Binge-watching: On-Demand Audience Viewership

Digital video on demand (VOD) has brought so much convenience into our lives, it's almost like pizza where everybody loves it! But, is it possible to love on-demand digital streaming movies, videos and live network news and shows, just a little too much? I mean, there's consequences for everything, right? You eat too much pizza, you get fat. You binge-watch too many things on Netflix, Hulu or Amazon Movies and like, what? Your head explodes?

Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Mobile VODs

Ever hear your mother's voice in your ear that a little too much of anything is not a good thing? So, incessant viewership overload can't be good, I mean, you have to go to work, eat, sleep and go to the bathroom at some point, right?

The first time I heard about binge-watching it was on a morning television show. I thought I had an idea of what it was, but, I just could not get a visual on people actually engaging in this type of activity. Seriously? This is something you do when you're at home sick with the flu, right? Nope. This is something you do when you want to watch twenty uninterrupted series episodes in a row of a specific show, then, do the same thing with another show series, and another (Oniwura, 2015).

Honestly, at some point it would not be my head that would be ready to explode, but, rather my backside... with bedsores from sitting or lying in the same place for so long!

But, the reality is that this is a fast growing audience behavior modification due to the digitization
of streaming VOD. So, instead of going to a friend's house and asking what they want to watch, it's more of an event to watch the entire 7 seasons of the latest series, circumventing most all commercial advertising for the most part. So instead of an hour per episode it's more like 40 minutes per episode. Ok, well, that's not too bad then... -unless they multiply it by like 47 episodes, then, a night of movie watching turns into, -what? A weekend? A week? Have you no lives, people!?!?!?! "LOL!"

Seriously, I just couldn't do it, at least not now, because I am too busy with my own real life, with real responsibilities and issues. This binge-watching seems like more of an escape or addiction than what it was originally designed for as... -entertainment.

                                                 Binge-watching advice from celebrities.

As a global community we are becoming the all time content consumers at alarmingly historic rates. Which is great if you are the content provider, but what about the content consumer? Television, movies and video are literally riding the coattails of Web and mobile technology, and that is awesome. But, since there are so many hours in a day, it would lead one to believe that audiences are acclimating their lives to accommodate their news, entertainment and overall media viewership. Because, let's face it, too much of anything can't be good.

The advancements in mobile technology with regard to audience viewership is at a meteoric rise that even people driving are having a difficult time not watching TV or videos on their smart phone when on the road. It's a good thing that self driving vehicles are almost a reality then.

But, mobile technology with it's expected high growth on VOD platforms such as games, network television, movies, music, and in new in-development technologies like interactive and alternate reality (AR), this will make this generation the most connected, and with the most variety of any previous generation of audience viewership ever (Oniwura, 2015).

"Mobile Binge-Cat"

It will be interesting to see if by then if they've also invented a time-travel time machine that adds more hours to each day to make up for all the hours of our lives lost by binge-watching!

As for me I have not attempted to binge-watch yet... probably out of fear that my head really may explode! ..."LOL!" ;-)


Oniwura, C. (2015, June 8). How Technology Has Influenced Audience Viewing Habits.
Retrieved November 6, 2016 from https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-technology-has-influenced-audience-viewing-habits-oniwura

Digital Television Media's Impact on Audiences

VHS Tape

As I recall, I believe it was the 1990s and the onset of VHS video recording tapes and DVDs that made television and video watching on a set schedule a thing of the past. It was probably the earliest form of what we now know as on-demand, except we were responsible for taping the shows we wanted to see and that wasn't always a straightforward or easy task. I never did quite get the knack of how to record what, and at the same time as something and even though I had taped a show, at best, for me anyway, it was a hatchet job most of the time.

It wasn't that long ago that this technology was new and we all had a VHS and soon after that a DVD player to learn how to operate, with shiny little discs! Friday and Saturday nights were reserved to go to Blockbuster Video to pick out the often rented out popular film on video, and then over to pick up a pizza. Ah! Those were the days. We had no idea how fast things would change in the next few years. 

The death of the VHS video store.

 Now, all we need to do is to open up our laptops, tablets and smart phones and there awaits at our fingertips, no matter where we are in the world, Waldo, we are connected to something and everything! Isn't that awesome?

We live in an on-demand world now, folks. If it's digital, yes, that's right, all those VHS tapes and DVDs are now digital, and when that happened, people quickly discovered that we no longer have to wait for anything anymore. If you want to watch practically anything, you can watch it immediately now.

Old DVDs... -they now make pretty Christmas ornaments.

Much of it is now accessible on or through social media and as of 2014 the Pew Research Center research suggested that over 52% of all adults access multiple forms of social media, making it the preferred platform for advertising and showcasing the latest movie, video, television show, news broadcast or musical endeavor (Oniwura, 2015).


Don't even get me started on Twitter and all those hashtags (#) that automatically direct audiences right to the very entity being advertised. It's all too easy now, and that's the thing, the fact that this is the first time since the invention of the old boob tube television that the very act of viewership is the most effortless that it ever has been. Which actually makes audiences a bit spoiled, lazy and entitled to whatever they want, whenever they want it.

Audiences learned how to allow a technology to come to them, instead of them going to the technology, and with digital live streaming on-demand technology is spoiling the viewer that only waits a half a second for the technology to go to them. No waiting, no effort... it's literally effortless for the audience now to have anything their hearts desire in terms of television and media.

Which is quite a new concept to those of us who have spent our previous lives waiting for just about everything, with regard to television viewership. I remember if lightening from a storm hit the outside antenna, well, then TV time was over. Or the time in the 1970s when we had indoor rabbit ear antennas and had to wait (and sometimes use aluminum foil) to turn the antenna just at the right direction (usually facing Mecca! -kidding!) to get any television reception.

Old TV with custom foil rabbit ears.

By the time cable television came out, there were issues with that technology too, as in the price to watch television without a reception incident would cost you an arm, a leg, a kidney, blood and your first born, as we went into debt and ruined our credit for such an expensive technology. The waiting came in the form of how long it would take to have Comcast cable technicians come out to your home, install equipment and how many times they would have to come back to fix and upgrade our cable service.

Old Black & White Television

Again, we were not spoiled. We weathered the good, the bad and the very ugly and swift transitions from that black and white TV, to color, to cable, to VHS, to DVD and now, to the digital transformation that allows anyone and everyone in the world the entitlement to watch television, video and all things interactive. I have to say, I do enjoy not waiting for anything anymore in order to watch a show or the news programs I enjoy. I kind of do feel spoiled, but, by the same token, I feel I earned it, too.

But, what I can't wrap my head around is how anyone who never lived through those years, does not know the full history of just how this ultra-convenient digital television on our smart phones evolved, and how fortunate they are to have been born well after television and video technology fully evolved. For some of us, personally, I wish I had all that money back that I sent on all the very short lived previous older television technology (and computer technology for that matter) that I've owned since the 1970s!

                                                            The Evolution of Television
                                          

All I've got to say is one thing... -you Millennials are so lucky, but now we are all spoiled and entitled and that makes waiting patiently for anything related to television viewership a non-existent issue anymore. But, the marriage between television and mobile phones, in my humble opinion, is a match made in heaven!

If video killed the radio star, then who did digital kill to be king? "LOL!" ;-)


Oniwura, C. (2015, June 8). How Technology Has Influenced Audience Viewing Habits.
Retrieved November 6, 2016 from https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-technology-has-influenced-audience-viewing-habits-oniwura

How 'The Jetsons' Changed Modern Television Media Technology & Audience Viewership

In thinking back to how many technological and non-technological advancements my grandparents experienced in their lifetimes, I have to say that I feel privileged to be living in the times we are, in technology's infancy. Yes, I can still remember when television (TV) was only in black and white. What I call, BC (before color).

In my life time this technology has morphed into a very exciting industry, with possibilities we only imagined while we watched TV shows such as the Jetsons and Star Trek, I'm really looking forward to being beamed up by Scotty before I die, actually.

The Jetsons was a great cartoon show back in the 1960s that invented all these futuristic contraptions that are now being invented and coming into our lives. Sorry Tim Cook., but, it really wasn't you or Steve Jobs who invented your Apple Watch, and I can't wait until Elon Musk invents the electric flying car, too! Thanks, George Jetson!... "WHAAAaaaa!?!?!?!" Yep! That's right! That George Jetson, of the 1962 cartoon, The Jetsons.

The Jetson's Watch vs. The Apple Watch

I know this all sounds really silly and very funny, but many of us who grew up in this era actually envisioned living in a future world that was just like in The Jetsons cartoon. These characters lived in a world of flying automobiles, flat screen televisions that also acted as telephones, video call TV watches, and that doesn't include half of the modern conveniences that still are being influenced and designed today to emulate they very once popular TV cartoon that captured millions of imaginations, as in the featured video below "The Jetsons Future of Technology" (Usborne, 2012).

 

I just could not start speaking about how much audiences have changed, without mentioning the obvious catalyst of most all of our current modern technological conveniences. The basic ideas that we cannot live without today were born out of the imagination of a cartoonist and not Steve Jobs, necessarily. I mean, the guy's a genius and visionary, but, come on, Steve, were close to the same age and I know you watched The Jetsons, too, and well, so it goes...

The irony is that so much influence, design and technological ideas came out of a show that only created 24 original episodes (before they merged with the Flintstones episodes). Ok, so, the modern family of the 1960s hangs out with the most famous prehistoric family of the same decade, even sillier and funnier, but, if you notice the prehistoric conveniences in the Flintstones and you were perceptive enough, you would recognize the parallel between the 20th Century Industrial Revolution (non) technology of The Flintstones and the 21st Century Technological Revolution of the Jetsons.

An accident? I think not. I think those cartoonists were smarter than we gave them credit for, because the cartoons themselves got us very excited about things that weren't even going to be invented yet and became the bridge between the impending futuristic changes that we were quickly  headed towards, but were unaware of back then.

Subconsciously, these traditionally Saturday morning cartoons were preparing us to accept the coming changes and to desire them, as well. Imagine that. A television cartoon ultimately influenced how we watch television  now in the 21st Century. Who knew that we would have live streaming on-demand broadcast television shows and news on our smart phones, that are essentially small television phones. I know I'm not only amazed, but also grateful for new technology, because I no longer have to run home to watch TV anymore (Usborne, 2012).

                                           A Jetsons inspired conceptual view of the future

What The Jetsons also introduced and also influenced audiences viewership was a vision of futuristic possibilities to look forward to. I mean, who wouldn't want someone to invent a color television. Done. Or a smaller lighter TV? Done. Or to invent a way for us to see each other while talking a the phone? Done.

These concepts and ideas were way ahead of their time over 50 years ago and we're still getting a lot of mileage out of the futuristic ideas, and what's better is that we're living to tell the tale, just like my grandparents would marvel all the modernization that they lived through.

OMG! Now I don't ever want to die, for fear I miss out on the next greatest invention... -and THAT is how technology has changed audiences, by the way they keep creating all the great stuff we knew would someday be invented, because television shows predicted they would be someday. I still want to live long enough to be beamed up, though! While I watch my shows on my new nifty Apple Ring! "Hey! ...-it could happen!"

"Beam Me Up, Scotty!"

Usborne, S. (2012). Back to the future: Why The Jetsons is the most influential TV show of the 20th century. Retrieved December 11, 2016 from http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/features/back-to-the-future-why-the-jetsons-is-the-most-influential-tv-show-of-the-20th-century-8225272.html