Friday, July 17, 2020

It's 2020. Don't touch that dial...

Nothing in the 20th Century really prepared us for what the illustrative dial above represents. Let's review TV history from the viewer's perspective.

In olden times - the early 1950's - Americans (including this writer's family) bought a TV with a VHF channel selection dial used to choose between channels 2 through 13. Towns were lucky to get three TV stations, typically ABC, CBS, and NBC affiliates, each using one of the 12 numbers on the dial.

Later that decade came TV's with a UHF channel selection dial used to choose between channels 14 through 83. More TV stations each using one of those 82 channel numbers went into business. But they would come and go, if not completely at least in terms of ownership/affiliation.

The thing is, those channels numbered 2 to 83 theoretically represented a potential maximum of 83 programs we could select from at a given time. but only if a channel was active, which most weren't.

Of course, you had to start watching when the show began, generally on the hour or half hour. Eventually we did get various recorders and tape or disc players which allowed us to access more programming.

Without elaborating on a complex subject, at the beginning of the 21st Century conversion of analogue broadcast TV to digital broadcast TV began as the FCC recovered radio bandwidth for other uses. However the introduction of digital to broadcast TV increased the number of potential channels which in the San Francisco Bay Area has led to the single channel 36 now channels 36.1, 36.2, 36.3, and 36.5. But digital falls well short of the reception distance range of the old VHF.

Netflix triggered a revolution

In February 2007 Netflix became the first financially strong streaming service offering professionally produced entertainment. On November 12, 2007,  a six part post The Screen Writers Guild strike, technology, and the future of scripted television introduced this blog noting:

    The Television Writers Guild strike is viewed by many as just another labor dispute. It’s not. It is the first nationally significant economic acknowledgment of the transition in home entertainment that has been under way for a decade. For this industry, 2008 is 1948 all over again.
    Neither television industry executives, nor the writers, nor any of us viewers know where scripted episodic drama and comedy programming will end up within five years. We need to think in terms of media, source of funding, format or survival.
    While the home entertainment industry struggles to cope with changes over he next 5-to-10 years, viewers who want to watch scripted tv will need to adapt. That’s us, folks.

Fast forward to 2020. The 15 "channels" shown on the dial above are actually the streaming services we use. All but one are really Subscription Video-on-Demand (SVoD), an entertainment programming model where users pay a monthly fee in exchange for instant access to a streaming library consisting of movies, TV shows, and other media content, plus live content.

One, Locast, is a non-profit streaming substitute for an antenna to receive local broadcast TV channels live. It depends on donors for support. In the San Francisco Bay Area designated market area (DMA) today there are still only 46 such channels offered in different languages and/or different interest focuses.

Ignoring live content, the 14 SVoD "channels" offer 385,000± hours of on-demand viewing content options in the form of movies and TV episodic shows. That "availability" is radically different from 20th Century TV. It represents about 130 years of 8-hours-a-day TV watching and if we decide to watch a show at 8:08 pm we can start streaming the show from the beginning at that point in time.

It's cheaper than cable????

When it began streaming in 2007 Netflix on its own it did not represent a replacement for cable TV. At that time cable TV was not cheap. As reported in The New York Times, in 2007 Cablevision received from each subscriber an average monthly revenue of $75 which is $93.25 in 2020 dollars.

But today, streaming with all its content must really be expensive...except it isn't.

Comparing the cost today for streaming to to the cost for cable in 2007 is complicated. The initial question is do you count the cost of internet service?

We've had internet service since the 1980's for reasons that have nothing to do with TV. So for us internet service is not a cost of streaming TV.

If you are currently working from home using Zoom or some other similar online meeting software, the cost of internet for you is also not a TV cost. If you are a Millennial (or from any other generation) who carries around a cell phone with internet service built in, the reality for you is also "no."

The fact is for the majority of Americans access to the internet is the norm not for streaming TV but as a result of having basic communications with others.

Nonetheless, let's assign $10 a month of the costs for internet service to the cost of streaming since many providers limit data in basic subscriptions, limits which not infrequently constrain streaming data volumes.

To that $10, one must add the costs of the SVoD "channels" on that dial above. Begin by recognizing that CBS All Access (CBS), Hulu (ABC and Fox), and Peacock (NBC) have a price for content with advertising which is a constant on cable TV. Then recognize that the dial includes what are "premium add-on" channels in cable packages (Starz, Showtime, HBO). Finally recognize that the "channels" are available at a monthly cost which can be "turned on and off" monthly - you don't need to have all the channels all the time. Oh, and there are others you may want to add at times.

Comparing the cost of SVoD to that 2007 cable TV average isn't straightforward. It seems fair to use the ad-supported price for the three services that have that option. And since we're comparing average subscribers, it seems fair to assume that half of those 2007 subscribers subscribed to a premium add-on. And probably half had a package that included a channel with British TV content.

With those assumptions for the comparison, we're looking at a 2020 cost of $68 for streaming services plus that assigned $10 for internet. So today you can have on-demand television from the dial above for $78. Or less. Or more.

Some might want to argue that the dial above does not include much in the way of sports. True. So don't subscribe to MHz Choice (which is all subtitled foreign language content) and instead bundle ESPN+ to your Hulu and Disney+ subscription.

Add a preferred other sports provider.

I only explain this to provide a beginning point for thinking about the fact that you could at any one time subscribe to fewer channels, swapping in and out to give you access to scripted content not immediately when it is released but within a few months.

Keep in mind that cable service in 2007 offered a fraction of the content - mostly on a rigid schedule - at a cost of $93.25 in 2020 dollars.

We want our TV content without commercials from CBS All Access, Hulu, and Peacock.Those three channels without commercials do cost us $15 a month more. But in 2007 we were paying for Dish Network $87.91 a month which is $109.30 in 2020 dollars. And we were paying for high speed internet back then. Streaming in 2020 is cheaper than cable TV was in 2007.

About those "devices."

The real indicator that SVoD is not 20th Century television is that there is no dial anything like the representation above. Instead viewers buy a device known as a digital media player, connect it to their TV, then select and watch content through "apps" providing access to SVoD services such as those shown on the dial representation above.

In our household we have an Amazon Fire TV Cube (we paid $90, but it is also an Echo performing other duties), an Apple TV (we paid $89), and a Roku (we paid $79)...yep, one each from the Big 3. Nobody needs all three. Some TV's today have a digital media player built in, but you do need something for each TV. (To be fair, one probably should assign an amortized cost of $3 a month for the device you need because cable systems charge for their devices.)

Of course, today you can use most cell phones and tablets to watch content when away from a TV. Many do that on a regular basis if they travel for business, or if they are kids.

Revolutionary SVoD mileau changes in the time of Covid-19.

On March 12, 2008, NBC lauched Hulu. It's content expanded to include partners ABC and Fox. On  October 28, 2014, CBS launched CBS All Access. At that point, the four major networks were offering their content, aired the day after an episode aired on local channels. The advantage, of course, is that you could watch shows four months later on demand.

This year NBC launched Peacock. Disney gained ownership of Hulu while introducing Disney+.on November 12, 2019. The scene keeps changing. But the one thing Covid-19 has done has rapidly increased subscriptions for all these services because viewers can't go to work or school.

As quoted above, in November 2007 it was clear that the TV industry and viewers would be forced "to cope with changes over he next 5-to-10 years." In 2020 for as little $20 a month anyone with high speed internet can have on-demand access to a substantial trove of movies and TV shows. Subscribers can change SVoD services monthly as desired.

Nothing in the 20th Century really prepared us for what the illustrative dial above represents.

Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Why I prefer scripted, episodic TV series to any other diversionary story-telling

I know some find it odd that I prefer scripted, episodic TV series to any other diversionary story-telling offerings. (Keep in mind that documentaries, reality shows, news shows, etc., are not scripted diversionary story-telling.)

Sure, movies can be great, but they tend to leave me with a feeling of incompleteness. I want to get to know the characters further, over a longer period of time, soon after I've digested what I just saw. But not all at once. (This is why I find "binge watching" unsatisfying.)

For instance, the prospect of watching The Irishman puts me  off. I have to both spend too much time with the characters initially and then I know that I will never really get to know them because it's one episode.

In contrast, most novels at least allow me to fill in blanks including the future, creatively because I can't "see" the characters. Even the simplest of words - for instance colors such as "blue" - make me wonder if I "see" what the author and other readers see. I certainly know that I don't "see" the characters physically as the same person others "see", including the author. And many novel series allow me to spend more time with the characters.

I grew up with television. I was six years old when we got our first television so that my parents and all the neighbors could, on April 18, 1951, watch live, as it happened, General Douglas MacArthur arrive in San Francisco from Korea after being relieved of duty by President Truman. All I was interested in, of course, was to watch kids shows, particularly westerns on Saturday morning.

The next 29 years of watching TV was scheduled by three broadcast networks. Effectively, I could watch no more than three hours a night of scripted TV, and many nights that turned out to be fewer hours and sometimes even none. In 1980 when the VCR entered our world, we began to miss fewer shows and fewer episodes.

Today we have video streaming. As I noted here in In 2020 thousands of scripts will be lost to each of us every night because it's wireless video streaming not television. And it seems to be positive progress!, video streaming allows us to miss thousands of episodes of hundreds of shows every year (532 active scripted shows in 2019, along with thousands of shows available from prior years).

The current situation is every bit as frustrating as it was before 1980. Not only must we choose from among 500+ active scripted U.S. shows, we now can watch hundreds and hundreds of shows from around the world. Heck, each year added to our choices are a few hundred new and old British, Australian, Canadian, and New Zealand shows which are in English. And I don't mind subtitles on shows from elsewhere.

The problem is to figure out what shows to watch. And after an episode or few, one must decide if it is worth watching more episodes given all the other options. Frankly I don't care about ratings or critics. I have my own criteria for judging shows based on a few questions.

Is this show "entertaining" meaning:

  1. Does it engage my interest and leave me looking forward to more?
  2. Do I find it either-or-both humorous and moving?
  3. Are the primary characters  either-or-both well-developed and compelling?
  4. Does it frequently offer wisdom and meaning from circumstances and discourse?
  5. Is the show's overall theme not depressing?
  6. Does the show not rely upon gratuitous violence?

Not every episode of a scripted series show can elicit a resounding "yes" answer to the first four questions.And sometimes an episode of a show can be depressing or violence in a scene may seem gratuitous.

But if the overall theme is depressing, that's a problem. One can answer "yes" to the first four questions about most of the episodes of a show, but if the theme of the show is just simply depressing...well...there are many more shows out there with themes that are not.

A good example of a show that consistently elicits a "yes" answer to the first four questions is "Breaking Bad." It is a show with excellent writing, directing, acting, etc. and an incredibly depressing theme as described by IMDb:

"A high school chemistry teacher diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer turns to manufacturing and selling methamphetamine in order to secure his family's future."

It went five seasons offering 62 episodes, winning Golden Globe, Emmy and other awards galore. Among IMDB all time Top 250 TV Shows it is #4 in viewer ratings, behind "Planet Earth II", "Planet Earth", and "Band of Brothers." In other words among IMDb viewers it is the top rated multi-season scripted live-action drama series.

We stopped watching it in its second season.

Then there is the judgement call regarding a show's use of violence. Violence is a significant problem in American society and we shouldn't take the use of violence in a show lightly, particularly when the show has a strong appeal to the under-25 audience. One could probably write deep thoughts about the relationship of the popularity of scripted series with violence to the American predilection for violence, suicide, and drug use.

Still violence is sometimes essential to present a story.  It has been argued that the violence in Lord of the Rings is non-gratuitous in comparison to "Game of Thrones." I felt that - which means the "gratuitousness" sometimes simply can be a feeling. The key question is: "Did showing that scene of graphic violence add anything to the story telling?"

"Game of Thrones" ran 73 episodes over 8 seasons. Among IMDB all time Top 250 TV Shows it is #8 in viewer ratings with extreme high ratings among those under 30.

We stopped watching "Game of Thrones" in the second season. It seemed like the basic question of the show's theme, what drove the most curiosity, was which characters at the end of the series will not have been butchered.

The highest rated live-action comedy series is "Friends" at #41, well behind murder and mayhem.

Admittedly, comedy is a tough genre. It's entirely your sense of humor that will determine if a comedy show appeals.

A good example today is "Mom", a broadcast network show which has excellent writing, directing, acting, etc. but is admittedly about reformed drug and alcohol abusers. It's overall theme is not depressing. In terms of IMDb ratings (with 10 as the highest rating) 58.2% rate it 8 or higher. I would answer "yes" to the first four questions regarding the majority of episodes of the show. But on IMDB 4.0% rate it a 1. And I can understand why many would react that way, particularly to the first couple of seasons.

"Fleabag" is another current comedy though in the streaming-only arena. I just don't get it. It's that simple. It ranks well above "Parks and Recreation" but, then again, "Parks and Recreation" which aired 125 episodes over 7 seasons on a network broadcast channel has two-and-a-half times the number of individual ratings than "Fleabag" which has 12 episodes on Amazon Prime streaming, so perhaps the top 250 ranking is meaningless.

Fortunately, as noted above there are thousands of episodes of hundreds of scripted shows every year (532 active scripted shows in 2019, along with thousands of shows available from prior years), there are more than enough dramas and comedies for every taste out there.

Thursday, January 16, 2020

Peacock TV - a 15,000-pound bird just landed on your streaming video device


Waiting for Comcast/NBCU to determine the best way to deal with streaming has been tough. But now they giant has dropped his Peacock and it is big. Here's links to articles at Deadline Hollywood:
  1. Peacock Programming: List Of NBCUniversal Streaming Service’s Series, Films, Sports, News & More
  2. ‘Two And A Half Men’: NBCU’s Peacock Acquires SVOD Rights To Chuck Lorre Sitcom & ‘George Lopez’
  3. NBCU's Peacock Lands Dick Wolf Library Of 'Law & Order' And 'Chicago' Franchises In Non-Exclusive Deal
  4. NBC’s ‘Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon’ & ‘Late Night With Seth Meyers’ Get Early Streamings On Peacock Premium
  5. Peacock Reveals Launch Date, Pricing And Exclusive Olympic Programming
The first four articles, along with a 15,000-pound shrubbery and lights tower bird, make it clear the huge investment in content that is being made by NBCU, The fifth article outlines the service and pricing strategy which includes three tiers that will be made available:
  • Peacock Free (with commercials)
  • Peacock Premium (with commercials)
  • Peacock Premium Commercial-Free
Peacock Free will be free to everyone. It will offer 7,500± hours of programming with commercials, including a selection of classic TV series and movies, next-day streaming of some broadcast shows, Spanish-language content and a curated collection of news and sports programming.

Peacock Premium will be free to Comcast and Cox cable TV subscribers and $5/mo for everyone else. It will offer 15,000± hours of programming with commercials and early access to late night talk shows.

Peacock Premium Commercial-Free will cost $5/mo for Comcast and Cox cable TV subscribers and $10/mo for everyone else. Content will be the same 15,000± hours of programming and early access to late night talk shows, but all without commercials.

Regarding the rollout associated with the Olympics, the fifth article says:
"Peacock will offer extensive coverage of the Tokyo Olympics, some of it exclusive. Peacock will feature live coverage of the Opening and Closing Ceremonies before they air on NBC in primetime. It will also stream three daily Olympic shows. That lineup includes Tokyo Live, with live coverage of one particularly compelling event from the day; Tokyo Daily Digest, with midday highlights; and Tokyo Tonight, a complement to the primetime show that is designed to help audiences catch up on the day’s events."​
This Comcast-owned NBCU creature can't be ignored and should not be taken lightly. Scroll carefully through the lists in the first article linked above. Not only will they have all the old “Law and Order” shows and the Paramount Network hit “Yellowstone,” they will be offering new versions of “Saved by the Bell” and “Battlestar Galactica,” the true crime “Dr. Death,” featuring the actors Jamie Dornan and Alec Baldwin, and an adaptation of “Brave New World” with Demi Moore.

How this mixes in over the next decade with Netflix, Amazon Prime,Disney+, Apple+, HBO Max, Acorn TV, CW Seed, YouTube TV and the gazillion other streaming services out there is going to be interesting.

Tuesday, January 14, 2020

The coming decade of the Wild West of personal entertainment video streaming. It's subscriber economics not ratings.

In the previous post we explored the 21st Century technology shift that has changed the home entertainment industry "television" to the personal entertainment industry "video streaming." What was not explored was the impact on the economic context.

For the past 50+ years, the economics of the home entertainment industry "television" has been portrayed with tables that looked like this:

The 2020 reality is these numbers don't matter in the personal entertainment industry "video streaming." In 1968-69 an average of 21.7 viewers watched ABC's  "The F.B.I." in its hour as opposed to programming on the two other off-the-air networks, NBC and CBS (Fox did not launch until October 9, 1986).

In 2018-19 an average of 7.9 million viewers watched CBS's "FBI" ...uh, well, that's not really true. Some folks actually watch it when it aired via a TV antenna or cable. Likely more watched a "recording" within the next week. They were all measured by the Nielsen folks.

Not reflected in those numbers were
  • those who watched it when it aired via the CBS All Access streaming service,
  • those who streamed an episode later - even a couple of months later - via CBS All Access, and 
  • those who watched their recording weeks later.
But it doesn't matter to viewers because the ratings are important only to advertisers. And in the 21st Century advertisers are being rejected - we don't want to watch ads.

And then there is the Netflix effect. Netflix cares only about how many subscribers it has. And not just couch potatoes in the United States. Consider this from The Hollywood Reporter:

    In July, Netflix launched its first mobile-only plan, rolling out a $2.99 (199 rupees) a month offering in India to help boost its reach in a country boasting 478 million smartphone users. In October, the company launched a similar plan in Malaysia at $4.
    This year, the streamer is expected to test lower-priced plans in more markets to attract price-sensitive customers in locales where its regular offerings are already available.
    While addressing a conference in the capital, Delhi, on a recent trip, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings talked about the company's India strategy, saying that the streaming video giant would spend more than $400 million (30 billion rupees) for the years 2019 and 2020 on local content.
    The India plan, which became available in July, is the fourth option from Netflix in India. Its basic service costs $7.27 (500 rupees), which goes up to $11.50 (799 rupees) per month for its most expensive premium service. Netflix is still expensive compared to Disney's Indian OTT service Hotstar and Amazon Prime Video. Both services are offered at an annual rate of $14.50 (1,000 rupees), or about $1.20 per month.
    While addressing a conference in the capital, Delhi, on a recent trip, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings talked about the company's India strategy, saying that the streaming video giant would spend more than $400 million (30 billion rupees) for the years 2019 and 2020 on local content.
Simply put, Netflix and other streaming sources which offer original content without ads measure their economic success on monthly subscription revenue. The issue for them is will folks around the world watch what they have to offer. And don't get confused. The Netflix cheap smartphone only plan involves comparatively low resolution video (standard definition, 480p) which cannot be cast to TV's.  It is the ultimate personal entertainment and content can be downloaded, thereby separating the signal source presence from the viewing opportunities.

Representing the epitome of confusion between ratings and subscribers is the streaming service Hulu, (though likely to alter its model somewhat since Disney became its sole owner and also owns Disney+ and ESPN+). For years, along with Disney/ABC, NBCU and Fox had financial interests in Hulu, their programming (along with some cable channel programming) was available for streaming a day after it aired with or without ads, and Hulu has original programming. They also offer programming from foreign sources and old U.S. programming. And while rats ings are not irrelevant to ABC, NBC, and Fox, the only thing important to Hulu is their 28± million U.subscribers.

Netflix, of course, has 68± million U.S. subscribers, Amazon Prime at 100+ million, CBS All Access at 8+ million,  Then there is the new Disney+ at 10+ million and Apple TV+ at 10+ million. Coming to the internet near you this year will be the new HBO Max, NBC's Peacock, Quibi, etc.

What makes this all confusing is that Nielsen tells us there are 120± million U.S. homes with televisions and there are 270 million Americans over the age of 14 almost all of whom are smartphone users. Only Amazon Prime has a significant market share, but that is not exclusively because of its personal entertainment offerings.

Some have called the personal entertainment industry economy a wild west. It is likely to take most of the coming decade to sort itself out.

Friday, January 3, 2020

In 2020 thousands of scripts will be lost to each of us every night because it's wireless video streaming not television. And it seems to be positive progress!

On November 12, 2007, this blog began with a series of posts that offered the following conclusion:

    While the home entertainment industry struggles to cope with changes over he next 5-to-10 years, viewers who want to watch scripted tv will need to adapt. That’s us, folks. And that’s what this blog about.

It's 12 years later. Television technology, video content quantity and sources, and viewing habits all have changed radically.

Whether you think it's the end of a decade or the start of a decade, 2020 is the year to acknowledge "video streaming" as the medium that has replaced "television." Simply, with apologies to HBO, the truth is "it's not TV, it's streaming."

Well, sort of....

The technology shift from television to video streaming

Let's begin with a review of the video streaming technology most all viewers use and the television technology those of us who are "elderly" grew up with.

January is the month for the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. According to the experts:

    Ground zero for new TVs is CES 2020 this January in Las Vegas.
    Prepare for more 4K, 8K, HDMI 2.1, HDR, 120Hz, OLED, QLED, ULED and ZLED than you can handle (I made the last one up, but it's probably coming soon, too).
    In 2019 8K televisions hit the market from the likes of Samsung, Sony and LG, but they remain ridiculously expensive (the cheapest, a 65-inch Samsung, is $3,500).
    I don't think 8K TVs are worth buying, but OLED TVs are another story. They're my favorite high-end models.
    TVs are a mature technology but that doesn't stop big screens, think 75 inches, from remaining remarkably popular.

Hmmm. Why did I think more and more viewing...


...was done by individuals using "devices" (aka smart phones) about 6" wide such as pictured above? Was I mistaken?

Of course not. In 2017 Adweek noted "consumers are flocking to smaller screens." And this year the LA Times headline was People spend more time on mobile devices than TV, firm says:

    The change has been years in the making, as smartphones have become more ubiquitous and the ways people use their devices has shifted. Phones now let you do more than steal quick glances at social media, and streaming shows and movies on the smaller, portable screens has become commonplace.
    The gap between the amount of time spent on mobile devices and TV has narrowed dramatically over time. Last year, American adults spent nine minutes more watching TV than looking at their phones and tablets, eMarketer said. But TV watching used to be more dominant — just five years ago, adults spent two hours more watching TV than using mobile devices, the firm said.
    The difference in time was even more pronounced for younger Americans, with people 18 to 34 spending 1 hour and 51 minutes on live and time-shifted TV and 3 hours and 25 minutes on the web or apps on smartphone and tablets in the third quarter of last year, Nielsen said.

Television technology has radically changed to the point that the word "television" should be removed from our jargon. A generation is coming of age that has only a vague idea of what "cord-cutting" means, while the majority of the generation immediately ahead of them, the Millennial Generation, has rejected "the cord" in favor of streaming.

And for them "television" can never refer to the device they stare at. We of older generations remember "watching television" on a 'television set", say, a fancy console we called the television or "TV" that looked like this...


... which got its content through something on the roof that looked like this...


Today, streaming video viewing looks like this...


 ..but with a heavy emphasis by content providers making the hand-held-device streaming experience pictured on the right the best possible experience because the results will also pass to that 75" TV streaming experience such as that pictured on the left.

One thing becomes clear while reading the CES stories - "TV" and "television" now refer to the large "devices" we hang on walls to view streaming content. In olden times, we referred to those "devices" as "TV sets." Curiously, those small hand-held devices in the picture on the right are called "phones" which used to mean something that looked like this:
Yes, things have changed. Today the term "video streaming" refers to "a system used by content providers for transmitting electronically.a visual image with sound which is reproduced on devices with viewing screens and speakers, providing to individual viewers in separate locations on demand content predominantly for entertainment but also for education."

The devices have no "cords" connected to them. In the early part of this decade I rejected the use of the terms "cord cutter" and "cord never" which were being used to describe people connected to the internet "cord" instead of the cable TV "cord." But times are different now.

More and more viewers, particularly GenZs and Millennials, rely on devices with no cord attached. They access the internet for video viewing through a "phone company" wireless signal or a local wifi signal. Obviously, at some point down the line there is a cord feeding whatever generates the signal. But the viewer's device is cordless and the viewer may be entitled to either the label "cord cutter" or "cord never" as no cord is directly involved.

In many homes, even though the signal comes to a modem/router through a wire,all viewing devices use wifi. Ironically, also many of those viewers are reverting to OTA live/recorded TV viewing in addition to their wireless/wifi streaming. In terms of "cords" it is like it was 60 years ago in 1960 when we watched TV coming across the airways by radio signal.

In 2013 we noted here:

    Broadcast TV is still around. So are "land lines." In fact, they have something in common - they are attached to a location and were designed to be used with a television set and a telephone.
    Smart phones and tablets and the related YouTube and Netflix apps are not attached to a location but to a person, a subscriber.
    It's not a new Golden Age of Television. It has been the Era of Television. and it seems to me its headed for retirement. Now its the Era of Mobile Diversion with completely different perameters and effects. Find or create your own word - something like "modiversion." After all, "television" is a created word for a technology: "Other proposals for the name of this then-hypothetical technology were telephote (1880) and televista (1904)."

In truth, today we know it is not "television" but rather "video streaming." And the content is provided by "video streaming services" not "channels."

The proliferation of streaming services and content choices

In 2015 Chairman of FX Network and FX Productions John Landgraf infamously noted “There is simply too much television.” He coined the term "Peak TV." He predicted a decline from the 409 scripted series offering new episodes that year. But three years later, there were 495. This year Landgraf's FX research team reported the number at 532 for 2019.

In 2019, despite the fact that Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Acorn TV, and literally dozens of other streaming services existed, Apple launched Apple+ and Disney launched Disney Plus. Both offered new scripted series. But Disney Plus includes many thousands of titles from the Disney brand itself, plus Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars and National Geographic content. It will also integrate programming from Fox.

In 2020 AT&T's WarnerMedia will be launching HBO Max. In addition to streaming the content from premium cable channel HBO, it will offer its own exclusive shows and movies, and content from WarnerMedia properties such as Warner Bros., The CW, DC, New Line, and Turner Classic Movies. It will allow access to 10,000 hours of content versus the paltry HBO Go and HBO Now's 2,000+ hours of programming.

Also in 2020 Comcast's NBCUniversal will be launching Peacock which will be the streaming home of popular NBCUniversal properties (think NBC, USA, SyFy, Bravo, E!, Oxygen, Universal Kids). In total, there will be more than 15,000 hours of content available on Peacock. In addition, a big attraction will be sports - think NBC Sports, Golf Channel, Olympics, etc. And early discussion has raised the idea that Peacock could be offered free with commercials.

The point here is that in the foreseeable future we're likely to have available 500± scripted series offering new episodes plus have access to tens of thousands of hours of programming in the form of thousands of old series (we used to call them reruns) and movies.

Back in 1960 at best we had available about 75 TV scripted series offering new episodes and no access to reruns. We had to watch TV live. And we had no recording capability, which meant within a year at most we could only watch new episodes of about 30± shows including Summer reruns.

Of course, most of us can watch only about the same number of hours of streaming video. All we've really gained is more choices. Not that it is entirely a gain. Back then we looked at the TV schedule in our newspaper or TV Guide magazine and chose from three or four viewing choices at any one time. Now you must literally choose from thousands of options.

Perhaps Landgraf was right. There is simply too much television. In terms of this blog, there are now many hundreds more lost scripts. No one viewer can possibly access all the available creativity because there are only 24 hours in each day. Few can allocate more than 20% of them to viewing streaming video.

So we choose. All those other scripts are lost to us.

Oh well....

What about those internet signals after 2020, wired or wireless?

While in the past decade technology shifted to take advantage of cellular wireless access from a device to the internet (which was created for purposes other than video streaming), the fact is AT&T and Comcast are the only internet service provider (ISP) conglomerates involved in providing significant content.

Today the competition is confusing. Nothing is settled, particularly the technology.

On the horizon are newer wireless signal technologies. You may be aware of 5G cellular wireless which is being implemented in a limited way in the U.S.  And in anticipation of the new decade, we must acknowledge a new wireless signal source - low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites.

The curious reality for 5G is that there are no manufacturers of 5G equipment in the U.S. which has led to a dispute over the use of Chinese equipment which is available and plentiful with the alternate being European company equipment. And even the Europeans are still looking at the Chinese equipment. In any event, 5G implementation will be expensive and likely will not easily be offered in rural areas.

The low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites could provide service in unserved and underserved areas, but it has its own complications. Those involved in implementation are not currently internet service providers. We should note that astronomers are alarmed because these satellites will interfere with scientific observations of the universe.

In  the early 1920s radio broadcasting became a household medium. By 1960 television became a household medium. Another 40 years later, in 2000, the internet was serving households and it has effectively become the replacement for television in 2020. It has led to the availability of tens of thousands of hours of video, both for entertainment and education.

It boggles the mind. The most comparable historical human experience would seem to be printing. There was a time when one could have read every book in print. Now one could not even imagine such a possibility. Yes, you could probably buy most of the available books on the internet as 48.5 million books are available to buy on Amazon, about 20% of which are available to download as e-books. But in one lifetime no one has the time to read them all.

Yes, there are a lot of scripts lost to every one of us. And yet, more people than ever do get a chance to express themselves to the world. That must be good. Right???

Now what the heck are we going to stream on the TV tonight?

Sunday, June 4, 2017

We & TV are in our 70's - what about that cord?
  Part 5: How a plan for streaming-only
  in 2017 became streaming-mostly

TV streaming services are not yet adequate for this!
In previous posts, I offered my belief that 2017 would be the year our household would shift to streaming TV only.

For over six months I have been experimenting with it. As of June 2017, I am comfortable stating that while the time for streaming-only TV for many is here, for many others streaming-only is not quite "ready for prime time." As I explained in Part 3 of this series the television content industry is still hung up in the past, partly because of the simplest of an American religious value - greed is good.

But let me break the issues of streaming TV down into key subjects - internet streaming technology, commercial free content providers, and the basic cable channel dilemma.


Internet Streaming Technology

You can't stream internet television content without a fixed terrestrial fast internet service. The rock bottom reliable speed needed is 10 Mbps. At least 25 Mbps is preferable.

The FCC in January 2016 issued a report finding that:
  • 10 percent of all Americans (34 million people) lack access to 25 Mbps service;
  • 6 percent of all Americans (20 million people) lack access to 10 Mbps service; and,
  • 31 percent of rural Americans (15 million people) lack access to 10 Mbps service.
The report also indicates that:
  • 10 percent of Americans have no options for 25 Mbps service;
  • 51 percent of Americans have only one option for a provider of 25 Mbps service; while only
  • 38 percent of Americans have more than one option for 25 Mbps.
The good news for streaming television is that about 90% of Americans have access to 25 Mbps service. Whether costs are reasonable is a separate issue.

We have service that exceeds 25Mbps. For our household, high speed internet is an essential unrelated to TV. So it isn't a cost of streaming TV service, unless we exceed the 1TB data streaming cap. During this experimental period, we have been streaming about four hours a night, seven days a week, plus we use the internet heavily during the day. Here is our last three months of usage according to Comcast/Xfinity:

For internet service costs to be an issue for us, we would have to use five times our current usage.

The other piece of technology needed for streaming TV is a "device" that uses streaming "apps" provided by content provider services. For us old techies, that means you need some kind of dedicated computer that can download and run the streaming software provided by services like Netflix and CBS All Access.

To start off with, most TV's you can buy today are smart TV "devices" that come with apps for streaming services (in addition to a TV tuner that you can connect to "that other cord" through which your off-the-air, cable, or satellite signal comes). Effectively these TV's are just a great big tablet.

The problem is many such TV's, Samsung for instance, probably won't have the key apps you need. In my opinion it's preposterous that Samsung TV's provide a Facebook app but has not yet provided a CBS All Access app. Who wants a 72" screen with a Facebook app. Yeah, I know, I'm old....

The hardware you will need is a specialized device (actually a dedicated use computer) that connects to the internet (via a wire or wifi) and to your TV (which is a flat panel screen) via an HDMI cable such as one of these:

Personally I agree with Battle of the TV Boxes: Android vs Apple vs Amazon vs Roku which states "Gizmodo is a big fan of the Roku box and everything it can do." But that's mostly because at last count (it changes hourly) there are Roku apps for 5,584 streaming "channels." This is, of course, irrelevant to just about 98% of the population, except for a handful of techies. My Roku screen normally displays just 9 channels:

There are good reasons one might choose an Amazon Fire TV, an Apple TV, or a Chromecast. Because these boxes are updated with new models regularly, one can't rely on old reviews. And remember Roku was the first of its kind, and operates outside the constraints of the Amazon, Apple, or Google environments.

You can get one of these devices for under $100 and they make "stick" wifi versions for under $30.


Commercial Free Content Providers

One of my primary goals when shifting to streaming was to get rid of commercials. Indeed, today you can subscribe to more than enough content commercial-free. Consider this:

Admittedly, Amazon Prime Video is shown at $0.00 because we were Amazon Prime subscribers for a year before they added video. And - this is ironic - PBS does show a commercial before and after each show.

There are other weirdness's. CBS All Access does, occasionally, insert commercials for other CBS shows but they give most subscribers live streaming access to their local CBS affiliate. Cable premium channels like HBO Showtime and Starz do the same at the beginning of each show.

Licensing restrictions prevents Hulu from carrying NBC's "The Blacklist" and requires them to show one commercial before and after episodes of ABC's "Grey's Anatomy."

Nonetheless the list above represents the streaming "commercial free" environment available on line.

With almost no exceptions everything that appears in prime time broadcast TV on ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, and PBS can be streamed the day after it airs. Additionally past episodes and seasons are available. And original programming not available elsewhere is offered by CBS All Access and Hulu.

The truth is that through streaming you can view without commercials thousands of episodes of both current and past TV shows, exclusive original shows, and movies. So why wouldn't you switch to all streaming, aka cut the cord?


The Basic Cable Channel Dilemma

The "basic cable channel dilemma" really is about resistance to change based on economics.

The dilemma involves so-called basic cable channels such as these top 50 from 2015 ranked by their seven-day averages in primetime total viewers: ESPN: 2.022 million,  TBS: 1.876 million,  USA: 1.850 million,  Disney: 1.784 million,  Fox News: 1.775 million,  TNT: 1.766 million,  Discovery: 1.549 million,  History: 1.536 million,  HGTV: 1.498 million,  AMC: 1.443 million,  Adult Swim: 1.307 million,  FX: 1.251 million,  Food Network: 1.129 million,  Lifetime: 1.065 million,  Nick at Nite: 1.027 million,  Syfy: 1.006 million,  ABC Family: 985,000,  A&E: 959,000,  TLC: 944,000,  ID: 891,000,  Hallmark: 881,000,  Bravo: 872,000,  Spike: 790,000,  CNN: 672,000,  Animal Planet: 652,000,  Disney Junior: 644,000,  VH1: 642,000,  TV Land: 608,000,  MTV: 606,000,  BET: 598,000,  MSNBC: 576,000,  Comedy Central: 569,000,  E!: 568,000,  National Geographic Channel: 544,000* (rounded tie),  OWN: 544,000* (rounded tie),  WETV: 523,000,  truTV: 476,000,  Lifetime Movie Network: 462,000,  Nick Jr.: 440,000,  Travel: 438,000,  GSN: 434,000,  ESPN2: 432,000,  FXX: 413,000,  Hallmark Movies: 410,000,  FS1: 406,000,  INSP: 389,000,  NBCSN: 381,000,  CNBC: 375,000,  Disney XD: 370,000,  H2: 348,000.

These and the other several hundred other "basic cable channels" offer programming that many watch.

If you a sports fan, ESPN and other sports channels are likely important to you.  Also the fact is you won't even be able to watch live games on ABC, Fox, and NBC, and sometimes on CBS. If you're into reality TV or nature shows the key channels are among those listed.

And some popular scripted programming is offered by cable channels.

If you want to "cord switch" but need basic cable channels there are varied choices that address the dilemma, most now offering a cloud DVR. In my opinion, particularly if sports is your thing, Hulu with Live TV for $39.99 plus $4.00 for commercial-free Hulu streaming should be considered first. It adds $32 a month to your commercial-free Hulu. For me, Hulu with Live TV would not give access to some cable channels offering scripted TV and I have no need for live channel streaming.

Other options include the PS Vue offering the most complete set of services available, AT&T's DirecTV Now which has advantages with your AT&T cell phone wireless service but has no DVR and limitations with regard to those boxes that deliver the signal to your TV, and YouTube TV which doesn't play well with others but is perfect if you are 100% Google/Android and the content options are adequate.

At $25 plus $5 for the cloud DVR feature, the Blue Package with Sling TV would give me the least expensive choice for a "full cord switch" with a lot of add-on options that I wouldn't use. But there is that pesky commercial skipping problem with shows like "The Amercans" and "Fargo" on FX.

You see at this time that the ability to fast forward and rewind through commercials is restricted by the complexities of network contracts with service providers on every choice out there. For instance, based on what I know at this time, FX and other Fox-owned channels simply don't allow skipping commercials on shows you've recorded to your DVR cloud. Since I don't want to revert back to the 1970's, that's a deal breaker.

Further, because of contract provisions, occasionally special event live programming is not allowed by the content producer/owner to be streamed.

Finally, that sports fan who likes to watch live - but rewind and fast forward during the game - could be frustrated because even the systems that allow FF/RW on live events are kludgy. This even varies between "devices" used to access streaming content.

You need to evaluate channel availability, cost, and convenience. I ended up staying with Dish Network because of pricing1 including a number of discount offers and a zero-cost DVR system. It meets my current needs, but that is likely to change within a year. Here is how it all ends up with my choices:


This is cheaper than obtaining TV completely through satellite/cable services, particularly with the premium cable channels, plus having a streaming subscription from Netflix. And it is mostly streaming commercial-free. We are still having to use a remote to skip through commercials in a few recorded basic cable shows each week. (See below a graphic listing the channels we receive from the basic Dish Flex Pack.)

Finally,  binge-watching a full season of a show before watching another show just doesn't mesh with our TV viewing habits. In our lifetime, the TV channels scheduled the programming from which we simply picked a show to watch in any particular period of time as explained in Part 4 of this series. So I have to schedule TV viewing along with scheduling recordings on the basic cable channels, using a schedule like this:

Click on image to see a larger version!

The above schedule format is the latest format evolution and I'm still struggling with the fine tuning. In future posts I'll address this frustrating learning process.


1Dish Network offers the least expensive  approach to content packages in the cable/satellite market today. By subscribing to their basic Flex Pack, we are not paying for local channels nor for any Disney/ESPN/ABC channels which are the most costly in any other package. Our equipment is limited to the Dish "Wally" which is a single receiver box which with an attached external hard drive functions as a DVR. Here are the cable channels in the basic Flex Pack which can be supplemented with separate add on packages as follows: Local Channels, National Action Pack (sports including ESPN), Regional Action Pack (sports),  Variety Pack (more basic cable channels),  Kid's Pack (Disney and other channels), and others: 

Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Allegory in American TV series
  What Can Americans learn from Gillian
  Anderson playing the Goddess Media
  looking on the screen like Lucille Ball?

The important question coming from an allegorical TV story is: Can Americans learn anything from Gillian Anderson appearing on a screen as Media but looking like Lucille Ball playing Lucy Ricardo? (No that is not a misspelling of the name of the ancient Greek diety Medea - it is Media, the name of a 21st Century deity.)



An allegory is an extended metaphor wherein a story illustrates an important attribute of the subject, perhaps characters, places or events, representing real-world issues and occurrences. It is used because it can readily illustrate complex ideas and concepts in ways that are comprehensible or striking to its viewers, readers, or listeners. And/or it is used to convey hidden meanings through symbolic figures, actions, imagery, or events, which together create the moral, spiritual, or political meaning.

Two TV series full of allegorical meaning which appeal to limited audiences will appear on American TV this month. Both confront obliquely, as allegories do, the belief systems of modern Americans.

On American TV it is difficult to present series dramas with allegorical themes because each of the potential 100 million viewers relates to the world differently particularly as mythical or religious symbolism applies to living a virtuous life or a vile life.

If you believe or are inclined to believe in one or more deities, that will color how you see the world. It will also color how you see the world if you believe the Universe - all of time and space and its contents - is randomly evolving - meaning changing incrementally in structure, form, organization, and/or makeup over time albeit logically though without the benefit of rational choice with hindsight.

Regardless of your outlook on those matters, there is the question of "specialness" - in the context of the Universe, are humans "special."

Let's draw a simple comparison. Is there something "more special" about anatomically modern humans as compared to California red-legged frogs? Making such a judgement about "specialness" is a subjective process where "subjective" means thoughts of the thinking subject rather than the object of thought.


Individual frogs don't tell us if they are "special", but individual humans do so regularly. And it can be annoying. Sure each individual is unique, as is each individual frog and as is each individual rock. But we don't use the term "special" that way. We mean "particularly valuable when compared to others" like a diamond is particularly valuable when compared to driveway gravel.


The Leftovers

That question of "specialness" is, of course, the core question underlying the story of the HBO series The Leftovers which just began its third and final season. The Leftovers starts three years after the "Sudden Departure", the inexplicable, simultaneous disappearance of 140 million people, 2% of the world's population, on October 14, 2011.

The gnawing question is were these people taken from us because they were living a virtuous life while the "leftovers" were not?  Obviously, they were "special" but it doesn't seem like virtuousness or vileness had anything to do with it.

The billions left behind experience the impact of the sudden loss of loved ones, but because it was 2% of the population, the loss isn't very unique to you and therefore not very "special."  Then there are social and philosophical questions around what it means to be left behind, when others were "chosen" unless of course it was a random albeit logical event - much like 100 years ago we couldn't understand those large bones people found in the ground which appeared to be from animals that really weren't like animals we saw.

Why did they disappear? It can't be right, because they weren't "special" like us, of course.

The Leftovers began as a novel by Tom Perrotta. In an interview about his novel, Perrotta explained:
    I thought a lot about the Evangelical Christian worldview, and this apocalyptical vision is part of it. I thought the idea of the Rapture was both poetic and richly metaphorical. Isn’t life itself a Rapture in slow-motion? Aren’t we left behind by the people we love who die before us? ...So in the end I borrowed the Christian Rapture and used it for my secular purposes.
    The Leftovers deals with trauma on a grand scale and explores different reactions through the various characters. Some...try to re-establish a feeling of normality in the community, they cling to their former life in order to pick up from where they were interrupted. Others...believe that the ordeal revealed an emptiness in their life. They can’t go back, they have to invent a new way of life. This is the novel’s real theme, the way people are changed by events that surpass their understanding and the different ways in which they try to recover from a cosmic tragedy.
That brings us to a new 2017 Starz TV series....


American Gods

What if, for a moment, you reconsidered the phrase I used earlier "you believe or are inclined to believe in one or more deities" in the context of someone saying it is hard, perhaps impossible, to find a religion that has only one deity.

Wikipedia explains:
    The Oxford reference defines deity as "a god or goddess (in a polytheistic religion)", or anything revered as divine. C. Scott Littleton defines a deity as "a being with powers greater than those of ordinary humans, but who interacts with humans, positively or negatively, in ways that carry humans to new levels of consciousness beyond the grounded preoccupations of ordinary life".
A number of people who identify themselves as members some of the world's most significant religions think their religion is "special" because it has only one deity. And yet many who identify with Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, for example, would have a hard time explaining the difference between a deity and those listed in Wikipedia's List of angels in theology, List of theological demons, List of saints, and List of early Christian saints. Particularly in an attempt to contrast to a religion that has a pantheon of major and minor deities, many of those whose mind screams "there is but one god" will inevitably fail their religious history test.

But as human life evolves deities become seemingly irrelevant, less popular. People believe in new myths, metaphorically weakening the players in the old myths. In 1988 Douglas Adams, author and creator in 1978 of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, wrote the second book in the  Dirk Gently series The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul. In that book, Adams explores what it means to be a deity aging, becoming irrelevant. A key character is Odin.

Hugo and Nebula Award-winning English author Neil Gaiman said of Adams who died in 2001 at the age of 49:
    I think that perhaps what Douglas was was probably something we don't even have a word for yet. A Futurologist, or an Explainer, or something. That one day they'll realize that the most important job out there is for someone who can explain the world to itself in ways that the world won't forget; who can dramatize the plight of endangered species as easily (or at least, as astonishingly well, for nothing Douglas did was ever exactly easy) as he can explain to an analog race what it means to find yourself going digital. Someone whose dreams and ideas, practical or impractical, are always the size of a planet, and who is going to keep going forward, and taking the rest of us with him.
Also in 2001 Gaiman's novel American Gods was published. If you read my political blogs, you have read repeatedly that migration is the essence of California. Here is how one reviewer explains American Gods:
    After being released from prison to discover that his wife has died, Shadow Moon finds himself being courted for a job by a man named Mr. Wednesday. While traveling cross-country with this mysterious stranger, he discovers a world populated by ancient gods and other mythological beings that our immigrant ancestors believed in when they first came to America. Not only are the Old Gods fading from the collective consciousness, but they’re also being targeted by the personifications of America’s New Gods, who get their power from technology and mass media. Wednesday wants to rally the Old Gods for a battle, and needs Shadow’s help to convince them to fight.
    Early on in the book, Shadow asks Mr. Wednesday if he’s American. “Nobody’s American,” he responds. “Not originally.” Those four words represent the central thesis of the book: that in a nation made up of different immigrant experiences (including even Native Americans, whose ancestors traveled across the Bering Strait during the Ice Age), there is no quintessential way of being. Makes sense, considering that Gaiman himself is an immigrant and wrote the book entirely based on places he’d been while on a lengthy road trip.
    Of course, a story about legendary religious figures is also ostensibly going to be about belief and sacrifice, both of which the deities of American Gods need to survive. And it’s also about the staying power of mythology and legends, and how they are warped and shaped over time by the people who learn them and pass them along.
The name Mr. Wednesday tells us what we need to know, as Wednesday is the "day of Woden", reflecting the pre-Christian religion practiced by the Anglo-Saxons. Linguistically, Old English wōdnesdæg is really linguistically derived/evolved from the Latin dies Mercurii "day of Mercury", reflecting the fact that the Germanic god Woden (Odin) during the Roman era was interpreted as "Germanic Mercury".

Odin (from Old Norse Óðinn) is a widely revered god in Norse mythology, associated with healing, death, royalty, the gallows, knowledge, battle, sorcery, poetry, frenzy, and the runic alphabet, and is the husband of the goddess Frigg, associated with foreknowledge and wisdom. The English weekday name Friday (etymologically Old English "Frīge's day") bears her name. In Anglo-Saxon England, Odin held a particular place as a real ancestral figure among royalty, and he is frequently referred to as a founding figure among various other Germanic peoples.

The English settled what is now the Eastern Seaboard of the United States. They were, of course, avowed Christians who regularly used the names of Norse gods in common conversation. We won''t even mention who settled the part of the United States where Fargo takes place except to note that Odin and his buddy Thor (the day of the week Thursday ia"Thor's day" from Old English Thunresdæg, 'Thunor's day'), regularly appear in English language literature and stage and screenplays.

Simply, all the old gods in American Gods were brought here by our ancestor-migrants, regardless of their professed religion. The old gods worry that they're being displaced by new gods such as Technical Boy, petulant god of the Internet, part Silicon Valley punk billionaire, part cyber-bully (in the book a fat hacker kid, but in the series Max Headroom’s annoying younger brother) and Media, goddess of screens, taking the form of Lucille Ball among other TV characters.

The allegorical reference, of course, is that these creatures exist because people believe in them. The power of the old mythological beings has diminished as people's beliefs waned. New gods have arisen, reflecting America's obsessions with media, celebrity, technology, and drugs, among other things.




The regular cast is remarkable. Appearing in every episode are Brits Ian McShane, known to American TV audiences for his role as saloon owner Al Swearengen in Deadwood, who is Mr. Wednesday and Ricky Whittle, known to American TV audiences for his role Lincoln in The 100, who is Shadow Moon. Appearing in almost every episode are Gillian Anderson, Cloris Leachman, Kristin Chenoweth, and many others you will recognize.

Stories of disputes between deities allows a culture to place all its aspects in perspective. Most significant cultures in history have knowledge deities associated with knowledge, wisdom, intelligence, language, schooling, rhetoric, invention, and the arts. We don't acknowledge our deities. So we create them without an awareness of what we are doing.

The Leftovers raises the issue by having us watch how we might struggle in the absence of any comfort from a knowledge of our deities. American Gods thrusts into our consciousness deities such as Odin, the ruler of Valhalla, who sacrificed his eye and was hung for nine days from the world tree Yggdrasil in order to gain the wisdom of the ages.

What message will Americans get from all this? For we do believe in technology more than any other deity - we recreate ourselves in the fun angels of Facebooks, Twitters, YouTubes. But real American Gods created the most powerful technology well beyond anything Thor could have dreamed of. Have recent generations forgotten the true power of the deity of technology, the power to create real Leftovers from death? Will America learn anything from a manifestation on their many and various screens of an allegorical Lucy Ricardo?

Sunday, March 12, 2017

We & TV are in our 70's - what about that cord?
  Part 4: The daunting challenges when
  switching from "normal" TV viewing

The impact of streaming TV on the television industry and the service options available now, at the end of the first quarter of 2017 were reviewed in the last two posts.

What wasn't discussed is the stressful process of scheduling the unscheduled. I'm old and I'm used to the network channels offering up their nightly schedules. For over 60 years that process meant even in the DVR era watching TV series more or less within a few days after episodes air.

Yes, choices regarding what shows to watch had to be made, but at the beginning of the Fall Season, the Winter Season, and the Summer Season.

Netflix changed that. They will release all 10 episodes of a series season on a Friday. A few weeks later they might release 8 episodes of another series on a Friday. Next month the same kind of thing occurs. Amazon joined them, although they don't release as many shows, so far. (Acorn TV tends to release two episodes a week of a new series, but will will release three seasons of an older Australian series all at once.)

Apparently Millennials, and others, binge watch these series, meaning they might watch anything from 3 episodes to a whole "season" in a day. In our learning process we've tried this.

Two things about binge watching. The weekly episodes of network TV pile up. It leaves one with an empty feeling when...
  1. you finish a "season" of a good show in two days,
  2. you know next season has been ordered, and 
  3. you know it might be 8 months or 18 months before the next season is released.
Because of the Netflix system, "cord-switching" is giving me a whole new set of headaches. But I think I'm getting a handle on it.

Fortunately, Hulu, CBS All Access, PBS, HBO, and Showtime continue to provide weekly episodes of the shows we've been watching on "regular" TV, some shows for over a decade like "NCIS." And they release for streaming each episode of these shows the day after it airs. This allows one to schedule those shows in an orderly manner pretty much as we did in 1998.

There are some "problems" with this when you have ingrained viewing habits. As I mentioned in a previous post, "CBS Sunday Morning" has been a Sunday breakfast companion since 1979. CBS All Access does provide it to us but late at 10:30 am. Even though that is more generous than if they had waited until Monday morning, it makes it late for Sunday breakfast. And HBO holds the Friday night episode of "Real Time" until Saturday. Still, one can schedule around these "problems."

But once those weekly shows are listed in a schedule, a new "problem" appears - the amount of viewing time remaining in which to watch shows from streaming-only sources like Acorn TV, Amazon, and Netflix is inadequate.

The solution is to treat all these viewing sources as "channels" and intersperse that programming into the viewing schedule. The channel Hulu replaces the listings for ABC, Fox, and NBC. CBS All Access replaces the listings for CBS.

It becomes obvious that if we want to start watching new episodes of "Bosch" when they are released by Amazon we have to reduce by one series the broadcast network programming we watch. And because many shows, particularly those from other countries, have a "season" of six episodes, we need to know in advance when event programming like March Madness college basketball preempts a significant amount CBS programming for at least a couple of weeks. And we need to be ready to intersperse episodes from Acorn TV or Netflix shows for those weeks in which broadcast network shows are either not on or in reruns.

The other reality is when we sit down to watch TV, we cannot grab this week's TV Guide magazine like we did in olden days like in 1960:

Instead, for adequate planning I had to create my own version of a TV guide scheduling system, which I keep redesigning:
Click on image to see a larger version!

As I noted in my last post, I have hopes that some of the cable channels will find a way to transition their programs conveniently into the streaming world without blowing up the streaming economic model. Right now they are locked into costly streaming packages that are equivalent to cable packages.

What I'm considering and testing is what it would feel like to not watch cable channel original programming, replacing it with that from streaming sources. It's difficult to just drop shows we've watched for several years. But streaming-only sources for original programming like Netflix do adequately provide replacements for the relatively few cable series we view.

Still, it's tough at any age to break old habits. When you're a TV viewer who remembers watching TV in 1951, it is difficult.

Tuesday, March 7, 2017

We & TV are in our 70's - what about that cord?
  Part 3: Will the cable channel fixation
  on packages end our "too much TV"

One thing "cord-switchers" quickly discover is that the "evil" of cable TV, the package, is still a problem. But its a problem only if you want to watch non-premium cable channels.

Here's what the monthly cost of an assortment of streaming TV sources looks like to us at this time:


Amazon Prime Video is $0 because just as with internet service we already subscribed before they offered video streaming and would if no streaming TV were available. When Amazon threw in the video for us it was just a free bonus.

The HBO and Showtime prices are deals we get with our Dish Network package. If we drop Dish those costs would go up about 50% except no reason exists to subscribe to both at the same time. In fact, one might only have to subscribe to each for three months a years to view series seasons

Truthfully, there is more than enough good content available from those seven sources to watch TV four hours a night. However....

For whatever reason, non-premium cable channel content without commercials the day after it airs is not available without adding a "package" streaming service to your costs. The rock-bottom price available for a scripted TV fan to get AMC, BBCA,  Comedy Central, TNT, USA, and numerous others from Dish Network's Sling TV is indicated below:

Actually that is not bad except that basically this is for streaming live programming with commercials and generally without the ability to control the flow. Depending upon channel there is limited streaming of previous shows and no DVR equivalent. Sling TV recently did launch a beta test of a cloud DVR approach which presumably will be available to everyone "soon" though I can't imagine it not being at an additional cost.

Basically, there are two other choices, Sony's Playstation Vue which does have a cloud DVR system and newcomer AT&T's DirecTV Now.

The difficulty of balancing cost with programming is that with all three you end up buying broadcast networks and with other than Sling TV no choices exist that do not require subsidizing the costly Disney/ABC/ESPN channel group. With all of them you start looking a add-ons that cost more money - what I call "the package trap."

Corporate commercial internet streaming as we know it began with Netflix. With Netflix you get "original programming" as you do from Amazon, Acorn TV, and others out there. You also now get original programming not available elsewhere from Hulu and CBS All Access. For a scripted TV fan, that programming is of value.

All of which raises a question. Why are the cable channels locking themselves into a 1980's package mode that begins with live streaming? I understand that is a sports channel mode, but it chews up bandwidth. And then why don't they get the idea that the Netflix model is to watch what you want to watch when you want to watch it - without commercials and without pushing buttons to fast forward or skip commercials?

I had some hope that this situation will change as both AMC Networks and FX have agreements with Hulu that will make a number of series available. Apparently though, in some cases it will be like AMC's agreement with Amazon on "The Americans" where a season can be made available only right before the next season is to air.

But the real shadow is that when Time Warner bought into Hulu, the explanation was that shows from its subsidiary cable channels will be part of Hulu's planned $40-a-month cable-package-type service, which is expected to launch this year.

This all leaves an old guy like me agreeing with cable channel FX CEO John Landgraf: “There is simply too much television.” Well, not really. There is too much mediocre-to-ok TV competing with some very well done TV.

Not that everything on Amazon or Netflix appeals. But their offerings when added to the offerings from cable premiums like HBO and Showtime, start to crowd out the mediocre-to-just-ok offerings on broadcast and cable schedules.

Reportedly, Landgraf also said that the “TV advertising model is broken.” I agree with him on that also. And I think the idea of using the cable-TV-package model in the streaming environment is foolish. But we may all be overruled by the sports divisions of all these companies that dominate the financial models today.

Then again, maybe over time Landgraf's "too much TV" problem will solve itself.

Monday, March 6, 2017

We & TV are in our 70's - what about that cord?
  Part 2: What we have gained is high
  quality scripted streaming content

In the past ten years the television industry has been full of turmoil and failure, but is ending with a robust technology system and a fulfillment of the promise of The Golden Age of Television which began in 1947.

Ten years ago I began this blog with a four part series The Screen Writers Guild strike, technology, and the future of scripted television. In part four I wrote:
While the home entertainment industry struggles to cope with changes over he next 5-to-10 years, viewers who want to watch scripted tv will need to adapt. That’s us, folks. And that’s what this blog about.
Four years ago, apparently as an old viewer frustrated because the industry was struggling through a watershed period without a clear direction I wrote:
It's not a new Golden Age of Television. It has been the Era of Television. and it seems to me its headed for retirement. Now its the Era of Mobile Diversion
Two years ago I wrote with far more optimism and understanding:
Let's acknowledge the elephant or 500 pound gorilla or whatever in the room. Our Millennial granddaughter was never conditioned to watch TV on a schedule. There was never a time in her life that the programming was not "on demand." When she was young it was on a DVR or DVD. But as she reached her teen years, streaming video was at her fingertips on the internet.

Because of technology constraints when we began watching TV, we were conditioned by ABC, CBS, and NBC to watch entertainment TV between 8 pm and 11 pm daily, while the local channels brought us news and some syndicated shows between 5 pm and 8 pm. We had to choose at any particular time what show we wanted to watch. If we picked "Gunsmoke" on CBS, we simply could not watch what was on the other networks until Summer Reruns. If there were three good shows on at 9 pm, the best we could hope for was to watch two, one during the regular season and one in the summer. If there was nothing we wanted to watch at 8 pm, we had nothing to watch.

In mid-2015 at any time we can pick from hundreds of shows. We won't live long enough to see all the things we may want to see. It may even be possible to watch a series we were forced to miss in 1975 because of scheduling conflicts. Good grief!
Last year, in December, I wrote a post titled It is likely that 2017 will be TV's "Watershed Year" for the TV industry and for our household in which I noted the controversy over a TV executive who in frustration pointed out "there is too much television" and said:
Our senior household will begin experimenting with the near-exclusive use of internet streaming through CBS All Access and Hulu along with Acorn TV, Amazon Prime Video, Crackle, Feeln, and Netflix.
Well, we're still somewhat struggling through a learning process but the truth is it works and the content choice is nothing short of a dream, or maybe a 1947 fantasy, come to fruition.

There was a period that is called by some The Golden Age of Television which began in 1947 ended when on May 9, 1961 a "Greatest Generation" attorney and politician Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman Newton N. Minow told the convention of the National Association of Broadcasters television had become  a "vast wasteland".

According to Wikipedia:
The term Golden Age (Greek: χρύσεον γένος chryseon genos) comes from Greek mythology and legend and refers to the first in a sequence of four or five (or more) Ages of Man, in which the Golden Age is first....
In 1947 the television industry, having ceased to be an infant, was a toddler trying figure out how to walk and talk. It was fun to watch the kid grow. In 1961 it had just entered puberty. By 1985 it was no longer an adolescent. After 70 years, in my humble opinion the corporate television industry now is mature.

The options of off-the-air (OTA) broadcast TV and cable/satellite TV delivery systems have worked well for decades and will continue. Internet streaming TV works and expands the content choices of the OTA broadcast network and cable channels by a factor of at least 20.

In fact, "channels" has taken on a new meaning. Consider these screenshots of our 27 "channels" from our Roku menu:


Since we are experimenting we still have our Dish Network Flex Pack with Local Channels and the Hopper equipment that goes with it. But by using the Hulu and CBS All Access "channels" on our Roku we have been watching ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC programs streaming mostly without commercials.

As it turns out Hulu was a critically important pioneer. As I noted ten years ago:
NBC offers full episodes of over 20 programs to be watched live through an internet connection - with ads, of course. Members of our household can watch these episodes on our 42" plasma "TV" which is really just a monitor without a tuner that connects directly to our computer and audio system.

To expand upon this, after trying out a deal with Apple to feed shows to iPods, NBC joined with Fox to create a venture called Hulu.com....

Is this going to change television? Zucker recently noted that NBC.com had 50 million video streams in October, 50% higher than the previous record, in May. "It's become a small cable channel in our universe," he said. Of the Hulu venture he said it was a "superstore" while NBC.com was a "specialty shop." He indicated that the digital issue is the biggest nightmare in his job. "Nobody has figured out the economic model yet. And if we don't figure it out soon, those dollars will turn to pennies."
Two years later Disney/ABC joined NBC and Fox in the Hulu venture as an owner as did Time Warner/Turner Broadcasting System in 2016.

It isn't perfect.

On Hulu ABC's streaming rights to "Grey's Anatomy" requires them to show very short commercials before the start of each episode and at the end of each episode. These really don't add viewing time when compared to watching through the Dish Hopper. NBC's "The Blacklist" is not available on Hulu.

CBS All Access offers all the network's prime time (and daytime and late night) programming with only the occasional commercial interruption showcasing CBS programming. Occasionally the commercial internet streams lock up before it starts which is irritating because it's in the middle of the show we're watching.

CBS All Access does provide a live stream of our local CBS broadcast channel. Somehow that eliminates some silly personal insecurity of an old guy who still remembers when live TV was our link to the world. It's silly because we have the internet to browse even on our phones.

Here's the kind of thing that does irritate an old guy. We've been watching CBS Sunday Morning with Sunday "brunchfast" since it began in 1979 with original host Charles Kuralt. Because of that we know its history. Originally offered at 9:00 am - 10:30 am ET/PT each Sunday, the San Franciso and some other Pacific Coast stations shifted it 6:00 am -7:30 am PT because of sports programming conflicts. Fortunately, by then we could record the show and watch it at our leisure. They do make the show available streaming immediately after its time zone scheduled broadcast - 10:30 am. That's later than we want to watch it.

And the fact is there are some special broadcast events that are best watched from our Dish Hopper DVR just behind the live feed skipping commercials. Award shows like The Emmys and The Oscars fall into that category. And though we are not a sports fan household, The Super Bowl is another example.

So if we drop our satellite TV service, we may have to adjust to some of the differences.

On the other hand, we have access to some "must see" programming simply not available outside streaming. And here is where we see what the future holds. Take another look at our Roku screen:

Right now we are using 27 "apps" which are "channels." The Cordcutting.com website Roku channel list is 5,190 channels long. Many are hidden from the Roku Streaming Channels menu but can still be added. Some aren't available to everyone everywhere. But there are far more than enough channels to meet anyone's needs. There are enough free channels to offer adequate entertainment to many.

For those of us who seek quality scripted TV, the number of high quality original shows offered by the cable premium channels such as HBO and Showtime has been supplemented with high quality original shows from Amazon and Netflix. Traditionally PBS has offered quality TV through its Masterpiece programming, much of which is actually British. Acorn TV provides access to additional British programming, plus some excellent shows from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and even some non-English-speaking European countries.

And the broadcast networks through Hulu and CBS All Access now provide original content not available on their broadcast network channels.

Which leaves me with the problem of non-premium cable channels in a streaming world, the subject of my next post in this series.