a cable bundle but I rarely use it.
I channel surfed right up until getting my first TiVo box (probably around 2002?). That killed it dead for me, by completely changing how I consumed TV (for the better).
I have to agree with epivosism about the TV experience. Waiting for the digital decoder to catch an I-frame slows down browsing immensely and it's just a lot less fun. Tivos are better, because they have multiple tuners and can scan the channels above/below the one you're on, which helps a lot. But it's still not as good as pushing the button on an analog tuner's remote and getting a new signal in < 1/15 of a second.
Maybe your comparison of live vs streaming TV is skewed because it takes so long to start a new stream that it's hard to imagine browsing content that way instead of trying to imagine the content from movie posters.
When TV's became more popular there was a pretty low number of channels for a long time limited to the three networks in the USA, then even after cable came out - adoption was slower in more rural parts of the country. I can remember wanting to do almost anything else and not wanting to watch much TV because the selection of shows appealing to me and not a repeat was so low.
Hands down the best thing about giving up cable (and broadcast) television is that I never just turn the TV on to "see what's on". If I turn on the TV it's because I make the conscious decision to watch something specific. The first month, in particular was illuminating. I found myself thinking about turning on the TV, but then, when faced with the decision of what to watch, I found it was easier to keep it off.
Makes sense though - older folks probably watch more broadcast/cable TV the old fashioned way, with commercials, as opposed to using a TV to watch movies or streamed episodes.
Based on what exactly? Are you suggesting that people don't get up in commercial breaks to go do something else, or that Tivo wasn't a huge thing for this exact reason?
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