No nuance and characters are saying the obvious stuff, because viewers are looking at another device while watching. We’re so cooked.
No nuance and characters are saying the obvious stuff, because viewers are looking at another device while watching. We’re so cooked.
This has been around for a long time, before Netflix. My dad and much of his generation get lonely when the TV is off, so he leaves it on at all times on whatever, while working or watching sports. Network TV does this with predictable crime dramas and sitcoms, cables got Hallmark movies and reruns of family guy, etc. Half-tune is a popular format for pretty much most age groups.
I explicitly don’t do this, but I do have podcasts for my second screen in a sense-- only I won’t do them unless it’s a grindy game or Minecraft or something, and usually the podcast is taking my cognitive attention. It’s disruptive if it’s a thoughtful activity, like scrolling social media (though I guess the fediverse is a little more engaging than slopbook or whatever).
I listen to podcasts, usually ones with minimal or no commercials.
But I can’t stand TVs being used like that. Especially when they are blasting commercials. It’s so depressing.
I 100% agree. A loud TV blasting ads all day is extremely upsetting to me, you can literally feel companies groveling and begging for your money; it’s disgusting. “Hurry in!” “These deals won’t last!” then of course the fucking low-level humor that makes you feel even more stupid. I honestly loathe being anywhere near a TV tuned into stations like that.
I used to do it back then, as soon as I got home I turned the TV on. It was like having the radio on with the difference that you could watch it when you heard something interesting. I think I stopped doing it when started to appear more themed channels, so the regular channels had less variation in their programming.