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Why TV Lost
theodp writes "Over the past 20 years, there's been much speculation about what the convergence of computers and TV would ultimately look like. Paul Graham says that we now know the answer: computers. 'Convergence' is turning out to essentially be 'replacement.' Why did TV lose? Graham identifies four forces: 1. The Internet's open platform fosters innovation at hacker speeds instead of big company speeds. 2. Moore's Law worked its magic on Internet bandwidth. 3. Piracy taught a new generation of users it's more convenient to watch shows on a computer screen. 4. Social applications made everybody from grandmas to 14-year-old girls want computers — in a three-word-nutshell, Facebook killed TV."
In Wired in 1998, I ranted as follows:
(Microsoft VP) Craig Mundie's statement that "we view the Internet as one of the 'features' of digital TV services" demonstrates the same lack of vision that caused Microsoft to miss the start of the Internet phenomenon. As communications technologies converge, TV will be one of the services of the Internet, not the other way around.
Not to say ITYS but ITYS.
Couldn't part of the reason for this win be that people over the age of two don't actually like being spoonfed their entertainment, their desires (mu-u-u-st SHOP!), and their political opinions?
On the Internet, I can not only drive, but plan out the whole route, if I want. Heck, I can build my own railway for other people to ride. Much more engaging than TV.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Yes, I download. But I pay £140 a year in TV licence fees that goes to the BBC, and about £125 in cable TV fees. The material I download is either produced by the BBC, or material that's showing on the stations that I'm paying for anyway.
Now yes, from a strict legal point of view, I've no doubt that still counts of piracy. But I'm not doing it because it's cheaper - I'm still paying £265 a year to the TV industry, and if I wanted to be unethical, I could stop paying, and just download. I do it because even though I'm happy to pay for it, it's much more convenient to watch TV when I want, and not when the TV company decides to put it on.
Not that I'm disagreeing with the article really - the fact that the TV companies were so inept to adapt to new technology shows why they are losing. They should just be glad that some of us are still willing to pay for them anyway.
While there is obviously plenty of overlap, there will always be those of us who prefer the control we get with computers, and others who want an idiot-proof story telling box. It's two separate but overlapping markets.
Caveat Utilitor
I stopped watching TV about 6 years ago. My biggest reason?
Even the paid channels that were supposedly "ad free" started having ads. I wouldn't mind paying a premium for a channel that had absolutely no ads whatsoever, and had uninterrupted programming. I can never relate to the whole, "ooh-shiny" mode of programming that's prevalent today. If anything, I wouldn't be surprised if this were causing an increase in ADDs.
With a computer, I can pretty much download and watch what I want at my convenience, without ads.
Today, I do own a TV (which I bought a a few months ago at the behest of the girlfriend) - but no cable. We use it to watch DVDs and play videogames, and that's about it.
So, yes. Give me programs that are longer and uninterrupted (and good quality) and I will watch them. I am willing to spend 4 hours watching an uninterrupted show with a good story arc, rather than something that is half hour long, with interruptions ever 4 minutes in this age of instant gratification. And having to watch it again the next week at the exact time, which would be programming my life around the show and not the other way around.
Not TV, media companies lost. The future came and they weren't prepared.
I'd be willing to bet that in ten years we won't have phones or TV sets, just digital boxes with broadband internet. Small boxes to carry in your pocket, big boxes at home.
Game consoles, computers, phones, they will all merge. Perhaps we will have some boxes more specialized than others, but inside they will all be the same. A computer with a display and some form of input device, communicating over a wireless link to the internet.
The signal bandwidth of digital TV is much narrower than traditional analog broadcast, so much less actually has to be received to successfully construct the stream.
The extra bandwidth can be used to instead transmit redundant information and error correction codes, to make the signal much more reliable than it ever was with analog TV, and potentially multiple different streams over the same channel.
The failure mode is more catastrophic, but digital technology should also be much less likely to fail.
30 years from now, people will think how stupid it was that you had to wait for your favorite TV show to come on at a specific time, rather than watching it whenever you wanted.
Also very strange, people considered it normal for their show to be interrupted periodically by attempts to sell you crap.
It funny. We got our first TV in the early 1970s. Within a week of watching it my dad had improvised a remote control to mute the ads. I think we started the decline of TV advertising revenue but standard wireless remote controls certainly played their part.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
If the article literally means that we're all going to be crowded around computer screens to watch entertainment instead of sitting comfortably on our couches in the living room, then yeah, it's wrong. My wife and I probably spend way too much time on our computers (we're WoW addicts). But when we want to watch a "TV show" (usually a DVD of a TV show) we go into the living room.
What's stopping you having a computer in the living room hooked up to the TV, or sitting comfortably on your couch with a laptop? Admittedly, I agree we're a way off for this being commonplace for everyone, but we've moved on from the days when "PC" meant a single computer in the household, that wasn't in the living room, hooked up to a small CRT. HDTV means that most TVs will accept a computer input; computers are cheap and commonplace; and laptops are outselling desktops. I agree that for this to be mainstream, it needs to be packaged in something more userfriendly, but I bet it'll basically be a computer with an Internet connection.
I actually RTFA (I know, I just don't fit in here...) but it's nonsense. It may be accurate in some tiny subculture, but it's so far off the beam for the general public, I really don't even know how to address it. I am reasonably up-to-speed, tech-wise, and my buddies and I all live right here in good old Santa Clara county, Silicon valley defined. But I don't know many people that actually have abandoned TV for a fucking computer. There are far more posers "stating" that they don't watch TV any more, as if that makes them somehow superior, but that is a tiny minority of the tiny minority (and most are just lying about it).
For the general American public, virtually *no one* has replaced their TV with a computer. The Facebook argument is nonsensical because the majority of people don't even know what the hell it is aside from buzzword/fad at 14 minutes, 55 seconds, and counting. The article sounds as if it was written from the perspective of a bunch of geeks huddling in their mom's basement arguing over who is watching TV the least between downloading Natalie Portman pictures. It may be true in that crowd, it may be highly represented on slashdot clientele, but it's so far off for normal people (you know, those who admit they watch TV, and are making Simon Cowell a billionaire) it's frightening.
Brett
This is like saying that verbal storytelling lost to books, or that books lost to radio, or radio lost to movies.
I disagree. There's differences to all of these things. If by "Internet" we meant things like "posting to Slashdot", then sure, it wouldn't replace TV.
But TFA isn't talking about this, it's talking about delivering television shows over the Internet, so you get the same thing that you'd see on the TV but, ultimately, in a more convenient manner.
So even if you just want to sit down and receive and not interact, the point is that you'll still be able to do that with video downloaded over the Internet (admittedly, switching the TV on is easier than downloading over the Internet, but that's an implementation issue). The "one way entertainment" will still be one way when it's over the Internet.
A better analogy would be how VHS lost out to DVD, or tapes lost out to CDs. When you can get the same thing through a better means, few people want to keep the old technology.
Completely agreed, people seem to think that because they have a computer and don't watch TV that it is the end for TV.
TV won't die for decades, and by decades, i mean a good 5+.
TV is many MANY times more cheaper to do than laying wire everywhere to deliver internet "TV". (hence some of the crazy high prices for cable at times)
Most of the world still hasn't got internet, nevermind a decent connection.
The exact same thing can be said for games stores, they won't be going anywhere for decades, the internet just cannot handle that many people downloading games, it will cause connection drops and blackholes all over the place, it would be like a massive DDoS.
Also:
1) Setting up the server-side of such a system would be mind-boggling, and the bandwidth costs, server costs... way too much.
Steam might be big, but it is nowhere near as big as the consoles install-base.
2) Nowhere near any the amount of current gamers even HAVE the internet in the first place
Any company stupid enough to make a DD-based console only deserve to die, and oh my, looks like history already demonstrated that by the Phantom, it didn't even come to be in the first place, it was doomed from the start.
Newspapers too.
Well, maybe it might evolve into a new delivery format, e-readers, foldable interactive paper.
It won't replace it, but by the 5 decade mark, i can sure see it being in use and being a competitive format for paper-based delivery.
This is why i laugh at all these "DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION, TV / NEWSPAPERS / DISCS ARE FINISHED".
TV hasn't lost, and won't, it will evolve.
There has already been TV studios that have had interviews on such things, the future, evolving to take advantage of the internet and many are, such as those internet players and programs, channels on things like Myspace, Bebo, Youtube, Hulu, etc.
People were buying computers in the late 1990s specifically to access eBay.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
I work in media and the future is in real HD content in RSS streams that can be subscribed to NOT the utter crap that is Youtube or anything like that.
Automatic subscription to my content that my equipment can collect. and I can view at my leisure. Every person I show that model WANTS that model and not the sift through garbage to find what I want model that is Youtube or the other current systems.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Right - I agree. And it's just a matter of time till Tivo or some company like them will make a Tivo that doesn't actually record anything but just downloads it. Then you can cancel your cable bill and pay more for your Tivo subscription, but what you'll get is a huge Tivo full of the sort of stuff you like, in HD. Every time you plop down in front of "the tube" it will look just like TV, except with micro-targeted ads. It will even have a "personal broadcast" mode so that you can flip channels between various arrangements of the stuff on your Tivo. It's like "custom channels made specifically for you."
That stuff will be interspersed with "breaking news" and local shit that the Tivo algorithm suspects you will find relevant.
I LIVE in a 'snowy broadcast' area. My new LCD TV has the digital channels perfectly clear, while the analog channels show lots of artifacts. I'd even rate one of the stations that did a flash-cut as 'unwatchable' before the transition, is now perfectly clear at 1080i.
Are you sure that you're not comparing the lower power temporary digital channels against the old full power analog? Many stations are transmitting both, but the digital station at a tenth or less of the power.
When they finally turn off the analog stations, most are going to put their digital broadcast on the original station at the old power.
I don't read AC A human right
Lovely. Ala carte eventually came about.
Shai Schticks:"You don't make peace with friends, you make peace with enemies"
Same here, except my computer is always on and is connected to my 37" LCD HDTV with an HDMI cable. Watching TV via cable or satellite is now annoying and feels primitive. Even when I go somewhere that has an HD receiver hooked up to a similar TV, the quality does not compare to 720p mkv files. Although we may be outliers right now, TV has nothing on what can be accomplished with a computer.
The "TV is dead" line is all about broadcast technology, not the display device itself. People are already using various boxes to watch Internet content on their living room TV's. All you need to kill TV completely is to sell a tuner-free display which plugs directly into your home network.
Most (ALL?) new TVs are embedded computers. My reasonably affordable 32" LCD TV runs linux, has all the features you listed, and updates its firmware over TCP/IP
We are already there in terms of technology. The only ongoing challenge is the content owners who use legal structures to resist change.
I agree somewhat with that view, but I think it's jumping too far ahead (and introducing uncertainty as to how things will evolve) to say we'll end up with a hybrid.
I think TVs (the device) will stay a TV (even with a tuner, albeit DTT). However, set-top boxes will become ubiquitous and rather than the current programmatic content, there will be the "appearance" of a pull system (you decide what you want to watch). The broadcast system will merely be used to stream new content to set-top boxes, where it will be stored encrypted on a hard drive, to be accessed through a digital TV-guide style menu. It will look like you are requesting content from the service provider, even though any content you can immediately watch will already be on your set-top box.
I think this is far more realistic than Internet streaming TV (note, it doesn't work, and ISPs will inevitably have to switch to a metered-data system with capped downloads - that or traffic-shaping/bandwidth-limiting to stay in business). Broadcast is a microscopic fraction of the cost of streaming (whether that cost is borne by the content provider - i.e. no net neutrality - the ISP or the end user - ultimately the end user pays somehow - broadcast is the only sensible model).
Torrents will not go away, but I think rather than catching "pirates" the crunch will come as ISPs start restricting their packages. Any ISP not doing this might get customers in the short term, but won't be able to finance the network needed to serve them. Traffic-shaping/bandwidth-limiting and using small print to limit "heavy users" is braindead in my opinion, but from an ISPs perspective it is fairly foolproof and successful to cap downloads on a rolling basis (i.e. not monthly which would result in peaks destroying the network each month start, but each user on their own 30 day rolling cap). No disconnect of people exceeding cap - just limit their bandwidth to e.g. 128kb (until last 30 days is below cap). You also offer deals for people to purchase extra cap allowance.
There will still be competition between ISPs in pricing with this system - theoretically under the capitalist model driving down prices - but it will have to be the pricing model in the future for any ISPs to stay in business (and indeed the longer we go on without this model, the fewer ISPs left in business - resulting in ISPs with a dominant market position).
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hey, my pc is in the living room, tower connected to the hdmi port on the tv. The woman uses it for tv SOMETIMES but generally if I plan ahead and download the day before I can get most shows w/o comercials via torrents (use google: moviename torrent") Games play nice on here, WOW would prob look great still, divx (avi) and mp3 are the only format I want to see online. The flash videos are great for being so small. Youtube looks nice on here too. "TV, yer just not that good anymore" (mop/broom comercial): "baby come back, you can blame it all on meeee, I was wrong and I just can't live w/o you" No TV. You had your chance and now Internet land has all you offer and more. It misses news, CSI on 20 channels out of the 60, weather, and some sports...but I can live /w that!
Internet has:
torrents (downloads) from google
mp3 albums to download
tv shows (seasons at a time)
movies (w/o the riaa b/s already cut out)
e-books (pdf files of books made digital)
software (vlc and winamp are good downloads)
TV has force fed junk and advertisers cutting other advertisers like local cable company overlapping the ads from a network in America.
Basically, by cutting out TV I've saved 20 mins from every hour watched due to comercials, can pause vlc media player /w spacebar (pee break, food break, smoke break, etc), and auto goes to the next show if I set up a playlist of shows to watch (good for going to bed /w star treks. :D)
Get the video card /w the white dvi port as well as the regulat blue monitor one. go to best buy, buy the no name 6 foot dvi-hdmi cable (40-60 bucks) then use yer tv as the computer monitor. ...oh yeah, forgot youporn ain't bad either ;)