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I told her that the two people who lived in our house, didn't watch TV, and could care less (which is essentially true)... The telemarketer then went on to push their broadband service, which gave me a chuckle, because we get our broadband from them already.
She then informed me that we actually got basic cable (almopst 60 channels) included with our broadband service.
Oh? Now THAT was news to me. We've had the broadband here for nearly two years, and it never occured to either me or my fiance to try plugging the coax into the back of the TV (yes, we do have one - for Videos and DVDs).
I mentioned it to my gal later that day, and she was equally surprised. We both then stared at the box in the living room suspisciously for a moment, then got on to reading Nat Geo and Sci-Am.
Two weeks later, we actually got around to plugging the cable into the back of the TV. For a half hour, we sat stuporously flicking through 60 whole channels of.... Stuff we had no interest in. We turned the thing off and went to the pool for a swim.
In the month and a half since we plugged the cable into the back of the TV, I think we've watched a total of 5, maybe 7 hours of TV.
Are we freaks? Out of step with the pop culture? Or are there more and more people out there who could really care less if they had cable? Even if it's free?
An increasing number of people I know don't watch 'it' either. There is little or no point, and, what goes around comes around. I find that, in my social circles, personal interaction in someone's home counts for more - "just like the old days" (so they tell me).
TV - in its traditional format - is on the wane (imo).
Syzygy
So my answer.... yes tv is still relevant.
I get something like 350 channels of nothing.
I don't watch TV at all.
MMR is on all of the time because I feel like I have to use the cable because I'm paying for it.
My brother has the digital cable nonsense. 500 channels of nothing on and he happily pays for this.
Sometimes more is less.
...I don't miss it. But listening to the BF's kids whining for brand-name "stuff" in the store, or singing commercial jingles in the back seat of the car (even though they only watch TV on weekends at mom's house) keeps in the forefront of my mind that it's still VERY relevant and insidiously effective at crawling inside the brains of those who DO partake.
For a while, I'd drag it out for wars, earthquakes, and other emergencies, but finally stopped even that. The coverage was inane, inaccurate, and insulting to intelligence. Upon finding this out about me, some people plain don't get it, and continue to talk about a teevee show like I'm just half a sentence from being on the same plane as them. Never saw one Friends or Seinfeld, and am much richer for it.
I'll say this though.... whereas I hate the sound of a teevee yammering in the background, if one is on in my field of view I get mesmerized because I'm not jaded to all the little attention-grabbing tricks. Not long enough to get hooked, mind you, just long enough to wreck a conversation.
I haven't watched tv since about 1965. I haven't missed it. It's the biggest timewaster ever invented.
I dont have very good reception in my flat so tend not to watch it at all, I havent watched it since March last year thinking about it.
I dont miss it, get the news from the (serious) papers its great NOT knowing what (banal) famous sports stars have been upto!
We don't have satellite TV, just the five terrestrial channels, all of which spew forth programmes of the most inane calibre.
"I'm A Celebrity...", "Celebrity Fat [sic] Club", "Celebrity Wife Swap", "Celebrity Big Brother". I use the word *celebrity* very loosely as most of these people I've never even heard of. Call these programmes intellectual stimulation?!?!
And anybody who can sit through an episode of "Big Brother" and call it entertainment seriously needs their head seeing to.
Give me a good book any time :-)
30' Flatscreen , surround sound , Sky Plus (like Tivo), DVD Recorder, VHS....
It is a social thing in our house. We get the best of the worlds sport and it's brilliant for watching movies (something I do almost daily).
That's about all though. TV in the UK is made up of reality-soaps, Docu-soaps, soaps and more soaps & they're all dirty!
I was captivated by the recent BBC documentary "The Power of Nightmares [news.bbc.co.uk]" which showed, among other things, how the training camps in Afghanistan were not being used primarily by bin Laden but by Islamist nationalists who wanted to go back and bring about revolution in their own countries and how Al-Qaeda, which has a different agenda with little support (to attack US military and economic targets directly) has a total core membership of about six people, if that.
There was a lot of expose and a lot of myth-busting - and some good explanation as to why there is so little questioning of the official line as defined by the neo-cons and their allies.
I particularly liked the part where one bin Laden video was exposed as having paid extras in it.
But if I had read this on an unidentified page on the web, I would have just dismissed it as more idle speculation.
That's what television is good for - if a programme is produced by a reputable company with a good pedigree, you can have confidence in the editorial control.
We comprimised at 1 and in the living room. I won't abide with TVs all over the place invading my life in everyway.
We also do not have cable. My husband would love to have it but when I tell him that he would be responsible solely for the bill, suddenly, the cost is too high. ;)
It's funny though. My husband started out quite the TV junky and now he watches very little of it. My kids are allowed to watch PBS and 2 hours of Saturday Morning cartoons (again a comprimise with my husband). I will admit that they are very easy to shop for. They don't have marketing crammed down their throats so they are happy with gifts they really want, instead of what they have been made to think they want.
Otherwise there's better things to be doing!
And I'm the one who grew up with English as my second language!
>> if a programme is produced by a reputable company with a good pedigree, you can have confidence in the editorial control.
ronin, I've said this before: You're too trusting. :) The BBC is one of the most self-serving, biased, inconsistent, euro-cheerleading, left wing propaganda machines the communists never invented.
[edited by: Macro at 5:00 pm (utc) on Jan. 25, 2005]
Other than that, I mostly use the TV part of our cable hook-up for background while I work online.
News? I like to stay in touch with the spin that the media biggies are asking us to buy into once in a while, but I use the web for my "real news" so I can take in different perspectives.
Bought my TV in '87 beat that!
We do watch quite a bit of sport on ours, can't beat a bit of sport.
That being said, I never use the TV for news when I can find much acurate coverage from multiple sources online.
Ironically, we do watch the very occasional TV program, but only after it's appeared on DVD at NetFlix. :-)
insulting to intelligence
That describes pretty accurately most of what is on.
Having said that, I love Adult Swim on cartoon network and a few fox shows (arrested development for ex.). I like to have the tv on when I exercise, but I would rather watch tapes with documentaries or something else educational. Although most documentaries are pretty dumbed down too, books are much better. And I've always had cable - any place I've ever lived is lucky to get any channels at all without it. I don't have kids but if I did, I'd have them watch Sesame street and that kind of stuff. I turn it on when there is severe storm and tornado warnings too.
You know the regular joe return from work ,get into his pajamas and just sit before the *BOX* until its time to sleep...And i dont think this is gonna change in the near future :).
I miss a lot of TV shows from the UK, Ray Mears, all the Micheal Palin travel shows, basically I'd like to have BBC2 and Channel4, I'd also watch some of those newfangled american shows - CSI, Buffy, ER, the odd episode of Friends.
So I guess I'm the odd one out - I want to watch more TV! but I can't.
> The BBC is one of the most self-serving, biased, inconsistent, euro-cheerleading, left wing propaganda machines the communists never invented.
May it live long and prosper! damn I miss star trek too.
But only in HD during football season.
Television enables you to be entertained in your home by people you wouldn't have in your home.--David Frost
I watch the commercials. ;)
You're too trusting. happy! The BBC is one of the most self-serving, biased, inconsistent, euro-cheerleading, left wing propaganda machines the communists never invented.
HOOORAAAY! I'm SO pleased to read that - I was beginning to think I was the only person who'd spotted it. Now, at least I know there are two of us!
And the ads are often the best things on TV - which is another thumbs-down for the BBC really...
Quality-wise - it's pretty dreadful in the UK right now - mainly "celebrity who's doing up and selling their house now" shows.
The thing that scares me is this - you THINK the news and factual programmes are well-researched and authoritative. Then they say something about computers, or the net, and you realise they haven't the first clue... which gets me wondering - are they just as clueless about astronomy, ecology, economics, quantum physics etc - just that I don't know enough about those subjects to spot it....?
Battlestar Galactica has the production values of a movie and the writing is very good.
I saw the mini-series with the gal from "Species" as the hotty-bot. Didn't realize it had emerged as a full-blown series.
Glad to know that I'm not alone in non-TVland. Some of my extended family pretty much lives in front of the TV, and they kinda view me as a freak because I have no idea what third-world sinkhole the latest iteration of Survivor is in.
