27 ms·
Traditional TV Is in Trouble
- drblast 8y agoWhat's most fascinating to me is that the 50-64 age group spends vastly more time overall viewing nearly every medium except streaming TV and video games. My own experience with my parents bears this out; the TV is always on and they're also on their phones as much or more than teens. But it looks like if habits don't change, there will be fewer hours overall spent on "consuming content" as the population ages.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- ImaCake 8y agoI wonder if the real reason advertising companies are worried about millenials is that they just avoid advertising whenever they can. There is a growing awareness about the effects of advertising, and the popular trends are towards reuse and recycling, even if those trends are mostly bullshit. In Australia we have a popular TV show called Gruen Transfer which does nothing but breakdown ads and explains how they do what they do. Finally, a biased anecdote from a millenial: Myself and many of my friends avoid ads by using ad-blockers and subscription services and not leaving the TV on when there is nothing to watch. Whereas my parents (about 60) watched far more television and didn't use ad-blockers... although recently they have been turning the TV off and using their ipads instead.
- downer56 8y agoI’ve been holding to the opinion for a few years now, that ever since end of the 2nd term of George W. Bush, TV, print, movies and music have all suffered a nigh-catastrophic brain drain, and fewer and fewer nerds drift in the direction of such career paths. Because of this, the candidate pool is smaller, filled with weaker options and the ones that do land in the field are mostly mediocre and surrounded by the mediocre examples of the old guard that can’t (or won’t) retire. After that, the rest is deterministic. Bad decisions compound, nothing is good any more, and the shit that really sucks isn’t even laughable, it’s either confusing, tragic or repellant. I made the mistake of watching cable in a hotel room, and it was like grazing my eyes with a red-hot shrimp fork, while running an angle grinder right next to my ears, and telling me my parents were killed in a horrible accident. The things happening on that TV were decisions so awful, that I questioned whether those responsible even understood their own motivations for operating what doesn’t even seem to be a business anymore. Everything was a chum bucket. Everything was clickbait. Everything was dark patterns. To watch TV and feel that way, for every channel I tried, means that almost all of TV has been reduced to the lowest internet tabloid trash by default. I remember what it used to feel like when nothing was on, but this seemed beyond nothing being on. I don’t know how the story ends though. The only thing I do know, is that TV is still a different enough game, such that no tech company really represents a credible DIRECT threat to TV at large, except Netflix, and only Netflix distinguishes itself from other tech companies by producing original shows that people actually talk about.
- orloffm 8y agoWhat is the cause for this brain drain?
- downer56 8y agoThe internet changing the world, and all of the technology companies offering jobs that attract the best technical resources with better compensation packages, and unicorn dreams. Contrast this with what used to be the 20th century version of the tech industry’s unicorn narrative: becoming a super star on old media, appearing on TV, in movies, on the cover of magazines, or maybe making it big in music, or being a mogul thereof. These things still happen, but it’s obvious that fluffy celebrity stardom, or becoming the star maker, is shakier ground than it used to be, and technology-oriented success is an alternate path to fame and wealth. Because of the new things that have emerged over the past 20 years, the brain drain began some time ago, when alternate paths to success became evident, and old media suffered for it.
- tomhoward 8y agoI wonder if the real reason advertising companies are worried about millenials is that they just avoid advertising whenever they can I don't think advertising companies are worried about millennials; they can target them and measure results far more effectively with online advertising than they ever could via television, and thanks to smartphone addiction, screen time/ad exposure time is the highest it's ever been. Myself and many of my friends avoid ads by using ad-blockers and subscription services That may be true of sophisticated users like yourself and your peers, but I'm fairly sure you're in a small minority. Most people just use Facebook and Instagram and Snapchat and YouTube and read news articles unfiltered, and outside of that, brands can insert their message directly into the content via sponsorships and product placements with online celebrities. Broadcast TV may be declining as millennials spend their time and dollars elsewhere, but the advertising industry has never been stronger.
- malka 8y agoidk about ad companies. But publisher are kinda worried about ad blockers :), I head numbers as high as 50% of users with ad blocks. normies use ad block now.
- chocolatebunny 8y agoI'm not sure if that's universal. My mom was a phone+TV person until all of her friends migrated to Whatsapp and Facebook. Nowadays she's on her smartphone a lot more than the landline. I guess the TV is still always on. My dad was a TV+book+newspaper person but now he's always online. He'll watch news clips online and read online. It's not that big of a change for him though, when he watched TV he used to watch these channels that would show text of the news along with news clips, very much line the news websites he checks out now.
- magduf 8y agoYeah, my mom is about 80, and she now spends her most of her screen time with a laptop or a Nook e-reader.
- dominotw 8y agoI watched TV ( for background noise) in my hotel room while on work trip. All the ads were for skin tightening, erectile dysfunction, joint aches and sharp knifes( old ppl need these?).
- Simon_says 8y agoEverybody who cooks needs a sharp knife.
- magic_beans 8y agoThe biggest danger in the kitchen is a dull knife.
- SlowRobotAhead 8y agoCan't agree, this weekend my mom asked me about how to cut cable and if she can get a TIVO to record the things from Amazon and Netflix... So one step forward at least! Had to explain the whole point of streaming is you don't need to record it. If my mom is moving towards cable cutting, TV is in trouble now.
- thaumasiotes 8y ago> Had to explain the whole point of streaming is you don't need to record it. That depends on whether you think the problem with streaming over-the-air is that you have to watch it at a certain time, or that you won't be able to watch it again once it's over. Have you seen how content rotates in and out of every streaming platform? If you record it, you'll have it.
- EADGBE 8y agoWe just buy it once it's gone. Still save a ton of money and have the really good stuff on archive.
- EADGBE 8y agoJust make sure she has a good streaming box and healthy internet bandwidth. It can easily get frustrating, and become a complete turn off.
- magicbuzz 8y agoDepends a lot on the person. I see a lot of 60+ year olds watching TV but younger tech-savvy 50 something’s watch TV substantially less or not at all. I have a TV - only gets turned on for elections, major political announcements or certain annual sporting events. My teen years were in the early 80s and TV was simply the prime source of media at that time. My family religiously watched the national news at/before dinner. My parents still have that habit - but they’ve learned to record it and zip thru ‘crap’. Sometimes they now zip thru 30 minutes in a couple of minutes. It also seems that the quality of the content has massively declined. On the rare occasion I am waiting somewhere and there is a TV on, I’ve been stunned by how low quality some of the advertising is - poorly produced voice overs that would have been inconceivable in the 80s. I’ve met a few people who have their TV on all the time. I have never formed a positive opinion of people who have that habit.
- ams6110 8y agoI'm 52 and watch less TV than I ever have. I only have basic cable because it's cheaper as a bundle than internet alone (Comcast). I don't think I've watched any traditional TV since the super bowl. I also don't have a data plan on my phone.
- EADGBE 8y agoI don't think they mind the ads. They've always had them, and when the internet took their generation mainstream it already had an ad problem like TV. In my experience, people of this age don't seem to get into streaming TV because it's just such a jarring experience from what they're used to. They'd much rather flip through the channels on a guide, or leave the TV on and watch the news, compared to going to Netflix for A, Amazon Prime for B, and some proprietary streaming app for C. Even if it means less ads.
- mfoy_ 8y agoAs a millennial, I can proudly say that I never cut the cord, because I never even signed up.
- JTon 8y agoTerm you're looking for is "cord-nevers" [1] [1] https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/10/14/448579937/what-do-we-know-about-people-who-dont-and-never-did-have-cable https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/10/14/44...
- sgtmas2006 8y agoSame here, but gen Z instead. Only been out of the house for two years (i'm 20) but I have never had an inkling of a desire to sign up for television service. I'm sure part of that is skewed by torrenting, but I still probably wouldn't sign up if such things weren't possible.
- abraae 8y agoStick to it. In your latter years you'll never wish you had watched more TV, but you might fondly remember that moment you walked on a beach at sunset instead and had an amazing encounter. Same applies to your phone too though :)
- sampleinajar 8y agoYou must have had a pretty good life. I can name many encounters I have had for which I would have much rather have been at home watching tv. :)
- criddell 8y agoMost of the time when you walk on the beach, you don't have an amazing encounter. There's a long list of television shows I haven't started yet and wish I had. Game of Thrones, Sopranos, The Wire, Mr Robot, and lots of others. It's surprising how often conversations with friends and strangers revolve around our common culture. I think a lot of people my age credit their love of sci fi while growing up in the 70's and 80's with putting them on their career path. My advice would be to watch the TV you want to watch, then take your dog out for a walk after. Best of all worlds.
- gaius 8y agoPost- the GDPR adpocalypse maybe TV advertising won’t look so bad!
- Analemma_ 8y agoThe GDPR isn't going to make millenials start watching network television, which is the main issue here.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- seanalltogether 8y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top-rated_United_States_television_programs_by_season https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top-rated_United_States_televi... Going all the way back to 2000, it's pretty clear that the top rated tv shows have always skewed towards older demographics. ER, CSI whatever, Lawyer drama #25.
- Retric 8y agoThat and the top raised shows have fallen dramatically, in the 50's you had 60 million people watching now it's capping under 12 and steadily dropping. Not to mention how much larger the population has gotten.
- snuxoll 8y agoMaybe the traditional networks would make a decent comeback if they started producing view-worthy shows again. There was so much content actually worth watching and getting excited for one or two decades ago, now at most I’m looking forward to the next episode of Bob’s Burgers as far as domestic network shows are concerned. Anything else worth watching to me comes from Netflix or Amazon, or premium networks that are already preparing for the death of cable like HBO. There just isn’t a modern day equivalent to ER, and THAT is why TV is dying (along with absurd price hikes).
- ruytlm 8y agoI'd argue another angle to it, which is there were fewer channels to choose from back then. Modern shows aren't just competing to win their timeslot; they're competing against the choice to stream whatever you feel like.
- snuxoll 8y agoMaybe I’m just overly picky, but I am constantly at a loss as to what I want to watch. My wife gets more use out of our streaming services than I do, as I have mostly watched or own digital copies of everything I care about - so I get more use out of Hulu, Crunchyroll/VRV and iTunes to keep on top of current shows. I think the era of strictly scheduled programming may be coming to an end, though there’s still people who like to channel surf - but I think the networks could find something in the middle if they tried (especially as somebody who doesn’t like the binge model that Netflix operates on).
- ahmedfromtunis 8y agoOff-topic question: shouldn't this be 'Why is traditional TV in trouble'? I see that there is no question mark at the end of the title too; is that why 'is' is after the subject?
- Analemma_ 8y agoIt's phrased as a statement, with the usual headline-speak of dropping articles: "[This is] Why Traditional TV is in trouble". Why they chose that over an interrogative form ("Why is traditional TV in trouble?"), I don't know. Maybe the NYT has a style manual that prefers the first formation.
- lainga 8y agoI have noticed US media convention, both print and web, is to prefer statements: "Why <x>", "How <y>", and "<z> did <z'>, and it's <z''>"; the last one even conveniently tells you how you're supposed to feel about the article. I imagine it conveys more authority than questions do.
- liveoneggs 8y agohttps://www.nytimes.com/section/corrections https://www.nytimes.com/section/corrections
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- oh-kumudo 8y agoThe new generation don't watch TV, period. TV is ancient, forced ads, too few choices.
- paxys 8y agoYeah, I was surprised that live TV was still on the top and tied with smartphones in terms of hours per week for 25-34 year olds. I figure live sports makes up a majority of that.
- ghayes 8y agoAnd live sports are slowly moving online. The biggest problem, in my estimation, is the cost to consumers is very high per game (to make up for the large advertising spend on traditional TV broadcasts).
- chickenfries 8y agoLive sports, reality TV, premium cable...
- wavefunction 8y agoThe new generation is busy consuming content filled with forced ads via product placement. They forget this to their detriment.
- elcapitan 8y agoThe new generation doesn't watch TV. TV watches them.
- nikanj 8y agoThe dopamine-per-minute is so much higher with smartphones. Can’t compete with the super-instant-gratification.
- eip 8y agoThe diarrhea analogy still stands. Two restaurants: One serves random food at random times. It's $80/plate and each plate is going to be 30-50% diarrhea. The bill has at least 20% unexplained markup. The other serves whatever is on the menu all the time. It's $10/plate and each plate is diarrhea free.
- draw_down 8y agoCome on
- the-pigeon 8y agoA more accurate analogy would be One restaurant that serves only one dish a day and there's always a 30 minute line. You have to purchase a monthly pass to eat there. The other has no wait and a menu that rotates slowly over the year. You have to purchase a monthly pass to eat there. Each is comparable in quality of food.
- InitialLastName 8y agoIn other breaking news, it's bad for babies to eat lead paint.
- draw_down 8y agoDo you have a source for this claim?
- peterjlee 8y agoMillennials still watch sports and it's still pretty hard to watch sports without having your parent's cable service logins..
- dasil003 8y agoPretty hard to watch them with their logins too. The Comcast stream for game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals was completely borked yesterday with a weird mixed-content warning in the dev console, and I'm fairly certain it wasn't just my account affected.
- skookumchuck 8y agoSome channels do not show commercials, and they show old movies that are not available elsewhere other than buying a DVD. I used to watch CNN, but don't anymore because it doesn't have news anymore. Tune in at any moment 24/7, and it's an editorial on the topic of "we hate Trump".
- heroprotagonist 8y agoI feel like the decline of traditional television is behind a lot of the push to destroy net neutrality. The strategy being to first introduce some artificial scarcity on internet bandwidth through data caps, and then offer exceptions. Either the cost to the business to be on the exception list will be high, or the cost to the user will be high to override the data caps, with the cost of service increasing as oligopoly in a region allows. They can use this to steer people to the services that they back, like Hulu, or at least to make their own cable-box video on demand services seem more reasonable. If one were truly pessimistic, the categorization of content wouldn't stop at simply high bandwidth services like video. A separate limit could be applied to things like html, with websites indexed as to their type and views counted. Which could result in an online equivalent of Sinclair media's control of local television news as certain channels of information are more accessible because they don't count towards a cap. And anything untrackable like VPN use goes into a more expensive version of the existing bandwidth-based quotas. I believe it will not come to that last part, but less because I don't believe the telcos would attempt it than that I think it would incite people to legislative action. If it's introduced in slow increments, though, we might get closer to this worst-case scenario than many believe.
- ClassyJacket 8y agoTraditional television is behind the push to destroy the net in general. Look at us here in Australia - look up "NBN". we had a plan (that was already 10% complete and working great) to install gigabit fibre in 93% of homes. Then Rupert Murdoch handed the election to the Coalition, in exchange for them: - Immediately stopping work on the fibre network - Replacing the bulk of the remaining rollout with a VDSL system (ancient technology, my parents got it and instead of gigabit fibre their internet went from 13 Mbps to 19 Mbps - and this costs 2400$ per house to install) - Using loans and taxpayer money to expand the Fox cable TV\internet network to double the number of homes, and paying Foxtel hundreds of millions of dollars for the privilege, while continuing to grant them exclusive rights to broadcast on it on all frequencies they want, including the ones that are optimal for internet - Purchasing and decommissioning the Optus cable TV network which competes with it, replacing it with VDSL service It's a national tragedy, wasting fifty billion dollars and a decade, just for the sake of protecting a conservative TV monopoly.
- throwaway287391 8y agoWhat I find weird about most of my generation is not that they don't buy overpriced cable subscriptions, but that they don't buy TV screens and instead choose to stream video at home on a 15" laptop screen at best or a 4" phone screen at worst. TVs are obscenely cheap these days -- to the extent that it blows my mind that anyone doesn't have one. (And then once you have a TV screen you might as well pay another $10 for an HD antenna, which gives you completely free access to unlimited content, most of which is admittedly total garbage. But even if you use it once a year to watch the Super Bowl, Olympics, or live coverage of some local emergency, the tiny cost is easily justified. The existence and free-ness of HD antennas seems more or less unknown to most millennials, who have a "mind blown" reaction when they come over to my apartment to watch the Super Bowl or NBA finals or whatever and find out I'm paying nothing for it.)
- slaymaker1907 8y agoFor a lot of people like myself, the larger screen over a laptop is really only worth it when watching with other people.
- monocasa 8y agoYeah, a laptop screen in your lap has nearly the same apparent size as a TV most of a room length away.
- mykull 8y agoHaving a bigger, further away screen may prove to help prevent myopia, though. Eyes focused on near objects all the time tend to go myopic. I'm not sure a few extra feet is that significant though, compared to looking out a window at the hills or clouds.
- ggg9990 8y agoA big part of the problem is effortlessly getting content from your phone (where it’s easiest to find) to your TV (where it’s best to watch) through the competing hostile ecosystems of Apple/Google/Amazon/Facebook.
- martinald 8y ago"Fox has announced a goal of reducing ad time to two minutes an hour by 2020." Is this correct? Two minutes of adverts per hour? Or is this a typo from NYT and 'by two minutes'. Two minutes of ads would be 4 slots an hour, they'd have to increase prices by ~7x per slot to make the same amount of money.
- HumanDrivenDev 8y agoNY Times writing an article about why TV is in trouble.... in 2018. Can we just ban this trash website from HN?
- tomhoward 8y agoOne flimsy article doesn't warrant banning what's arguably the most prominent news outlet in the world. I can agree that a lot of NYT content is lame, but its stature remains strong and the HN community would justifiably revolt if it were banned altogether.
- drewg123 8y agoOne of the reasons traditional TV is in trouble is because it is a pain in the neck to deal with. The episode-at-a-time schedule is frustrating, now that I'm used to binging on Netflix. To get around this, I tend to watch network TV shows only at the end of the season, so I can save up an entire season and binge watch the show (I have a PVR and an antenna). However, you often find that some or all of your season is missing because the networks can't keep to a schedule. Just last night, Golf on NBC pushed their primetime schedule back by 10 minutes, causing me to loose the last 10 minutes of the series finale of something that I was binge watching. This is ... disappointing. Similarly, a previous episode of the same show was been 100% interrupted by overzealous local news/weather folks covering phantom "severe weather" which was basically some high wind and lighting. Except for sports, I'm now planning to just ignore linear TV, and wait for the shows to appear on streaming services, which actually deliver the content..
- nkrisc 8y agoThe idea of "channels" seems so archaic now. Why should extended news coverage push back the schedule? News going long? Spawn a temporary, new channel and the coverage can continue there for those interested while the scheduled content continues on the main channel. I know why things are the way they are, but we have computers now: we can do anything.
- InitialLastName 8y ago> we have computers now: we can do anything. That's the title of my upcoming self-help book for millennials dealing with their aging baby-boomer parents' technology issues.
- nkrisc 8y agoWill there be a chapter called, "Can't you just...?"
- magic_beans 8y agoBrilliant. This phrase is so loaded with passive-aggression and condescension.
- otakucode 8y agoNone of this discussed the 'why' traditional TV is in trouble, it just said that younger viewers aren't there. The actual WHY is that it is a terrible product which is being successfully outcompeted by a much better product. Television networks got large because they solved a very valuable problem - distribution. With the Internet, distribution is worthless. A clever 12 year old can do global media distribution on their free time as a hobby. It's not something to build an empire on. And it's certainly not something people are going to pay you $100+/mo just so you can lace it with ads and fill it with garbage content that exists not because an audience is wanting it but because some programming director wanted to make a name for themselves by going in a 'bold new direction'. Public response to creative works is random. Truly random. Maximum entropy. There are no patterns to discern. So humans do what they always do when they face randomness.. they invent myths and replace reason with bullshit. If you control distribution, you can still force a win by leaning hard on your successes and kicking out your losses as fast as possible. But once the audience has extremely broad choice... you are screwed. The future for media distributors is death. The future for media production companies is probably either working for Netflix, Amazon, or similar services or being supported by viewers who want their content directly via Patreon or a similar avenue. The creatives will be fine. The suits will be jumping off ledges.
- nunez 8y agoI can’t fucking wait to get rid of our TV. There is so much better (and worse!) programming on YouTube and Netflix.
- tomkinson 8y agoWhen u cancel 'The Mick' no wonder
- stevenjohns 8y agoI personally don't have a TV antenna plugged in[0]. I do however have my TV connected to my WiFi directly and an Android TV device (with Chromecast) plugged in. I'm not the only person like this I imagine. [0] This is mostly due to the inconvenience of a TV antenna, maybe partially related to where we position TV antennas in older homes and apartments before the TV became so big.
- newscracker 8y ago> It’s hard to keep up with the many devices and apps people now use to watch shows. And there is a host of material from Silicon Valley that is competing for viewers’ attention, including Google’s YouTube, Facebook and Netflix. It's very hard to keep up with streaming services and knowing what's where too. It's a big mess since the streaming services seem to provide control on what to watch, when and where, but that turns out to be a kind of illusion when one can't figure out how to achieve that with content either moving around services or being produced and restricted to one service. While BitTorrent traffic may have reduced over the years because of streaming services, it still reigns supreme if you want to choose what to watch, when and where. > Both NBCUniversal and the Fox Networks Group have said they will trim the total time of commercials shown during some of their shows; Fox has announced a goal of reducing ad time to two minutes an hour by 2020. This is one of the worst aspects of traditional TV once you become accustomed to streaming services, especially ones with no ads. Traditional TV literally puts ads for about one third of the air time in many cases, and that's a huge waste of time for those who just want content (and there are many; how many times can one watch the same ad even if it's the best ad ever?). The writing has been on the wall for a long time coming. Better user experience, with lower prices, will eat into traditional modes of content distribution.
- upofadown 8y agoAdvertising supported media is in trouble in general. The networks still have a PVR problem from since forever. All this really means in practice is that prime time dramas are in decline and will become more and more marginal. Stuff like sporting events and news is the future of advertising supported real time streaming. The medium is not important. Some of this will still come from TV transmitters.
- snarfy 8y agoI tried watching a Star Wars movie the other day. The play time on TV was 7-10:30pm, 3.5 hours. The actual play time of the movie is 2.25 hours. And they cram most of the commercials towards the end. They do it so much so that I got sick of them cutting to commercial every 5 minutes and pulled out the blu ray and finished watching it. There was still 40 minutes left on the TV after I'd finished watching the blu ray. Here I am, willing to pay for cable and watch it, and they ruin it by trying to milk every last cent out of it.
- roryisok 8y agoI thought pay tv in the US had no ads?? Is that not the whole point of it? Are there ad breaks in game of thrones and silicon valley and all the other hbo shows??
- kellengreen 8y agoOnly premium channels like HBO and Showtime omit ads during broadcasts. However "regular" cable channels such as TBS and TNT retain them.
- joncrocks 8y agoI believe HBO (Home Box Office) is different to most cable channels, most have lots of ads, HBO does not. I think.
- pickpuck 8y agoRegular bundled cable has ads. (What IS the point?) HBO is a premium channel you pay for beyond the bundle. It has no ads except lots of self-promo in between shows.
- andreasklinger 8y agoI think the perfect example is "The Expanse" - Easily the best sci-fi show in 10 years(1) - Latest season has a 100% score on rotten-tomatos - The visual effects are absolute top of the art (2) - The fanbase is franticly close to the show (look at twitter how much they interact w/ the cast etc) - Season 3 and we are about to start the big turn of the story arch BUT… Canceled by Syfy because not enough people catch it at the time they happen to transmit it into the air. If this show would be on Netflix it could become on of the defining sci-fi shows of our generation. Now we have to hope Netflix or Amazon happen to pick it up before the team disperses. (3) (1) seriously watch it… the first few episodes are a bit slowish worldbuilding but it gets really good (2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yKn_EqA0ik https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yKn_EqA0ik (shitty rip unfortunately) (3) Please sign: https://www.change.org/p/netflix-or-amazon-please-buy-the-rights-to-the-expanse-savetheexpanse https://www.change.org/p/netflix-or-amazon-please-buy-the-ri...
- swebs 8y agoIt's been on Netflix outside the US and Amazon Prime in the US since season 1. You can't blame this one on the lack of a streaming option. Edit: Wow, those are some fast downvotes. Here are sources if you don't believe me Amazon Prime acquires US rights in 2016: http://archive.li/yc23D http://archive.li/yc23D Netflix acquires international rights in 2016: http://archive.li/Ww3Z0 http://archive.li/Ww3Z0
- ghaff 8y agoIn all fairness, they’re just distributors in this case and don’t hold the purse strings. It seems like a fairly dysfunctional distribution arrangement all around. I agree with what I think your broader point is though that a second tier cable channel like SYFY is probably not in the position to produce expensive fairly niche programming any longer.
- gr__or 8y agoWhile I love RottenTomatoes for Movies, I find it abysmal for TV Shows. Here are some shows with a >90% score: - Almost all seasons of Supernatural - Seasons 3 & 4 of Veep - Seasons 4, 5 & 7 of New Girl - Season 2 of The Flash - Season 2-4 of Arrow Now I'm not saying that those shows are all shit (tho they are certainly not in my ballpark), but I doubt anyone thinks of them as 100% shows, in the same sense that Moonlight is a 98% movie. The problem comes with few reviews (which is also a thing with more niche-y movies), which is probably amplified in later seasons, where reviewers who don't like it stopped watching.
- fredsanford 8y agoI remember watching MASH, Sanford and Son, Carol Burnette and Flip Wilson with my mother when those were first run shows. 5 minutes per half hour for ads and credits. But the shows were good enough to tolerate the garbage. That has not been true for a long time now. Television is a medium, so called because it is neither rare nor well-done. -- Ernie Kovacs [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernie_Kovacs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernie_Kovacs
- mrguyorama 8y agoJust the other day my mother asked me why I don't sign up for a package deal to get TV for essentially $10 a month. Why would I? Why pay $10 a month to be force-fed overly loud advertisements that play for more than 50% of the runtime of the shitty shows that ruined the networks I loved as a child. The vast majority of my curiosity about history comes from the history channel and discovery channel, learning about wars and "science" and things, while my interest in tech can be traced back to Modern Marvels, a show on the History channel. All that was dead by mid 2000's, replaced by "Deadliest Catch" and "Did aliens do history? (probably not but we will lie to you and say they might have" and "Is bigfoot real? (OH COME ON)" Sometimes I try to watch TV when I visit home, and it is infuriating in every possible way. An ad break every five minutes, sometimes twice in a row. The thirty minutes of ad space is populated by a grand total of two different ads that scream at the top of their lungs to get your attention. Sure the ads may have seemed funny or insightful or unique the once or twice the marketing department for a company viewed it, but I promise you after the tenth time seeing it it in one hour. TV content used to enrich my mind, at least on certain specific and enjoyable channels. Now I view it as actively being cancerous, and am disgusted every time it's on in my mother's house. I worry for her mental health. I mean for christ's sake, just look at "The Learning Channel"!
- dragonwriter 8y ago> I mean for christ's sake, just look at "The Learning Channel"! No such channel has existed for 20 years. TLC is not, and does not pretend to be, The Learning Channel, any more than the Paramount Network pretends to be The Nashville Network.