Haven’t watched TV in over a year. Does anyone else here not watch TV at all? Why not?

[Matz]

Just checking in.

Another year has passed, and still no TV. I’ve considered subscribing to satellite TV, but am deferring that decision until the house I moved into in 2018 is decluttered and my unpacking is complete.

You may detect an element of procrastination in my current situation.

I have, however, activated the BluRay player, and use my TV solely for watching movies. Not very often, but watching them on a 50” plasma screen is way better than on my 2010 27” iMac.

Still seems odd, not having TV, when I think about it. Which is increasingly seldom.

And so it goes. Maybe next year. Maybe not.

 

[LizKat]

I don't watch TV shows as they air, but I do catch up on them later. About the only thing I actually watch on TV is the news and that's just to see how crime in my area is at any given time.

Heh... that I did readily believe. [Ah Baudie, we hardly got to know ye.]

Still seems odd, not having TV, when I think about it. Which is increasingly seldom.

And so it goes. Maybe next year. Maybe not.

I came up here in 1983 with a 5" portable color TV that when used down in NYC with rabbit ears mostly showed me grainy news and the outlines of some tall buildings between broadcast towers and my upper upper west side apartment. It was worthless up here without an external antenna. So I parked the thing in a closet in the guest room upstairs. I ran into it the other day when combing that room for anything to haul off to the county's annual e-recycle event!

Meanwhile I went through the "maybe, maybe not" stage and settled on "maybe next year" until sometime in the 90s when local phone company ran cable out here. I had a during-week house sitter then and figured she'd probably enjoy the option. But after I was up here full time, I had the house uncabled in 2004 since I couldn't really justify the bill for the time spent in front of a TV. After that, and once my net provider got the DSL rate up off the floor, I have been happy enough just picking and choosing streaming or download options for video entertainment.

 

[Falhófnir]

We only have a TV in our small sitting room, and it's been going whole runs of days without seeing use throughout the summer (now football season has kicked off, it's starting to see a bit more use again). The focal point of our main drawing room is the fireplace, as it was originally intended to be - when going, that can be quite nice to sit and absently watch between spurts of browsing on the iPad (so yeah I get a lot of screen time anyway, TV or no ).

Seems on a broader trend, scheduled broadcast TV is well and truly on the decline as people choose streaming services (and looking at what it costs I'm not surprised). I've often wondered how some of these hundreds and hundreds of channels showing such absolute rubbish get enough viewership to remain afloat?

 

[Matz]

Update: In case anyone is interested, as of June 2023 I still have no cable, satellite, or other form of tv subscription. I hear about major stories through various online fora I subscribe to, but very rarely go beyond the headline in the list of posts. Friends will occasionally mention things to me that are going on, such as Fed rate hikes in the US, but I find that most of what passes as news is not only irrelevant to my life, it often aggravates me. I believe that my quality and quantity of life have improved significantly in part due to my eliminating tv, particularly news and advertisements.

I do, however, stream movies on occasion, and quite frequently use Youtube for instructional videos. I suppose those could be considered as subsets of tv, but I’m ok with that.

What continues to amaze me is the amount of time I used to spend watching tv.

 

[MacMan2013]

Well I don't really watch TV in the sense of actual broadcast programs (rare exceptions like election night). But I do watch streaming services and DVDs, so watch what I want on my own schedule with no commercials. Mainly like drama shows and serious documentaries. Have not watched TV news for years, far too depressing.

 

[boswald]

I can't remember the last time I watched TV. In fact, all my TVs are in storage and have been for years.

 

[romanof]

I discovered long ago that TV watching is a habit. Watergate broke mine in the way back prehistoric years. At the time there were only 3 broadcast channels, and all were saturating the air with reports, interviews and blathering politicians. You would settle in after a long week of work, have your popcorn and soda (and girlfriend) waiting for the 7:00 Friday/Saturday/Monday Night at the Movies - really popular happenings in the days long before streaming - then...

"Friday night at the movies will not be seen tonight so we can take you to the news briefing by Senator Babble, so he can talk about all the Watergate issues that innumerable other politicians and talking heads have jabbered about at nauseating length all week." Oh... And so he can get some valuable face-time with voters.

Or...

"...and a tornado has been spotted on the ground at... We interrupt this program to take you to Representative Praters very important news revelations about..."

etc,etc

My TV popped a tube during all that, and I kept putting off taking it to the shop since I had almost stopped watching and TV fixing in those days was not cheap. After a month or so, the habit was broken and I have seldom watched other than the odd on-the-air movie in half a century. And once the VCR and rental stores came out, I no longer had to sit through ads.

No regrets.

 

[Algus]

I very rarely watch TV or movies. The older I get, the more I enjoy the quiet. I am a bit of an introvert but my job requires me to be very extroverted so relaxation for me is playing with my dog or sitting down with a good book.

When I do watch TV, I generally prefer comedy or light action/comedy. I do still like stuff like shonen anime. I don't like anything too dark, graphic, or violent.

I really like audio dramas though. Whether it's old timey stuff from the 30s/40s or newer stuff. I think that, as with books, audio dramas let me slip into my own mind and imagine the scene. I wish the format was more popular in the US.

 

[retta283]

I do not watch television. The last time I had cable was in 2006, I moved that year and that was the end of that. I used to love watching sports in the 70s and there was a lot of good stuff on TV in those days, back when there was much less to do indoors alone, but by the time the internet came out I had no desire to look at television. I find that the quality of TV was degrading immensely already in the 90s-2000s, and it has only gotten worse.

I lived with a woman for a few years before Covid, and I HATED having the TV on. It did not matter what was on, it was all the same poor quality nonsense. Only times I enjoyed it was when a show I used to like was on, I would occasionally sit down when Murder She Wrote reruns were on otherwise I would just ignore the TV. It was her prerogative to watch it though so I never made any moves to have our cable canceled.

The only time it was seriously objectionable to me was some of the shows were gruesome beyond anything I consider acceptable, so I had to either leave or request that it be turned off which I do not like to do. I do not like violence or gore and I find that these things have been pushed into overdrive. Back when you'd hear someone die offscreen or it would simply be implied what happened, now they show you and it's often appalling. I find that the older I get the more it affects me too, I am easily distraught now.

I do not watch movies that much either these days. I am mostly into music and some light gaming for my hobbies at home. Otherwise it's just tinkering with stuff aimlessly. I do not keep up with the news anymore either, as mentioned above it rarely is anything that actually affects me. Only the state of the economy is of direct concern to me, but even then it's not necessarily something that I need to keep up with on a day-to-day basis as I don't have stocks anymore.

 

[compwiz1202]

One thing I'd clarify: I hear people saying how they don't "watch TV", but then go on to discuss shows on Netflix, Prime, etc.

I think some people call "TV", watching as aired shows via a network broadcast source, but really - anymore - there's theatrical releases and everything else that's targeted to a delivery mechanism, that includes: real time broadcast via network, cable, premium, streaming sources via all sorts of devices (TVs with a "box", tablets, computers, phones). I had a former business partner of mine proclaim proudly how he didn't watch TV, then went on to talk about some Prime original, I said, "That's TV", he said, "No it's not, I watch Prime on my Mac" ... BZZZZT, sorry, you're watching television, aka "TV programming"

Yea we haven't had cable in forever, and streaming we mostly just watch movies except for game shows. I don't like much new TV at all, and anything I do gets cancelled in no time or the genre does a sudden shift to something I no longer like.

 

[ovbacon]

We don't own a tv at all and haven't owned one since 2005. We once in a blue moon watch something on my iMac 5k or even on a MBA in bed, but it is pretty rare.

 

[Bodhitree]

I have a 42” LCD TV which I rarely use - perhaps once every two months. A few years ago I noticed that watching TV rarely taught me anything new, that the news was mostly just sensationalism, and so I stopped watching.

I occasionally watch Netflix on my iMac, documentaries or an episode of a series.

 

[rm5]

Here's me resurrecting an old thread...

We haven't had a TV in the house since I was around six years old. There were problems with it, so we got rid of it and just never got a new one.

In places where there are TVs, I don't enjoy watching it. Other people in my family REALLY love watching TV (even just on a computer), but I always exclude myself from that, because I've just never had an interest.

I also don't really like watching movies either (except for documentaries), I never have. I find them hard to engage with. So there's that aspect, too.

 

[lowendlinux]

The Army broke my TV in move in 2004 and I never replaced it.

 

[stinkhorn9]

Somewhere around a year ago I stopped watching TV, for reasons that after a few months no longer had relevance for me.

But then another month would go by, and another, and I just didn’t turn the set on.

I’d occasionally think about it, but in the end, decided to switch from a HD TV/internet bundle from Comcast, to internet with a basic SD TV package thrown in. It was actually cheaper to do that than for internet only. So I never took the TV box out of its wrapper, and subsequently moved to where Comcast doesn’t reach.

TV options out here in the country are DirecTV and Dish. I may subscribe to one or the other at some point, or may not. It’s not cheap, but the larger issue is deciding what I’d have to forego in order to spend a similar length of time in front of the TV.

Anyway, I’m curious about other folks that do not watch TV, and why they don’t watch it.

Initially because I moved into a flatshare with no TV - and after that for the majority of time in my own place - I ended up being without TV for over a decade. The internet / other creative interests more than compensated for the lack of incessant advertising (even on non-commercial stations, half the pogramming time seems to be in-house advertising for other shows/products) and uninteresting tripe (amongst some admittedly decent stuff).

I don't understand how people devote entire living room walls to huuuuge TVs, as though it's the ultimate home entertainment. Nowadays, if my partner isn't watching TV, I'll never initiate switching the thing on. (Er, now that the Lionesses have finished in Australia, that is. )

 

[rm5]

I don't understand how people devote entire living room walls to huuuuge TVs, as though it's the ultimate home entertainment. Nowadays, if my partner isn't watching TV, I'll never initiate switching the thing on. (Er, now that the Lionesses have finished in Australia, that is. )

Putting a TV in your living/dining room makes the space REALLY uninviting imo, I know far too many people who do this—how hard is it to put it somewhere totally out of the way?!

Or just get rid of the TV altogether - but wait, apparently that's too hard for some people...

 

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

I have a TV somewhere in storage, but that's that.