TV has been a wasteland as long as it's existed, because it's an advertising medium pretending to be an entertainment medium. The S.S. Minnow on Gilligan's Isl

TV has been a wasteland as long as it's existed, because it's an advertising medium pretending to be an entertainment medium. The S.S. Minnow on Gilligan's Island was even named as a dubious tribute to Newton Minow, an FCC head who famously referred to television as a "vast wasteland" in the early 60s.