What is wrong with TV these days!

[heffneil]

I agree about Blockbuster they didn't keep up with the time. I told my wife look at how big that store is and look at how successful a redbox is in 9 square feet. Although I did read Redbox isn't doing as well as they had anticipated. I still like the service personally.

I agree that most people don't time shift but I will say that even us who do time shift are left to the schedule of the networks. I am saying give me all the episodes as they become available or the entire season to watch at my leisure. I think this is where the future is.

I need to go work on the push news / sports service. I think this could be a pretty big niche market. No one is doing this and people don't necessarily want to reach out to the local news websites for the news they still want it pushed to them... Sports is going to have to be the same way. There just isn't any way around live events. DirecTV's sunday ticket is almost like the model but on a much larger scale.

[pjpjpjpj]

Originally Posted by heffneil

Look at the soap operas that have folded up after 60 years or however long.

That's because the majority of American women are no longer stay-at-home housewives who need an exciting life to fantasize about while vacuuming the house and making sure dinner was on the table for their husband when he got home.

Yeah, that's politically incorrect to talk about today, but those were the people who kept soap operas afloat (no pun intended, Ivory) for decades. The demise of the soap opera is not about modern TV/technology, it's about the changing lifestyles of the typical American. Even if a person (male or female!) stays home to care for the kids these days, they aren't cleaning the house - they're most likely surfing Facebook, running kids to activities, or online shopping.... and if they're watching TV, it's Oprah, Nate Berkus, or Dr. Phil.

Originally Posted by heffneil

As a whole TV is going to go away.

Maybe eventually, but not for quite a few decades. There is still a generation - probably early-30s or so right now, and older - who were raised in houses that operated in the old-school way, and will have a hard time letting it go. Their kids, while they'll be up to date on the latest trends and have all the modern gadgets, will still appreciate the "comfort" of, for example, mom and dad spending a lazy Sunday reading the newspaper, or perhaps the entire family gathering around the TV to watch a show, even if it's a "newer" reality show like "American Idol". And when they grow up and have families of their own, some - a decreasing number every year, but still SOME - will try to pattern their lives that way. I'm turning 40 this year, and, while I don't get to do it often, I still like to enjoy some of the relaxing "old school" stuff like that, because it's nostalgic from my childhood - and goodness knows we all long for the times when we didn't have so much "on our plates".

Over time, the number of people who carry these things forward will dwindle - some because they weren't passed on, some because the kids who grow up won't feel nostalgic, and some because the means will go away (i.e., newspapers going out of business). But the "future of TV" that most expect won't be very soon. Heck, TVs with built-in network connections for media streaming have only been on the mainstream market for a year or two, and people don't replace their TVs on a whim... so you still need to wait for old sets to die and be replaced.

While there will be many, many, many more options available, I would bet that TV, as it has been since the advent of cable/satellite and the DVR, will still be going strong, 20, 30, even 40 years from now.

[graywolf]

What Grinds My Gears is when you get invested into a show that is also doing well in the ratings, then they start monkeying around with the timeslots/days, or long hiatus then wonder where the viewership has gone and the next thing you know they cancel the show because now it is getting poor ratings.

And as others have mentioned, I miss the SciFi channel. What does wrestling have to do with SyFy?

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

Their kids, while they'll be up to date on the latest trends and have all the modern gadgets...

Reminded my of when my son was first learning to read, he would ask us to pause his book. Even now if we get caught-up to real time on a show or if I'm watching sports my kids ask why we are watching commercials .

Originally Posted by graywolf

What Grinds My Gears is when you get invested into a show that is also doing well in the ratings, then they start monkeying around with the timeslots/days, or long hiatus then wonder where the viewership has gone and the next thing you know they cancel the show because now it is getting poor ratings.

Like Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

That's because the majority of American women are no longer stay-at-home housewives who need an exciting life to fantasize about while vacuuming the house and making sure dinner was on the table for their husband when he got home.

Ah yes, the good old days

Originally Posted by graywolf

What Grinds My Gears...

Ha. Family Guy reference. (I'm board)

[heffneil]

I agree somewhat in terms of the soap opera thing that women don't stay home and watch soaps anymore but I think with reality tv (which isn't really reality) its hard to compete.

If the producers of Soaps were smart they would make 15 minute webisodes for their show. 15 minutes with a couple commercials here and there and juciy story lines it would rock and people would actually watch. Dedicating 30minutes to an hour isn't realistic these days. Also putting it online lets people watch during lunch from work or 15 minutes after the kids go to bed.

That is the only way Soaps can be saved.

Neil

[jptheripper]

my Wife still watches Days of our Lives. And she will not watch it "live". At last count she let 25 days (5 weeks of recordings) accumulate. And then , with a combination of comskip and FF Skip #2 , jumped through them in about a total of 3 hours over 3 days.

25 hours of programming, 3 hours of content.

Thank God for SAGETV.

[RocKKer]

A few meandering thoughts:
I would try a la carte, if it were available, there are so many channels I don't watch and just get in the way.

I wish they would quit advertising other shows on the bottom of the screen.

I watch Justified, (I like Timothy Olyphant, liked him in Deadwood too).

When I had a Tivo it would capture all button presses, Tivo used that to find out and report what you watched, but they promised it only detailed as far down as the zip code. I don't think I would mind if my viewing habits were captured that way. I don't think I would care if they associated my demographics with a particular show either as long as it didn't equate to any added advertising.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by heffneil

I agree somewhat in terms of the soap opera thing that women don't stay home and watch soaps anymore but I think with reality tv (which isn't really reality) its hard to compete.

If the producers of Soaps were smart they would make 15 minute webisodes for their show. 15 minutes with a couple commercials here and there and juciy story lines it would rock and people would actually watch. Dedicating 30minutes to an hour isn't realistic these days. Also putting it online lets people watch during lunch from work or 15 minutes after the kids go to bed.

That is the only way Soaps can be saved.

Neil

They have a whole channel dedicated to soaps. They just show them later in the day for the women who have been watching them for 30 years. Not too bad an idea either.

[heffneil]

I know there is an entire channel but the problem is the soaps are drawn out. They need to be webispodes to stay afloat

I Watch Days of our Lives too and some of the characters have been in the same place for 20 years since I started watching!

Neil

[Zippster]

Meh, all the soaps were simply rewritten into night time garbage and reality shows..........

[heffneil]

We really strayed from the topic but soap operas are almost the canary in the mine. It is a reflection that TV as we know it and what it has been over the last 80+ years is changing.
The internet will change TV and I don't know if that is a good thing. There have been big transitions from the basic broadcast but I don't think TV has ever just been this lousy!

[SHS]

The future of TV is on-demand

1: Nope that not going happing just another dead idea as more and more ISP/Cell start doing bandwidth caps.
2: There alway the local cable on-demand but we all know it video quality is very bad vs live air boardcast.
3: 35/40% of the people live in area where they don't have no high speed internet.

That's because the majority of American women are no longer stay-at-home housewives who need an exciting life to fantasize about while vacuuming the house and making sure dinner was on the table for their husband when he got home.

This is so so wrong, It more about paying the household bill.

Pettey much all of today latest TV show even min movie's are end up turn into lousy drama! as I'm a Science, Fantasy, Horror Fiction nut it seem that EVER first episode where great but after a few show they start to suck like drama/soap show like the new Battlestar Galactica, Terminator "The Sarah Connor Chronicles", V there so boring I move on to Reality Documentary like Pawn Star, American Picker, Holmes thank god Auto like Gearz, Horsepower, Truck etc are not boring.
Looking forward to seeing Falling Skies.

[Taddeusz]

This kind of proves that most people would rather watch something that gives them immediate satisfaction rather that sitting down and watching a drawn out narrative story that is actually interesting and character driven. I am just the opposite. I would rather sit down and have a great story with great characters than have an immediate "fix" for 30min or an hour. I admit that I watch some "reality" shows like Project Runway and Worst Cooks In America but I watch more story driven shows.

[drewg]

Originally Posted by jptheripper

my Wife still watches Days of our Lives. And she will not watch it "live". At last count she let 25 days (5 weeks of recordings) accumulate. And then , with a combination of comskip and FF Skip #2 , jumped through them in about a total of 3 hours over 3 days.

25 hours of programming, 3 hours of content.

Thank God for SAGETV.

I'm reminded yet again of the one feature from MythTV that I really, really, really, really, miss -- timestretch. With that, you can playback a show at some multiple of realtime (1.2x, for example) and still listen to the audio at the normal pitch. I think VLC also has this feature now. This is ideal for watching things like soaps (and I liked to use it for 24), talking-heads news type shows, etc. You can even assign a show to be played at an accelerated rate.

That would be about the only thing that would make me even think about going back to MythTV.

Anybody know if it would be possible to implement timestretch via an extension? Or would it simply have to be done by SageTV in the core?

Drew

[drewg]

Originally Posted by Zippster

Meh, all the soaps were simply rewritten into night time garbage and reality shows..........

I actually think soaps have morphed into the "tella-novellas" that are very popular in Mexico, and are always on our spanish language channels here in the US. The difference is that they have a fixed number of shows, rather than going on without end.

Drew

[Zippster]

Plot....Content......pff who needs those.

[SWKerr]

Although I think there is still plenty of decent TV out there to watch I am in agreement that a lot of good quality programming gets canceled while vast quantities of crap seems to survive.

I think that this is really a reflection of the current Wall Street mentality infecting the broadcast networks. There is really an instant gratification mentality out there where if earning are off by 1% the stocks get punished and hence there is no long-term investing and planning going on. Everything is focused on payback in the next quarter. This leads to the short term ROI reality TV investments and the copy cat spinoff like shows that propagate our current choices. The residuals on a reality TV show have got to be non existent and people generally tire of them quickly. The spinoffs can certainly be entertaining but how many CSI and Law and Order variants can there be before you start to tire of the franchise.

In reality it is a tough business. There are a lot more choices out there than there ever were and getting and holding the attention of the American public is not easy. We seem to have the attention span of a gnat. But really the Networks need to be investing in shows with more depth that captures an audience for more than a few episodes. To do that you need to build up the characters and build a plot and that takes time and an investment that they don't seem inclined to make.

I also don't think a lot of these networks have adjusted themselves to the paradigm shift of a more splintered viewing public. They are just not likely to get the same level of viewership and revenue as they have in the past. The viewers just have more choices. This could be a opportunity to be more targeted and sell that as an advantage for marketers but they don't seem to get it yet. They just go for a large demographic period.

[tmiranda]

I think it's all about human nature and expectations. When there were only three networks people complained TV was crap and there were no choices available. Now we have hundreds of channels and people complain TV is crap and there are too many choices. Human nature (especially these days) is to focus on the negative things happening today and reminisce about the how things were better in the past.

Back in the 70's when we were all complaining about how bad things were (gas lines, runaway inflation, Iran hostages, the Soviets were going to bomb us, etc.) I had a conversation with my grandfather once about "the good old days". His response was pretty clear. He said something along the lines of "Good old days my a$$. We didn't have any money, we didn't have enough to eat, and we didn't have a decent place to live. THESE are the good old days!" He was right.

And yes, I agree that TV is crap these days. And it was crap back in "the good old days" as well

[pjpjpjpj]

Originally Posted by Zippster

Plot....Content......pff who needs those.

All you need today is dysfunction, controversy, and drama (not in the theatrical sense of the word, but in the slang sense).

Or people willing to make complete fools of themselves. Seriously, I truly believe the way to become famous today is to find the newest and most unique way to do something to utterly sell your dignity, without risking personal injury or being too vulgar for mainstream TV. Post it on youtube, get it viral, and you'll be on all the talk shows the next day. Then there's TV deals, book deals, movie deals. You'll be a millionaire overnight.

Congratulations, you made a fool of yourself.