Do you think television is a dying media?

God, I hope so.

In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti…

Let’s define the question.

Television (the physical device) is not dying – it will be around for a long time to come. It’s the largest view screen in most people’s houses and businesses, and it has a huge advantage over smart phones and tablets for viewing events and programs. The the television as a device or delivery mechanism is going to be around forever.

Television broadcasting and programming is another, different story. Commercial TV as we know it as already changing. The advent of cable TV changed it 20+ years ago, and the advent of internet broadband and streaming is changing it today. The whole advertising delivery model, that pissed people off 40 years ago, is still around, but ultimately will die.

So, content delivery is changing but the TV itself is here to stay.

No!

Is cable TV dying? If they don’t stop gouging everyone it might die. I think about switching all the time.

The future of “television” is on demand programming with advertising. Cable companies are ready for that transition. Streaming services are starting to include ads. Soon there won’t be too much difference between cable and streaming services. Just look at how sly youtube was with the addition of advertising. Now they want a pay service with no ads. If people jump on that they’ll start including ads there as well. Ad revenue is just too easy, it’s low hanging fruit and we don’t have a really good way to complain about it.

Die?

A) Popular things may become less popular. This may tend to be associated with a decline in industry frenzy around them.

B) Common technologies may be phased out of mainstream use, or even discontinue in production.

I’m guessing you sort of mean A)?

Screens that show moving pictures. are going to continue to be popular, perhaps forever, even after 3D VR smellivision is a thing. Not everyone wants to be immersed even to the extent of looking at simulated 3D images. Most people I know tend to go to the 2D versions of movies.

But I’m also guessing you mean broadcast TV, presented as ongoing channels.

I expect that is going to go down and down in popularity, but I don’t know at what rate. It seems to still have appeal for some people.

The main advantages it has over Internet streaming video, is the lame streaming and buffering systems, browser issues, ISP performance, and brand name recognition and investment in producing non-stop attention-grabbing crap er, I mean “content”.

But I haven’t lived with TV for nearly ten years, and it wasn’t my choice to do so then, either. I like to choose what I watch, watch it from the beginning, be able to stop and pause and rewind, and not be subjected to commercials.

Also, modern TV services are starting to try out the Orwellian Mind Screen thing of watching you and tracking what you watch, even listening for what keywords you might say, so the marketing Borg can try to seduce you into more purchases of advertised goods and services. Those people are evil and should all be tortured and killed. ;-/

The model is evolving with the advent of on demand. The Flat screen itself will stay but become thinner.

Traditional broadcast television is becoming less popular but looking at computer or mobile phone screens is becoming more and more common. Virtual Reality headsets will make it even more popular.

A dying medium, perhaps, but I simply couldn’t call it a dying media, even if it were already dead.

I still get much of my TV over the air – for free. Nobody but me knows my TV viewing habits. We know that can’t last.

It’s actually the reverse. I’ve known many lifeless people who work outside all day and go home to watch TV as their single source of entertainment, every single day.