End of an Era

[akirlu]

I moved out of my parents' house in 1980. Since then, aside from a miniature Casio portable of libertango's so small and ineffectual that we only dragged it out for riots, fires, presidential debates, and other major disasters, I haven't shared my primary residence with a television set. Until now. We are now the proud parents of an umpty-hand 20" Samsung, the gift of a friend who inherited something bigger. I feel so cheap. Still, we had grown weary of the hitches, hiccups, and irritating freeze-locks that watching DVD movies on the computer is heir to, and the teevee gave us something to hook to the freebie DVD player we got for signing our lease.

I'd like to comfort myself that we only use the thing for watching movies. It is true that we get no reception to speak of, and have no plans to pony up for cable. But the truth is that it was really only moments after we got the set hooked up that we had borrowed a copy of the first seasons of Babylon 5 and Six Feet Under, and outright bought a pre-viewed copy of the first four episodes of 24, so it's only by the most diaphanous of fig leaves that I can now pretend not to watch television.

I feel so cheap.

Comments

[redbird]

If I had one to drag out for major disasters, I'd probably just go ahead and watch anyway. While much television is mind-rotting, I realized two years ago that the greatest advantage of not having one is being spared repeated disaster footage. For me, at least, it's a lot easier to walk out of the bodega downstairs where they have the television on than it is to turn off a newscast at such times.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

The great advantage to the Casio, from the perspective of not watching much television, is that it had a watchable screen not much larger than an Australian postage stamp. It was not quite physically painful to watch it for any length of time, so you had to be really, really interested in the information accompanying the images to put up with it for any amount of time. It was with a similar screen that I first discovered that my subconscious works by analog and metaphor. I kept wanting to fiddle with the volume, because some part of my brain was sure that if it worked to make the sound bigger, it would also work to make the picture bigger.

[sraun]

Watching DVD's is not the same as watching TV! Even if you're watching DVD's of television series - after all, the DVD of the series has no commercials, right? And you can watch when you want to, right?

I consider watching DVD's - of whatever content - to be equivalent to watching movies.

[pnh.livejournal.com]

See, now, we're just now starting to revel in the joys of watching DVD's on computer, on the crisp, snazzy 21" monitor I just got for Teresa's Mac, rather than on the crappy display of our seldom-watched 23" TV. No skips and pops yet, just sharp digital goodness...

We don't have comfortable couches in front of Teresa's Mac. I can see we're going to have to rethink our apartment's layout. Now if you'll excuse me, we have these Buffy DVDs loaned to us by a so-called friend...Next, I catch up on the Marx Brothers, the Beatles, and Stephen Foster. This "pop culture" of you young 'uns is most enticing.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Well, we have long suspected that our problems may be laid at the door of our early generation DVD-drive. On the other hand, [free television]+[free DVD player]=[within our budget for experimental hardware] to an even greater degree than buying a new DVD-drive. And none of our monitors are anything quite so luxy and sybarite as 21". So, what with the comfy seating and the stereo hookup in the living room, the television set seemed like a win all around. We've even been starting to whisper abou maybe getting a VHS player, because yes, we are the sort of sad people who own VHS tapes despite having nothing to play them on.

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

I only got into watching Babylon Five and Six Feet Under because of the DVD reissues. And I'd love to have Northern Exposure on DVD. Yeah! But you knew all this already...

I have seasons two and three of B5, and would be happy to lend you them in exchange for 24. Yeah!

Don't feel cheap until you get so hooked on Six Feet Under that you consider subscribing to HBO. Hah! 'Cause that's where we're doing.

[bibliofile.livejournal.com]

"..we're just now starting to revel in the joys of watching DVD's on computer, on the crisp, snazzy 21" monitor.."

Back in the 1980s, I knew a guy who hooked up a Commodore monitor to his VCR. That picture was excellent, albeit smaller than 21".

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

I feel reasonably confident you aren't. Vicki f'rinstance. But really, the difference between having a television set without reception hooked to a dedicated DVD player and having a computer monitor hooked to a computer with a DVD-drive is more semantic than actual in terms of "having a TV".