I'm dating myself a bit here, but does anyone remember when TV was black and white with no remote control? You really didn't need one because you only got one or two channels. We had the first TV on our street when I was a kid and every day after school all the neighborhood kids came over after school to watch Mighty Mouse which came on at 4pm when the station signed on for the day!
And remember when stations "signed off," usually with a picture of the flag and the National Anthem playing?
Fast foward to 2012 and whew, not only do we have hundreds and hundreds of channel choices, but a growing number of ways to watch those channels. 24/7.
The dam broke with cable. Goodbye rabbit ears. For years when you moved into a house, the first order of business was to get the phone and cable hooked up. With cell phones, land line phones are disappearing and it's been decades since cable was the one and only choice.
Hook up? Hook up to what?
Cable is still around, but in the 90's satellite TV came on the scene providing cable much-needed competition and technology like the DVR which allows us to watch TV when we want and even skip through commercials.
The commercial skipping part is becoming a bit of an issue with broadcasters. I understand as I used to be in broadcasting and you make your money through advertising. If people aren't watching ads, advertisers aren't buying spots. That said, I also used to work for DISH Network. There's quite a spat involving Charlie Ergen and DISH Network with the broadcasters and even Congress is getting involved. (As if they have nothing better to do) The best part about skipping commercials is during election years. Just when you think both parties have sunk to new lows, they sink even lower. Election years are great skips years.
Charlie and DISH don't make me skip through commercials, they simply give me the choice to do so. About the only shows we watch live are sports and news. Everything else is hours or days later. And yes, we skip through commercials because you can watch an hour-long show in about 40 minutes. It's important to remember that broadcasters transmit over public airwaves, which we own. So it seems fair we should have the choice as to how we use our airwaves too.
Programmers are also getting into spats with cable and satellite providers. In this tough economy, programmer providers like satellite and able are doing their best to keep our monthly costs down because we are going elsewhere for TV. More on that in a moment but the bottom line truly is becoming the bottom line.
Major programmers "bundle" their programming. I won't get into names but let's say a major sports programmer with a monster channel also wants many of their other lesser-watched channels as part of the deal. So you know, cable and satellite providers pay a lot of money to carry major networks. That impacts how much they charge us. The issue is being held hostage in that if they don't carry and pay for the lesser-watched channels, they don't get the big one that attracts customers. Both DISH Network and DirecTV are involved in transmission agreement disputes with some pretty big names.
But now we take another leap forward as to how and where we watch TV. We don't subscribe to HBO for example. Just not enough shows of interest at our house to warrant paying for it monthly. But in the case of some shows, Entourage the latest example, we simply waited for it to come out on iTunes. Who cares if we see a series now, or 6 months from now? Long as we get to see it.
Where do we watch those series or movies? On our computers, iPads and PDA's. The networks themselves offer most of their series on their own websites, (no commercial skipping) and you'd be surprised at the number of off-air free digital channels that are available. Plus outlets like Blockbuster and Netflix and yes, even bootleg on-line program offerings. We can also remotely access the satellite receivers at our house, long as they're connected to the Internet and watch programming from anywhere on an iPad for example, anywhere we happen to be. (Airports are a fave)
It's all getting very complicated and one thing is for sure, we as consumers are no longer beholden to just one source for our video entertainment. Free off-air, cable, satellite, Internet, iTunes, AppleTV and the list goes on and so does the type of screen we watch on.
Keep in mind, it's not the size of the screen that matters, just how close you are to the screen you're watching. I just watched a movie on my iPad with BOSE Headphones. Awesome. Less than an arm's length away it was like being in front of the big screen at home.
One of the toughest nuts to crack for consumers is the ability to just get only the channels we want without having to pay for a few hundred extras we don't watch. It's called "a la carte" programming and everyone in the industry has fought it tooth and nail, forcing us to pay for 200 channels when we only watch about 10 of them.
A la carte programming is here, well, almost. Consumers always find a way, and now technology exists to help us do just that. It's all going to get more complicated before it gets simple. Not as simple as that 12 inch B&W Crosley we once had, but in this high tech age, close enough.
Adding to the fun is the growing number of viewers who post on Social Media about shows while watching those shows. Watching TV is a multi-screen and multi-thumb experience.
Ultimately what's cool is many of the shows we watched like Bonanza and The Andy Griffith Show back in the day, are still playing all these years later. In today's hectic and digital world sometimes it's nice to pay a visit to Mayberry.
So ...how do you watch TV. Where? When? How?
Brian Olson
Owner/Consultant
Conversation Starters Public Relations
And remember when stations "signed off," usually with a picture of the flag and the National Anthem playing?
Fast foward to 2012 and whew, not only do we have hundreds and hundreds of channel choices, but a growing number of ways to watch those channels. 24/7.
The dam broke with cable. Goodbye rabbit ears. For years when you moved into a house, the first order of business was to get the phone and cable hooked up. With cell phones, land line phones are disappearing and it's been decades since cable was the one and only choice.
Hook up? Hook up to what?
Cable is still around, but in the 90's satellite TV came on the scene providing cable much-needed competition and technology like the DVR which allows us to watch TV when we want and even skip through commercials.
Charlie and DISH don't make me skip through commercials, they simply give me the choice to do so. About the only shows we watch live are sports and news. Everything else is hours or days later. And yes, we skip through commercials because you can watch an hour-long show in about 40 minutes. It's important to remember that broadcasters transmit over public airwaves, which we own. So it seems fair we should have the choice as to how we use our airwaves too.
Programmers are also getting into spats with cable and satellite providers. In this tough economy, programmer providers like satellite and able are doing their best to keep our monthly costs down because we are going elsewhere for TV. More on that in a moment but the bottom line truly is becoming the bottom line.
Major programmers "bundle" their programming. I won't get into names but let's say a major sports programmer with a monster channel also wants many of their other lesser-watched channels as part of the deal. So you know, cable and satellite providers pay a lot of money to carry major networks. That impacts how much they charge us. The issue is being held hostage in that if they don't carry and pay for the lesser-watched channels, they don't get the big one that attracts customers. Both DISH Network and DirecTV are involved in transmission agreement disputes with some pretty big names.
But now we take another leap forward as to how and where we watch TV. We don't subscribe to HBO for example. Just not enough shows of interest at our house to warrant paying for it monthly. But in the case of some shows, Entourage the latest example, we simply waited for it to come out on iTunes. Who cares if we see a series now, or 6 months from now? Long as we get to see it.
Where do we watch those series or movies? On our computers, iPads and PDA's. The networks themselves offer most of their series on their own websites, (no commercial skipping) and you'd be surprised at the number of off-air free digital channels that are available. Plus outlets like Blockbuster and Netflix and yes, even bootleg on-line program offerings. We can also remotely access the satellite receivers at our house, long as they're connected to the Internet and watch programming from anywhere on an iPad for example, anywhere we happen to be. (Airports are a fave)
It's all getting very complicated and one thing is for sure, we as consumers are no longer beholden to just one source for our video entertainment. Free off-air, cable, satellite, Internet, iTunes, AppleTV and the list goes on and so does the type of screen we watch on.
Keep in mind, it's not the size of the screen that matters, just how close you are to the screen you're watching. I just watched a movie on my iPad with BOSE Headphones. Awesome. Less than an arm's length away it was like being in front of the big screen at home.
One of the toughest nuts to crack for consumers is the ability to just get only the channels we want without having to pay for a few hundred extras we don't watch. It's called "a la carte" programming and everyone in the industry has fought it tooth and nail, forcing us to pay for 200 channels when we only watch about 10 of them.
A la carte programming is here, well, almost. Consumers always find a way, and now technology exists to help us do just that. It's all going to get more complicated before it gets simple. Not as simple as that 12 inch B&W Crosley we once had, but in this high tech age, close enough.
Adding to the fun is the growing number of viewers who post on Social Media about shows while watching those shows. Watching TV is a multi-screen and multi-thumb experience.
Ultimately what's cool is many of the shows we watched like Bonanza and The Andy Griffith Show back in the day, are still playing all these years later. In today's hectic and digital world sometimes it's nice to pay a visit to Mayberry.
So ...how do you watch TV. Where? When? How?
Brian Olson
Owner/Consultant
Conversation Starters Public Relations
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