The Internet Changed Television: Let's Talk About it
TV set the standard for almost 70 years. Then the Internet came along and stole all their formulas and did them better.
Back in the day, television had to compete with movies. Sure, it was more accessible, but they had to keep people coming back week to week. So TV developed all sorts of tricks to make sure viewers tuned in. Now, with the rise of the internet, TV is being victimized, and possibly changed forever, by the very tips and tricks it used to become our most popular entertainment medium.
We all know streaming has taken over where TV has left off. The ability to binge an entire season in a day made the glut for content completely insane. But TV and the internet have a ton in common. Aside from aspect ratios, TV and the internet have to draw in viewers every time a new episode or season begins.
So both mediums use cliffhangers to try to get people to come back for more.
Aside from that, each adopted the "stand-alone" ideal so that new viewers could tune in and pick up where they left off.
Where streaming and YouTube have really excelled is in reality TV.
I hate to burst your bubble, but most reality TV is completely staged. But what the internet has done better is to take that staging and make it personal. People look into the camera, carry us with them, and focus on intimate looks at lifestyles and interviews rather than staged encounters.
Streaming also opened up the medium to different narrative lengths. You didn't have to fill space around commercials, your videos could be any length at all. They could focus on one question, or 20. You could also read real-time comments, and adjust or pivot to what content the viewers want. That gave you a level of interaction that TV simply could not. It took the guessing game out and instead replaced it with a comfortable area where you were guaranteed to get what you were looking to find.
These are short summations, check out the full video from Now You See It that goes more in-depth on what the internet learned from television. And how it's changed TV forever.
What's next? See how the internet changed the new Twilight Zone!
The reboot is getting all types of attention from new audiences—I mean, Peele himself interrupted the friggin' Super Bowl with a TV promo that was more exciting than the game itself—but how well do these young, contemporary viewers, who are no doubt already avid fans of Peele's work, know the program that he decided to bring back from the 5th dimension?
Click the link and dive into the story.
