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TV Before Social Media: What The Dark Ages Looked Like | InteractiveTV Today


TV Before Social Media What The Dark Ages Looked Like InteractiveTV Today

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Back in the day, this was one of the ways people discussed their favorite televisions shows from the night before. "Internet" wasn't even a word in the mid-1970s, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg wasn't even a gleam in his parent's eyes, and wireless phones, computers, and tablets were relegated to annals of science fiction.

Still, everyone had methods of social media for the purposes of discussing things like favorite television shows. I remember my older sister watching the likes of "Rhoda," "The Waltons," and "Police Woman" with the phone glued to her head, her BFF on the other end, discussing every scene, cute boy, and tearful moment as it unfolded.

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In the public arena, the water cooler at the office was another important gathering place to discuss television happenings from the night before. Make no mistake about the water cooler back then. It was a real gathering place for such important discussions. Sure, they still exist today, but they don't hold the same purpose or charm they held in the pre-internet days. Today, they just dispense hot and cold water, the hot being an improvement over the old days.

But that's the only improvement. Adults had face-to-face discussions about "Monday Night Football" and how Howard Cosell was obviously drunk as he threw up on Don Meredith's cowboy boots; or when Sacheen Littlefeather refused to accept Marlon Brando's Best Actor Oscar because of the unfair treatment of American Indians by those in Hollywood.

The main challenge is that everyone was watching the same shows at the same time back then.

Now, thanks to TiVo, Netflix, YouTube, and Hulu, anyone can watch anything at any time, and everything has a tiny audience except the Super Bowl and major awards shows.

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