# Is Television better or worse now than when you were a kid?



## Dude111 (Aug 6, 2010)

Has TV got better or worse since you were younger..... In my opinion its MUCH WORSE!!

1) Digital instead of analog (Not as nice an experience (Natural,etc))
2) CRAPPY PROGRAMMING!!!!!!! (Nothing worth watching)
3) OLDER SHOWS SHOWN DIGITALLY JUST ARE NOT THAT APPEALING TO ME....... (I prefer to see them how I saw them then OR NOT AT ALL) -- They were FINE on analog cable in the 80s


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Over the last 50 years, TV has gotten way better in every way, except for saturation of commercials. YMMV. 

No SD is acceptable to me in this day and age, except under very rare circumstances. YMMV.


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## phrelin (Jan 18, 2007)

When I was a kid the TV set looked like this:










...so, yeah, it's a lot better as is the programming. But that was the 1950's.

So far this summer we're watching a lot of original or "imported" programming from Netflix, Amazon, and Acorn TV and in most cases the quality is excellent. Broadcast networks and cable networks perhaps not as much. But to satisfy one's own taste one can be selective from a wide range of sources which is a better situation than the offerings in, say, 1965 from ABC, NBC, and CBS.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

You have an interesting outlook. My guess would be that few agree with you. But that's OK.

What I find puzzling is what you don't like about digital. True, it has its own set of artifacts different from those of analog. But by probably every measure I can think of, its an improvement, except for how long it takes to change channels, and the lack of decent FFW REW, etc. I also don't understand how digital is hurting the content that you used to like when it was analog.

Where we really disagree is in the better/worse programming argument. I think that generally speaking it is better than ever, there is much more of it available, and it is more available on more platforms. Sure, there are old shows that were great that we have nostalgia for, but the golden age is now, not then. TV and movies are better than ever because technology has improved, and because the craft had been refined. It's much more mature, and most mistakes have already been made and learned from. People just got better at making TV.

I do understand certain arguments and support them, regarding how the limitations of yesterday had their attributes. There is value in B&W, and value in a sound system where people had to project and be understood rather than be allowed to whisper and mumble (acting is a lost art among a lot of well-paid actors). The limitation of radio gives us theatre of the mind. 24fps has its upside over 120 Hz interpolated frames.

But all of those negatives of the loss of those attributes to technology are greatly outweighed by the advantages of new technology.

I am also puzzled by why someone who doesn't like the programming would spend any time at all on a TV content forum.

But, vaya con Dios, my friend; there are still plenty of interesting things in the world for you. No one needs TV.


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## Dude111 (Aug 6, 2010)

Thank you... I dont mean to make anyone mad here......

Digital just does not look AS GOOD. The colours arent as good,not as natural looking,etc.....

I had a 1997 release of BUGS BUNNY/ROAD RUNNER on VHS (digitally processed (low audio)) and it looked like garbage!!!!! -- I finally got the ORIGINAL 1980 RELEASE (analog) and its georgeous!! (Strong colours,good audio,etc)

I had a 1990 release of THE SHINING which was crap (video digitally processed) and I finally got the original 1981 release (analog) AND ITS GEORGEOUS!! (On the video and audio)


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

I think its important to be sure anyone with an opinion or comment that might vary from the norm still feels welcome. I don't think anyone is upset; I just think that some may disagree and are puzzled by what you are saying. Still, I would like to think of this as a persecution-free zone. It sometimes isn't, but it should be.

It is possible that you are one of those sensitive to the artifacts that we are not supposed to be able to see; psychovisual compression technique is supposed to throw away data we can't see, but some are more sensitive.

But color is measurably better. That is an objective measurement that is a fact. The color gamut of TV displays is better than those from the 80's, meaning that there is more color available now, as opposed to then.

It's still far from perfect now, which is why when it gets much more perfect, along with 4K and HDR in just the next few years, I am curious whether you will like that better, or worse. We also all see color a little differently, but it you consider color from then more "natural" than color now, your definition of "natural" does not coincide with the common definition of that word.

There can also be a bad digital telecine job on occasion, but we sort of learned how to do that well by about 2008. Cartoons are one of the hardest things to compress without visible artifacts, because of all of those hard edges and high color saturations; it takes a lot of bits to do that right. When FOX first went HD, _The Simpsons_ was the worst looking show on their network.

But the only "analog release" of anything would have to be videotape (most of which is now digital and comes from a digital master anyway). So I am again puzzled by that. Videotape has never looked good, at least compared to live TV or DVR playback, or even SD DVD.


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## MysteryMan (May 17, 2010)

Dude111 said:


> Thank you... I dont mean to make anyone mad here......
> 
> Digital just does not look AS GOOD. The colours arent as good,not as natural looking,etc.....
> 
> ...


Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.


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## Mikej0530 (Dec 23, 2008)

Growing up my families money tree was lacking money. I grew up only able to view a couple of local Ota channels. Picture quality was not there. I now have satellite TV and I must admit I love it and having a dvr is the icing on the cake.


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

TV today is so far beyond what it was when I was a kid it is simply amazing. The old movies now shown on the new TVs are incredible in color and clarity. The old TV sets had the wire mesh look to most of them, today that is totally gone.
Like others have posted, when I was a kid there were 2 and then 4 stations to watch. The picture was snowy most of the time on the little 5" screen in the huge box that it came in.
Now there are hundreds of channels to choose from and every kind of programming imaginable.
I used to say "my picture is fine and I am not going to go to HD until my beautiful Toshiba CRT dies". In March of 2009 it died. I got a 46" Samsung LCD with 1080p. Brought it home and hooked it up to my receiver. I did not like it. The SD programming I was getting was not what I thought it would be. I hooked up a pair of rabbit ears to get OTA programming. Holey Moley ! what a difference. My son then got his Toshiba replaced with a 52" Mitsubishi. I then called DTV to come and switch us over to HD service and got my unit as a DVR.
Now, there are no SD channels in my favorites list.
I would never want to go back.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

I am amazed at how crappy the "sound stage" episodes were, what with shadows and, often, single camera shooting, and the scripts from most 1950s TV episodes were absolutely lame. 

I watched an episode of Naked City last night, with guest star George Segal, that was a bad joke. Some suspect had barricaded himself into an apartment and there were about 30 cops in front of the building, but they couldn't get tear gas into an apartment because the occupant had put a mattress in the window. The cops had to burst through his apartment door and provided cover fire for the first man in by blasting a Tommy Gun into the ceiling, which must have been exciting for the people in the upstairs apartments, but then the suspect escaped by moving the mattress and climbing up the front fire escape and then down the rear one, because the cops didn't think to station anyone behind the building. It was as plausible as Gary Shandling escaping from his apartment by going through the audience.

The Cisco Kid was actually filmed in color because someone had the foresight to anticipate that color reruns would some day be more marketable than black and white ones. While that proved to be true, I doubt that the extra pennies garnered today provide a positive return on that investment.

I'm more of a "content" guy than an "imagery" guy, so the only way I'd even suspect that something is not in high definition is by the aspect ratio.

One thing I don't understand is why it has become fashionable to deliberately mishandle the cameras. When cameras overtravel in panning from one actor to another and then wiggle in, or when the zoom similarly adjusts in and out, that is not inadvertently poor camera work. It is intended to convey something to me that it just doesn't convey because am not a "now" person, I am a "then" person.


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## Nighthawk68 (Oct 14, 2004)

While I am very happy with the way things have upgraded over the past couple of decades both in picture quality and sound quality. The move to stereo was really nice, remember when Laserdisk went to a digital audio? And even to 5.1, Laserdisk did that years before DVD even was out, and the picture quality, although analog, was still light years better than VHS. Well today I still have my Laserdisk player but it doesn't look that good anymore, the color space isn't there compared to today's HD.

Now one thing that I do like is the huge selection of channels available, there are a huge variety of channels that should satisfy even the pickiest of viewer. However, there is one thing I don't like about all the quantity, everybody has a tv show/series and they all have to compete, and the shows are getting less and less episodes per season. the gaps between episodes is crazy, especially in the Feb-May months, 4 months to show us 10-12 episodes. I am talking about CBS, NBC, ABC & FOX, with 20-22 episodes in a season, cable is even worse, 10-13 episodes per season, although they show them all in 10-13 weeks.
Back in the day of just the big 3 networks, there would be 30-36 episodes to a season. Personally I liked that, as you could get into the show easier, you wouldn't forget what happened because it's been 5 weeks since the last episode. Oh, and then episodes used to be upwards 51 minutes, now they range from 38-41 minutes.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

There were most commonly 39 episodes per season for shows from the mid 1950s through the spring of 1961, and then typically 36 episodes for the next two season, with the standard network season length declining to plateaus at 30 episodes, then 26, and now 22. We noticed that the season was shortened because the first reruns were aired during the week before school got out, rather than the first week after.


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## Eva (Nov 8, 2013)

The technology may have gotten better, but most of TV is horrible. Especially with all those crappy reality shows.


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## phrelin (Jan 18, 2007)

Eva said:


> The technology may have gotten better, but most of TV is horrible. Especially with all those crappy reality shows.


I agree with your opinion. But from my perspective the "most of" is offset by the many, many options I have.

I know this is just one night of TV, but tonight if it were like 1960 and all I had access to is ABC, CBS and NBC, my choices at 8 pm would be two reality shows and a 22-year-old movie.

Instead I have the option of watching quality original programming on Netflix and Amazon plus series shows on Acorn TV from Britain, Australia, New Zealand and/or Canada. Combine this with the very few good summer network or cable shows, and I'm having trouble finding the time to watch everything available to me.

And I get to watch it all through technology that would only have been "scifi" in 1960.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Most of TV is horrible: Agree! But the 20-30 other networks (including "cable" types) each have offerings that appeal to me. And no one can argue that broadcasting of sports isn't light years better than 50 years ago.


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## Dude111 (Aug 6, 2010)

TomCat said:


> I think its important to be sure anyone with an opinion or comment that might vary from the norm still feels welcome. I don't think anyone is upset; I just think that some may disagree and are puzzled by what you are saying.


Well thank you my friend...... I like to be able to post strong opinions w/o ppl blowing up and all.........


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Dude111 said:


> Well thank you my friend...... I like to be able to post strong opinions w/o ppl blowing up and all.........


Only when the number of CAPS is more than the lower case words..... 

Strong opinions: Good when well expressed.


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## Reaper (Jul 31, 2008)

I grew up in the 70's in a rural area so our television viewing was limited to OTA. There are some things that I miss, like the family gathering around the TV at certain times to watch the shows we all liked, and discussing "event" shows with friends the next day – for example: Chiller Theater with Bill Cardille, which was on Saturday late nights in Western PA. That being said, there's really no comparison. More TV is being produced now than at any other time. Yes, a lot of it's crap, but a lot of it's quite good too, and some of it's truly great. Whatever one's tastes are, there are a lot of options available. For my part, I most enjoy science fiction, horror, ufology and cryptology shows – and there's a ton of that stuff available nowadays. And when your mood strays to nostalgia, most shows you enjoyed growing up are readily available. For example, as I write this, I'm enjoying a great episode of M*A*S*H on Netflix.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

Nighthawk68 said:


> ... there is one thing I don't like about all the quantity, everybody has a tv show/series and they all have to compete, and the shows are getting less and less episodes per season. the gaps between episodes is crazy, especially in the Feb-May months, 4 months to show us 10-12 episodes. I am talking about CBS, NBC, ABC & FOX, with 20-22 episodes in a season, cable is even worse, 10-13 episodes per season, although they show them all in 10-13 weeks....
> 
> ...you could get into the show easier, you wouldn't forget what happened because it's been 5 weeks since the last episode...


I think it may have been obvious to some, and not to others, that about the time HD became the norm, that the 22-ep season spread out over September to June had two large problems:

1) built-in large gaps in any serialized storyline

2) too much pressure to make too many eps in too short of a time span.

By the time _Lost_ was in its middle seasons, it had become glaringly apparent that this was the case (although _Lost_ only had one clinker ep in the entire run). I would be willing to say that if _Lost_ was available to binge-watch at the time it aired, that the audience drop-off would not have happened at all, and it would be much more fondly remembered than it is. Much of the bashing of the ending is folks who stopped watching two seasons ago trying to validate that decision to themselves by boring the rest of us with that false opinion. For those who stuck with it, the ending was fine.

But I feel that TV has addressed a lot of these problems. Fewer shows have 22 eps, and those who do are usually vetted by the nets and producers as being capable of that. We get 22 eps of _Bluebloods_, because they are capable of giving us 22 quality episodes. We may get 10 eps of a cable series, because either the producers or the net or both realize that this is all the gas in that tank. To me, that is an improvement, and thanks, HBO, for showing everyone else the way. Seasonal arcs on cable of 10 followed by 6 seems to work well.

Also, we would not have reboots of shows like _The X-FIles_ if there were not the availability of short arcs. Neither Duchovny nor Anderson would have touched a 22-ep commitment, and that is a common attitude for a lot of talent when deciding what to take and what to avoid.

Shorter arcs fit better into the linear TV seasons, also. And creativity is not like a faucet that can be simply turned on and off at will. Also, stuff is less serialized, and serialized shows now include episodic elements so there is less pressure on remembering what happened 3 weeks ago.

So, I see these trends as generally a huge improvement.


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## pfp (Apr 28, 2009)

The technology is WAY better.
The percentage of decent shows is far lower today HOWEVER with the huge quantity of shows available now that low percentage turns out to be more good shows than there used to be. Alot of us are so busy weeding through all the garbage that this may be difficult to recognize.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

There is more, better TV now than ever before. There is also more bad TV too. There is more TV period!

There was a time when there was only a few networks... and many people didn't even have all 3 networks in their town! When I was a kid we had the "big 3" plus PBS... and that was it for a long time. There was good TV, but there was also bad TV.

Now there are hundreds of channels... even with all the reality TV and other things I don't like... there is so much more of the kind of shows I do like, it really isn't a fair comparison.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

When I was a kid:

No KardasiThings
No Real/Fake Housetramps
No Duggars
No Multi-spinoffs with the same name but different cites (L&O, CSI, NCIS, etc.)
A game show was a game show -- they didn't pretend to be 'dramas'.
Amateur hour competitions were named as such
Sports were limited to weekend afternoons for the most part.
Kiddie ball was not considered a sport - major leagues only were televised.
News was news - not opinion, conjecture or propaganda.


So, yeah, much better then.


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## 4HiMarks (Jan 21, 2004)

I'm going to concur with most of the previous posters. Better technology, more good shows, but more bad shows as well, making it difficult to find the wheat among the chaff. I still have boxes of VHS tapes buried in the basement, but if I tried to watch one, I would probably turn it off in horror within minutes.


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## Galaxie6411 (Aug 26, 2007)

Lets see when I was a kid we had 1 then 2 then finally 3 channels via rabbit ears. If I was lucky enough to stay at grandparents house they had some basic cable. Biggest TV's were under 30", looked awful, weighed a ton and cost a fortune.

Now I have HD in almost every channel, of which there are well over 100, I want, 50" TV that cost way under $1K and is put on the wall and I don't have to be home when a show airs to catch it AND watch all the commercials.

I can't stand practically the whole reality TV genre but that aside there are tons of good shows on networks like FX, AMC, A&E, USA, BBCA not to mention the premium cable channels. None of which were showing any kind of original programming when I was a kid. I've also now got just about every politically slanted news station I would want now. When I was a kid CNN and maybe a headline news was about all there was.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

People also forget... Reality TV isn't really a new thing.

When I was a kid, "That's Incredible" and "Real People" drew good numbers... that's in the 1970s... They also had those "Battle of the Network Stars" every year, with actors from the most popular network shows competing in track-like events. Before my time were shows like "This is Your Life" that qualify to me as Reality TV.

My point is... most things good or bad that there are a lot of now... there still were then, just not as many because there weren't as many channels and most channels when I was a kid still didn't have 24/7 programming. I don't remember how old I was when the local stations finally stopped signing off the air late at night.

I can't argue that there isn't a lot of crap... but I can argue there has always been crap. Go back to any year you think was the best year ever for TV and tell me that every single show on TV was high-quality must-see TV. It just wasn't. On the plus side, there's also a lot more good stuff than ever before. There are also still great things, if you look for them.

Even if the quantity/quality ratio has shifted in favor of quantity... I still bet any given year still has way more good shows than 50 years ago.

For what it's worth. The classics, stuff I really loved, are still good... many of them still hold up well today. But there's also an area of shows I remember as good when I was a kid, that do not hold up well at all when I watch them now. Some shows I thought were good then, were good by comparison to other options.... but compared to today's options, they aren't as good.


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## B Newt (Aug 12, 2007)

When I was a kid we only had 3 channels.



Sent from my iPhone using DBSTalk


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

Stewart Vernon said:


> People also forget... Reality TV isn't really a new thing.
> 
> When I was a kid, "That's Incredible" and "Real People" drew good numbers... that's in the 1970s... They also had those "Battle of the Network Stars" every year, with actors from the most popular network shows competing in track-like events.


Yeah, but you're talking about Cathy Lee Crosby, Sara Purcell and the likes of Jaclyn Smith, Joanna Pettet, Lynda Carter, Jane Seymour, Donna Mills, Cheryl Ladd ..........


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## Drucifer (Feb 12, 2009)

Dude111 said:


> Has TV got better or worse since you were younger..... In my opinion its MUCH WORSE!!
> 
> 1) Digital instead of analog (Not as nice an experience (Natural,etc))
> 2) CRAPPY PROGRAMMING!!!!!!! (Nothing worth watching)
> 3) OLDER SHOWS SHOWN DIGITALLY JUST ARE NOT THAT APPEALING TO ME....... (I prefer to see them how I saw them then OR NOT AT ALL) -- They were FINE on analog cable in the 80s


1) Disagree
2) Disagree
3) Disagree


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## TXD16 (Oct 30, 2008)

With very little effort, I'm able to watch, using any number of display options, pretty much everything that has ever appeared on television from it's first inception to the present (heck, I just watched an episode of Gigantor to prove this very point to myself), so I have to fall firmly on the side of worse, and better, and in-between---the choice is all mine, and that's a good thing.

TV is currently whatever one wants it to be.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

Stewart Vernon said:


> ... in the 1970s... (t)hey also had those "Battle of the Network Stars" every year, with actors from the most popular network shows competing in track-like events....





SayWhat? said:


> ...you're talking about Cathy Lee Crosby, Sara Purcell and the likes of Jaclyn Smith, Joanna Pettet, Lynda Carter, Jane Seymour, Donna Mills, Cheryl Ladd ..........


Jan Smithers, in her 1979 Battle of the Network Stars appearance, looked even more enticing in a bathing suit than she did on the back of a motorbike a decade earlier. And digitally enhanced too.










http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0376504/?ref_=nm_flmg_slf_3


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

We can argue that much of TV is better. We can argue that much of TV is worse. But even if the percentage of crap has become a larger part of the pie (which is not necessarily the well-held opinion), the pie is exponentially larger, which means that there is more good, better TV available to fill whatever hours any person can muster up to watch TV in. So from the point of view of "what is available for me to watch in the few hours I have to watch TV?" the bottom line is that there is unquestionably more good TV available, and covering many more niches rather than just mainstream. There can be no argument there.

20 years ago there were 3 cop shows on during the last hour of prime time, sort of like a choice between coke, pepsi, and RC cola. You might find one you liked better, but you might not find one you liked at all. But those were your limited choices. The "least objectionable program" theory was alive and well. When the choices go from 3 cop shows to 200 linear shows and 1000 streaming shows at any one time period 24/7/365 (a concept that doesn't even make sense when streaming is all VOD), the only way that our choices can be worse if is all 1200 of those shows and the other 400 you have on your DVR are worse than those 3 cop shows. Odds are heavily against that.

When I worked for cable TV we got Showtime, HBO, Cinemax, and The Movie Channel for free, and I could watch every movie that came out, and most of them were good. And not that many came out, so I could watch them all. Now I disagree that the percentage of crap is significantly higher in TV, but I agree completely that it is significantly higher in movies. In 1980 maybe 3 movies came out a week. Now maybe a dozen come out in a day. And 99% of them are direct-to-video crap.

I subscribe for some shows, but not for movies. It seems like if I check what's on during any of those free previews, most of what is on pay TV really is crap, and I can barely find one thing in a 4-day free weekend that I would even think of watching. It is almost as if the free preview is there to remind us how bad these services have become, at least as far as the movies they carry.

And that underlines another trend that implies that TV is better, which is that the talent has migrated from movies to television. While there are still major blockbusters that are successful and high-quality, TV used to be the red-headed step-child that only actors who could not make it in the movies would have to stoop to. Now it is almost the opposite. The web might even be a home for weak talent and still a better choice than most movies. Bad web stuff still gets tons of hits, while bad movies are not seen by very many people at all, so the web is a better career move, also.


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## MysteryMan (May 17, 2010)

It's called the cookie cutter approach. If a TV show is a success Hollywood's next step is to clone it and franchise it. Examples: Five versions of Law & Order, four versions of CSI, three versions of NCIS, ect., ect., ect. As for movies, there are tens of thousands in the studio libraries yet the major movie channels basically broadcast the same types of movies. For years the order of the day for Hollywood movies has been throw in a well known leading male, compliment him with some t*** and ass, and mix with a heavy dose of violence and special effects. This is not to say good movies with creative writing don't come our way. They do. Unfortunately they are a rarity in Hollywood when once they were the norm.


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## SamC (Jan 20, 2003)

B Newt said:


> When I was a kid we only had 3 channels.
> 
> THIS. /thread.
> 
> ...


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

"And sports? Weekend afternoons and Monday night football ONLY. Nothing else. "

HUGE positive for back then. Less sports is always better.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Are you simply trolling here? 

You do know you can create a custom list with no sports whatsoever. 

Fewer choices are not a good thing.


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

Laxguy said:


> Are you simply trolling here?
> 
> You do know you can create a custom list with no sports whatsoever.
> 
> Fewer choices are not a good thing.


I believe that he has turned off TV all together based on some of his posts in the last couple of months.


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## Eddie501 (Nov 29, 2007)

TV is both better & worse. You just have to change the way you watch. If you just sit in your easy chair & channel surf, of course all your going to see if the garbage reality programming that permeates basic cable. Punctuated by about 9 Progressive commercials per hour.

But there is a lot of great programming out there, it's just fracturing from the traditional cable/network platforms. I have been surprised at much more I enjoy TV once I ditched cable & went all streaming/OTA. Tivo/Netlfix/HBO Now/Amazon Prime/itunes is like having a very streamlined version of cable without the cost & commercials.

And I wonder about the guy who said HD has worse colors & picture. Do you have your TV hooked up wrong?


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

Eddie501 said:


> And I wonder about the guy who said HD has worse colors & picture. Do you have your TV hooked up wrong?


I remember when DBS satellite receivers had "S-video" connections in the late 1990s, and customers would have me switch them back to the chanel 3/4 RF modulator because the colors looked washed out to them.


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## mike1977 (Aug 26, 2005)

It's worse today. I remember the variety of different shows on a certain channel during a day.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Eddie501 said:


> And I wonder about the guy who said HD has worse colors & picture. Do you have your TV hooked up wrong?


I have avoided this thread because it seems to be more heat than light ... but I understand to a point the quality issue being raised. Perhaps it is just a memory issue ... I seem to recall a clearer picture 30 years ago than I get today on some channels. I certainly do not remember it being as horrible as "good" SD is today.

In the days of old before HD was available we watched 525 line SD broadcast via NTSC or recorded in formats that were output by the players in NTSC. And it looked good. People would buy 60" rear projection televisions and somehow they looked good. At work I would project SD on 40 ft screens in lecture halls when movies were shown to students and it looked good. Those are the memories I have.

There were days when it looked bad ... if one was watching a video tape recorded on the six hour setting the picture quality was less than the two hour setting. The picture was still acceptable. OTA suffered from reception problems that added static to the picture. But one could watch a marginal signal and forget or forgive the quality issues if one was interested in the content. Betters antennas including analog CATV helped improve OTA channel reception.

Now SD is less detailed than it once was ... ATSC SD is 640x480 or 720x480. Digital systems cut that down even more for compression. The best digital SD today would be on a source that maintained the old NTSC standards and transmitted every bit of that information to the monitor. Players set to 480i or 480p are below the NTSC standards - so an output of 720p or 1080i on an upconverting player would give the best picture.

I have seen some good remasters of old content that blows my socks off compared to memory. I have also seen some 480i remasters that simply blows. I can understand, especially compared to perfect memory, why a person would long for the old days of clean NTSC signals. We have lost something in the translation to 480i SD ... and that something is quality.

(The best remasters I have seen in SD were on DVD via an NTSC output ... no 480i steps in the process. With the right sources HD or at least better than NTSC remastering is possible.)


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

BTW: The quality of the programming is a separate question from picture quality. We seem to have a lot more junk on television but I am not sure it is more junk as a percentage. Unfortunately perfect memory comes into play ... and while we reminise about how lineups were better by remembering the best shows such as Dragnet, Bonanaza, Gilligan's Island and Car 54 Where Are You? we likely forget all the junk shows also shown.

Tolerance seems to change with age ... rewatching some of the programs I watched as a child and loved now I see how corny and thin the plots and performances were. The network's tolerance has also changed. A show that could have run a decade in the old days may get dropped before the 13 episode trial buy finishes airing. Society has changed its standards as well ... and with so many more outlets to compete with and more instant feedback on how well a show is accepted the networks are willing to make quicker changes.

Today one can tweet and blog and discuss a show in real time and Neilson ratings are overnight if not more immediate. Back in the day one could write a letter about a show or if it was really bad some would pay for an expensive long distance call to the network to complain. Or call their local affiliate (which may be a local call). Instamt feed back leads to faster reactions.

We probably have more good programming on TV now than in days of old ... we also have a lot more junk filling time - and a lot more time and channels to fill.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

mike1977 said:


> It's worse today. I remember the variety of different shows on a certain channel during a day.


What part(s) is/are worse today? Can you cite some specifics please?


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

The main big advantage to analog and one I *****ed about losing after the switch was the ability to see a weak signal. Whether it was a distant signal that only came in sometimes or a signal degraded by weather, at least you could still watch it.

Now, it's either there or not. There is no in between.

*HUGE* negative for now.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

MysteryMan said:


> This is not to say good movies with creative writing don't come our way. They do. Unfortunately they are a rarity in Hollywood when once they were the norm.


Without a lot of effort, it's really easy to look up and find bad movies in any era. As time passes, you tend to only remember the best movies OR the very worst... the average-to-bad stuff fades from your memory... so you'll remember those "good old days" as having better movies. But they really didn't.

Growing up in the 1970s, there was rarely a movie I really wanted to see. There were good movies, don't get me wrong... there just weren't that many must-see movies coming out on a regular basis. As time goes by, and more movies are being made per year... that number increases, to where I find myself today wanting to watch more movies. There are a lot more bad movies now too... but a lot more good ones as well.

They might be just as rare (the good ones) as they ever were... but I don't think they are appreciably rarer than they ever were. There's just more noise out there too.


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## B Newt (Aug 12, 2007)

For 2 years in Norway we didn't have TV. My dad brought our old RCA TV over there. He didn't realize that American TV's don't work in Europe. Our next door neighbors had a TV, that got only one channel. Only show I remember is some Robin Hood show. This was back in 1960 or earlier.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

James Long said:


> ...Now SD is less detailed than it once was ... ATSC SD is 640x480 or 720x480. Digital systems cut that down even more for compression. The best digital SD today would be on a source that maintained the old NTSC standards and transmitted every bit of that information to the monitor. Players set to 480i or 480p are below the NTSC standards...


Much of what you have said in your posts is true and insighful, and many of us agree; those points are well taken.

But nothing here is factually accurate, I am afraid. SD is not "less detailed" than it once was. The resolution, while technically exactly the same as it was originally, is much better perceptibly, because many of the things that can degrade that resolution are no longer there in the chain doing that. The same can be said for the color gamut, the gamma response, and the accuracy of the grey-scale response. All of those things contribute to NTSC SD being much more detailed than it ever was before.

A master analog 1" tape of a program in 1995 was significantly more detailed than what the delivery system could manage to bring us, because that delivery system significantly degraded detail as well as everything else. But that pristine tape, before becoming significantly degraded on the way to your living room, still was far and away less detailed than the state of the art of SD today.

That master tape which had an actual resolution of 480 lines had a perceived resolution of about 425 lines when viewed on a professional reference montor. By the time it got through a transmitter, the highest possible theoretical effective resolution was 336 lines, just over 300 in practice. By the time it got to your TV screen, the perceived resolution was approximately 290 lines or lower, even assuming good technique by cable TV delivery (which was not assumed to be good all that often) and by the time it was recorded on VHS and played back, the resolution was about 220 lines, and maybe a lot less than that if there were anything not perfectly aligned anywhere in that chain. Extended recordings (anything not recorded at the highest "speed") were lucky to have 160 lines of rez.

Plus there were other things affecting quality like convergence resolution error, interlace scan line jitter, tape dropout, impulse noise artifacts, and weak audio production. On cable, stereo was typically demoted to mono, and the close proximity of the aural carrier to the upper adjacent visual carrier meant that the already-poor S/N ratio was lowered another 15 dB. Every audio track that came from cable TV at that time had audible hiss in it, something we have not heard now for over a decade. It's gone, like polio.

SD today typically comes from an HD production chain, and since it is HD, it is also digital, meaning that there is no degradation whatsoever in detail or in anything else. When you centercut a 1080i or 720p signal (which is how cable and sat bring you SD channels since they no longer exist to be picked out of the air), the resolution is 640 x 480. Period. And that is delivered digitally to you, so it does not degrade further. That, along with the absence of legacy analog delivery artifacts, makes the effective perceived resolution very close to 480.

And there are no visible scan lines, and no scan line jitter. And no tape dropouts, and no satellite impulse noise. It is significantly more detailed than any SD delivered to any customer before HD and digital broadcasting, and it has significantly fewer artifacts degrading it. And it looks pretty darned good. The difference between how good SD looks today compared to how it looked 20 years ago is huge, and much huger than the difference between how modern SD looks compared to modern HD, today. Digital and HD (Its role in the production and delivery chain) is the best thing that ever happened to NTSC. It just mostly happened as part of the process of replacing it.

Also, digital DCT-style compression does not reduce detail (at least since there are now enough bits to not do that on purpose). As employed today it preserves detail nearly perfectly, and it preserves it much better than any analog process ever could, or ever did. Digital has its own set of artifacts, and issues, but loss of detail is not among them.

"Players" from the analog era are the ones never able to even come close to the NTSC standard. Extended Beta, SuperBeta, SuperVHS, all did have better resolution capability, but they were still degrading content that arrived in them at about 290 lines of rez, down to something even lower than that. Players today come exceptionally close to the original standard. A modern DVDR does SD 16:9 remarkably well, with nearly full 480i resolution and very few artifacts. And full stereo with no hiss.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

TomCat said:


> All of those things contribute to NTSC SD being much more detailed than it ever was before.


I was comparing the best NTSC SD to the best ATSC SD. If one starts with a better source (film or HD) one can certainly master decent or better than decent NTSC SD content. I dispute that digital SD is as good as the best NTSC SD available ... especially as people receive their SD through providers that compress or further reduce the quality of that signal.

Broadcast ATSC SD subchannels are notoriously bit starved, The only one that I have seen that matched what I would see from an NTSC SD DVD on OTA was a local station that dedicated 8.94 Mbps to their SD subchannels. I caught one station that had one 14.94 Mbps SD channel on their ATSC feed. 4 Mbps to less than 2 Mbps is more common OTA.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

If it wasn't for crappy movies, there would never have been a Mystery Science Theater 3000.


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## Number Six (Aug 7, 2011)

Well, back then I was watching _The Dukes of Hazzard_, _Knight Rider_ and _Buck Rogers_, and now it's the likes of _House of Cards_, _Homeland_, _Fargo_ and _The Strain_. Maybe those are kids shows vs. adult shows to some extent, but TV is unquestionably in a different league now. Anyway, I still like to get out my _Buck Rogers_ DVDs sometimes.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

Worse. Too many reality shows, murder and killing shows, comedies that deal with politics, sexual issues, cheating.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SeaBeagle said:


> Worse. Too many reality shows, murder and killing shows, comedies that deal with politics, sexual issues, cheating.


Those topics were covered on the popular shows in the 60's such as Star Trek. The Twilight Zone, Dragnet and other shows were not afraid of making statements about current events. Comedies such as Mary Tyler Moore, The Smothers Brothers and Laugh In did not stay away from current events.

The shows were less graphic, in keeping with the television standards of the time. Current shows show more "blood and gore" than back in the day (does every crime show need a discussion over a dead body cut open in an autopsy room). Even the later shows like Quincy, M.E. that focused on a medical examiner managed to pass on the blood and gore aspects of the science of autopsies.


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## hookemfins (Jul 3, 2007)

TV is better today IMO. While the quality of network programming has declined, except in a few cases, the better shows are on non traditional networks (HBO, Showtime, FX, TBS and streaming services). I also love more games on TV. Picture quality is awesome. The DVR is tremendously better than VCR tapes. 


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

James Long said:


> I was comparing the best NTSC SD to the best ATSC SD. If one starts with a better source (film or HD) one can certainly master decent or better than decent NTSC SD content. I dispute that digital SD is as good as the best NTSC SD available ... especially as people receive their SD through providers that compress or further reduce the quality of that signal.
> 
> Broadcast ATSC SD subchannels are notoriously bit starved, The only one that I have seen that matched what I would see from an NTSC SD DVD on OTA was a local station that dedicated 8.94 Mbps to their SD subchannels. I caught one station that had one 14.94 Mbps SD channel on their ATSC feed. 4 Mbps to less than 2 Mbps is more common OTA.


The "best" ATSC SD is channels created by sat or cable from OTA or sat networks that they receive via backhaul. In either case, those are already _digitally-encoded and delivered, _and compressed at a 100:1 ratio, meaning that 99% of the data is thrown away before delivery to them, and the other 1% has to provide the clues for your STB decoder to make educated guesses about how to reconstruct the missing 99%.

The "best" NTSC SD that consumers have ever had access to is either these _digitally-encoded _channels converted to analog locally and sent to analog inputs on a TV or DVDR, or NTSC SD from a DVDR using an HD source as its input. It is compressed to the same degree.

But 99.99% of the NTSC that consumers were exposed to in the past was very significantly lacking in quality compared to either of those current options.

Bottom line, NTSC from 2015 is a lot better than NTSC from 10 years ago, and even more better than NTSC from 20 years ago. In nearly every possible way.

If you are speaking of "available" as "available to consumers", digital SD beats analog SD hands down, simply because of the degradations it suffers during delivery. They start out about the same. The only thing different about digital SD from analog SD is that analog SD must be delivered by analog, or it is digital SD by definition. And the delivery by analog is where it gets ugly, which is why no one delivers SD by analog methods anymore, which is only one of a number of reasons why SD today is better than ever.

The obvious takeaway here is that delivered analog NTSC SD is NOT AVAILABLE TO COMPARE TO ANYTHING ANYMORE. You can dispute all day that digital SD is as good as the best NTSC SD available, but that is an empty meaningless argument, because NTSC SD IS NOT AVAILABLE; it longer exists in the world of "available" media, unless you create it yourself using your STB, DVR, or DVDR. And that NTSC SD is not delivered NTSC and not available as acquired content. Even if it were, it comes from, you guessed it, _originally-delivered digital content._

Modern compression does not degrade the signal very much at all, and it does not affect resolution at all, and never really has. You need to be closer than about 7 ft from a 60" screen to see compression artifacts today, and most folks sit 12 ft from a 50" screen. And if you were to sit 7 ft from a 60" screen displaying analog SD in 1995, you would not like it at all, and would wonder why anyone would even want to sit this close to a screen that large. Compression technique technology has enjoyed a large improvement from even a decade ago, and it has improved mostly for SD, because HD was already pretty good while SD had much room for improvement. Back then the SD chains were mostly analog SD rather than digital SD or HD.

Also, statmux is now common for local TV stations with subchannels.

It is very common to have 3 subchannels at 2.4 mbps each, and one main channel at 12 mbps, with statmux, and have plenty of bits to encode without obvious artifacts except on statistically rare occasions (a few seconds per hour). With statmux, if a stream with 2.4 mbps dedicated to it needs 5 mbps to avoid artifacts, it typically gets it right when it needs it, borrowed from the other streams which only need their allocated bits sporadically rather than continuously. The dynamic nature of how many bits it takes from moment to moment to encode without artifacts allows this. And there are absolutely no artifacts, or loss of resolution for that matter, when there is minimal movement in the picture, which is what makes the extra bits available for the other streams. That is much better than it used to be just a few years ago. Subchannels are rarely bit-starved anymore. They were notoriously bit-starved, but now, they just aren't.

The one thing you are right about is that if one starts with a better quality source, one can create better deliverable good content. That is the first tenet of digital compression technique. It also applies to analog content, but not really for video, because there is no analog content available other than AM and FM radio. And that is also a large reason why SD today is better than SD from the past. The source material (because it was acquired digitally) is better to begin with, and then it is also delivered digitally, which prevents degradation.

What really contributes to bad SD on subchannels is that the original content is typically from bad SD source material, because it is video (even if originally shot on film), and old, and never preserved well or archived well. Blame that, instead of compression, because that is why.

Bad compression technique can indeed degrade quality, but that is mostly theoretical anymore, because no one doing that professionally has any reason not to use good technique. That industry is mature and no longer has any bad technique. The bits to do it are also typically available, even for a local TV station with subchannels. But to support your argument, if the content is poorly-archived to begin with, compression or digital delivery will not be able to make it any better. But an ep of _Green Acres _will still look better delivered today than it ever could have looked in 1965, _because it is delivered digitally. Its digital SD._

And these are not ideas based in opinion. Instead, they are the facts.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

James Long said:


> Those topics were covered on the popular shows in the 60's such as Star Trek. The Twilight Zone, Dragnet and other shows were not afraid of making statements about current events. Comedies such as Mary Tyler Moore, The Smothers Brothers and Laugh In did not stay away from current events.
> 
> The shows were less graphic, in keeping with the television standards of the time. Current shows show more "blood and gore" than back in the day (does every crime show need a discussion over a dead body cut open in an autopsy room). Even the later shows like Quincy, M.E. that focused on a medical examiner managed to pass on the blood and gore aspects of the science of autopsies.


 I got HD in 2003, on a 60" Sony (cost me about $3800). _CSI _had been on since 2000. But I remember the first autopsy I saw on _CSI _in HD was pretty jarring, and made me realize that HD was playing for keeps. It was a "Whoa!...let me back up a few feet" reaction. Still, not nearly as jarring as actual autopsy video playing that I happened to pass by in a medical library in 1992 (and that was on SD Umatic cassette on a little 15" CRT). The poor guy on the table had been cut down like a turkey two days after Thanksgiving. Still chilling. _Hannibal _is _Three's Company_ by comparison.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

TomCat said:


> The obvious takeaway here is that delivered analog NTSC SD is NOT AVAILABLE TO COMPARE TO ANYTHING ANYMORE.


As I previously noted, the closest one can come to NTSC SD is via DVD ... a digital transmission (via disk) that is converted into an NTSC signal or component in one's own home. Better DVD players are available that upconvert DVD quality to HD (as best as possible).

If a HD channel on cable, satellite or even broadcast starts with a well mastered DVD it is going to look fairly good. Obviously not as good as if they used a well mastered HD source ... but a lot better than any SD delivery via cable, satellite or broadcast - thanks to the corruption added by retransmission.

I wish I could set up a perfect side by side test ... but that would involve opinion. Pepsi vs Coke lives on in the daily opinions we express where similar products are compared and equally emotional arguments are made for both sides. At the end of the day it comes down to opinion ... and a few people who claim that it is a "fact" that their soda tastes better.


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## Jaspear (May 16, 2004)

All of these NTSC SD vs HD posts reminds me of the one major complaint I had about "Mad Men". Every single time the producers put a TV in a scene, the picture on the TV displayed multipath ghosting distortion, horizontal rolling, or both. Every. Single. Time.

I watched a lot of TV in the 1950's and 60's and while there was occasional ghosting and rolling, they were nowhere near 100% of the time. They could have used Tom Cat as a technical consultant.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Jaspear said:


> All of these NTSC SD vs HD posts reminds me of the one major complaint I had about "Mad Men". Every single time the producers put a TV in a scene, the picture on the TV displayed multipath ghosting distortion, horizontal rolling, or both. Every. Single. Time.
> 
> I watched a lot of TV in the 1950's and 60's and while there was occasional ghosting and rolling, they were nowhere near 100% of the time. They could have used Tom Cat as a technical consultant.


Yes!

I did not notice same while watching (every single episode)! Now I will look for same when I get around to redoing it in a few years. I usually notice such things. Dang!


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

Jaspear said:


> All of these NTSC SD vs HD posts reminds me of the one major complaint I had about "Mad Men". Every single time the producers put a TV in a scene, the picture on the TV displayed multipath ghosting distortion, horizontal rolling, or both. Every. Single. Time.
> 
> I watched a lot of TV in the 1950's and 60's and while there was occasional ghosting and rolling, they were nowhere near 100% of the time. They could have used Tom Cat as a technical consultant.


I think the lines on the TV screens that were rolling was actually the fact that the camera and the TV were synched to such to cause it, even tho our eyes would not see it if we were not looking at it thru a camera lens. 
Kinda like the fact that our cameras in our cell phones and laptops can actually see the IR signal that our remotes put out when we press the button and we can not see it.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

James Long said:


> Those topics were covered on the popular shows in the 60's such as Star Trek. The Twilight Zone, Dragnet and other shows were not afraid of making statements about current events. Comedies such as Mary Tyler Moore, The Smothers Brothers and Laugh In did not stay away from current events.
> 
> The shows were less graphic, in keeping with the television standards of the time. Current shows show more "blood and gore" than back in the day (does every crime show need a discussion over a dead body cut open in an autopsy room). Even the later shows like Quincy, M.E. that focused on a medical examiner managed to pass on the blood and gore aspects of the science of autopsies.


This she shows were not the greatest.

Shows like the game shows were fun like Password, To Tell the Truth, I've Got a Secret, the Names the Same.

There were good music shoes like Dinah Shore Hour, Alan Young Show, Jack Benny Programme, The Jimmy Durante Show.

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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

I appreciated the Henry Mancini orchestrated opening themes. And we knew the lyrics to all the great theme songs.

The weather started getting rough
The tiny ship was tossed
If not for the courage of the fearless crew
The Minnow would be lost
The Minnow would be lost.

Branded,
marked as the one who ran
What do you do when you're branded,
but you know you're a man?


And, honest to God, the first 45 record I ever bought:

Who is the tall, dark stranger there?
Maverick is the name.
Ridin' the trail to who knows where,
Luck is his companion,
Gamblin's his game.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

SeaBeagle said:


> Shows like the game shows were fun like Password, To Tell the Truth, I've Got a Secret, the Names the Same.
> 
> There were good music shoes like Dinah Shore Hour, Alan Young Show, Jack Benny Programme, The Jimmy Durante Show.


 Yes, good shows all. But isn't that nostalgia more than anything else?


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

AntAltMike said:


> I appreciated the Henry Mancini orchestrated opening themes. And we knew the lyrics to all the great theme songs.
> 
> The weather started getting rough
> The tiny ship was tossed
> ...


I believe those are also known as "Hooks". They hook you in by constantly repeating the same thing all the time so that it gets stuck / hooked into your head.

I failed to mention the sounds. Someone earlier mentioned the analog mono sounds we used to get. Now we have stereo and then the AVR.
Holey Moley what a difference the AVR can make to a program / movie. The Dolby Digital 5.1 is awesome and some sets do even higher sound schemes / themes.


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## Cholly (Mar 22, 2004)

I'm probably the really old guy here.IMHO, TV broadcast quality is greatly improved, but the quality of programming for the most part has gone downhill

I grew up in Chicago, and while in high school in the 1940's, I worked part time for a local radio and appliance dealer. As I recall, they carried two TV sets at the time. Both of them were 7 inch models, one by Motorola and the other by Hallicrafters. There was one TV station initially, WBKB - owned by the Balaban & Katz theater chain. One of the programs they aired was "Kukla, Fran And Ollie", which later appeared on network TV.

By 1946 or 1947, NBC had acquired WBKB. My next door neighbor had a 10 inch TV and I'd get invited over to see comedy shows like Milton Berle or Ed Wynn, which were kinescope recordings, since national cable transmission lines weren't completed until 1948. In those early years, TV stations relied upon local live programming or film.

Fast forward to the mid 1950's. Color TV began to appear and in 1956, NBC's Chicago station, WNBQ, became the first station in the country to broadcast all locally originated programs in color. Musical and variety shows became the staple of live prime time color broadcasting on the networks, to be joined later by such filmed shows as "Star Trek", "Battlestar Galacttica", "Dallas", etc. Today, live programming seems to be limited to sporting events, news oriented programs and some talk shows.

An article in today's Charlotte Observer celebrated the 15th anniversary of "Survivor", which is credited with having changed TV programming forever by introducing us to "Reality TV" :raspberry


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

I grew up 75 Miles South of Chicago, but my family wasn't the first in town to get a TV. My dad said "After we get a dishwasher" (But I thought, 'we already have one, Mom!' but didn't say it) . My cousins had the first set I regularly saw, and many days we'd gather to watch Howdy Doody, and I think, possibly the first drunk on TV, Buffalo Bob. 

While there's way more junk than all programming of 50 years ago, there's also more quality than all of the programming back then. I'd rather have 20% of 300 than 100% of 4.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

jimmie57 said:


> I think the lines on the TV screens that were rolling was actually the fact that the camera and the TV were synched to such to cause it, even tho our eyes would not see it if we were not looking at it thru a camera lens.
> Kinda like the fact that our cameras in our cell phones and laptops can actually see the IR signal that our remotes put out when we press the button and we can not see it.


Some phones. iPhones don't. Galaxys do.

I have to agree with Jaspear; if they did that then they sort of hit us over the head with it, and it is less than realistic (but how realistic was MM?). Just because you can create an effect doesn't mean you should use it until people are annoyed by it. And they did create that effect, because simply shooting a TV screen with a film camera or even a video camera would have just been a constant mess. An effect that goes in and out would only be possible if it were an effect that was created in post.

And honestly, I am not sure how you would do that. Anything after 1953 has the same scan rate as the one you are using when you shoot modern HD video (59.94), but that might not be enough to make it appear on camera properly, even if you genlock the camera to the TV. If MM was shot on film, instead of video (it might have been--I never watched it) It would have been easiest to key that effect in during post-production.

I did hear that all of the "video" monitors on _Star Trek The Motion Picture _had to be done with actual film projectors synced to the Panavision cam, which was a technical nightmare. And it was so loud they had to loop in all of the actors' lines afterwards, and Foley in all of the footsteps and the like. I guess you couldn't add that FX stuff in post back in 1979.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

Cholly said:


> ...An article in today's Charlotte Observer celebrated the 15th anniversary of "Survivor", which is credited with having changed TV programming forever by introducing us to "Reality TV" :raspberry


Credited by them, at least. When _Survivor _premiered, I don't remember it feeling like it was "something new"; it seemed like just _another _reality show. Did this revered newspaper happen to mention _An American Family_, which is considered by many to be the first actual "reality" show, on PBS in 1973?


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

James Long said:


> As I previously noted, the closest one can come to NTSC SD is via DVD ... a digital transmission (via disk) that is converted into an NTSC signal or component in one's own home. Better DVD players are available that upconvert DVD quality to HD (as best as possible).
> 
> If a HD channel on cable, satellite or even broadcast starts with a well mastered DVD it is going to look fairly good. Obviously not as good as if they used a well mastered HD source ... but a lot better than any SD delivery via cable, satellite or broadcast - thanks to the corruption added by retransmission.
> 
> I wish I could set up a perfect side by side test ... but that would involve opinion. Pepsi vs Coke lives on in the daily opinions we express where similar products are compared and equally emotional arguments are made for both sides. At the end of the day it comes down to opinion ... and a few people who claim that it is a "fact" that their soda tastes better.


I agree with you completely.

But, there are some of us that can actually distinguish fact from opinion. I find that to be key to actually understanding the technical world; its an attribute that my profession relies upon completely. The laws of physics are not an opinion. How TV works is not opinion. What it looks like to us, is.

And facts always trump opinion when there are facts in opposition to opinion. Opinion can never win against facts. Facts immediately and completely invalidate opinion that is disproved by them.

But there are not always facts available, either. There are actually objective measurement techniques that come very close to being a metric for quality of service, and they are good enough to be relied upon. But they are actually still opinion, because what we see and hear and experience is always subjective.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

> celebrated the 15th anniversary of "Survivor", which is credited with having changed TV programming forever by introducing us to "Reality TV"


Which it isn't.

It's a game show. A group of contestants facing challenges and elimination in pursuit of a cash prize.


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## bidger (Nov 19, 2005)

AntAltMike said:


> If it wasn't for crappy movies, there would never have been a Mystery Science Theater 3000.


You bet. And on a related note, an off-shoot of MST3K called "RiffTrax" did the "Star Wars Holiday Special" that someone recorded on VHS over a Baltimore CBS affiliate. The commercials were left intact and there were several for CBS shows. In a word everyone of them was horrible. When the show aired in 1978 I had a TV (portable B&W), but the only shows I watched on a regular basis was "Monty Python" on PBS, SNL on NBC, and Sports. As has been already stated, the options we have for programming is truly mind-boggling. For the most part, even old shows are available for those stuck in yesteryear.

And as someone who's been on these boards for awhile it's not surprising that Dude111 and SayWhat? agree on this topic.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

Laxguy said:


> Yes, good shows all. But isn't that nostalgia more than anything else?


No just good shows. Can still be seen in some places.

Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

AntAltMike said:


> If it wasn't for crappy movies, there would never have been a Mystery Science Theater 3000.


Well, that just gave me an idea. CBS can run _Cyber _on Sunday or whatever day of the week, and then on Saturday they can do a MST3K version of the rerun.

And maybe there are some other shows that make you want to throw a brick through your TV. There is a rich cornucopia of WTF material that could provide fodder for those 3 guys.

If rights were not an issue, this probably would have already happened. You could also do this with FNC, 24/7/365.


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## djlong (Jul 8, 2002)

Anyone who thinks that old analog is better than today's digital is either trolling or looking at the past through some VERY rose-colored nostalgia glasses.

Remember rabbit ears? Remember snow? Remember having to tweak the horizontal and vertical hold knobs? Remember having to touch the antenna to get a clearer signal? Remember the constant fritzing during every thunderstorm as every lightning strike within 20 miles produce an EMP-like disturbance to TV signals? Remember sets with edges so rounded you lost most of the 4 corners of your picture?

No? Well I do - and I lived in cities where we DID get more than 3 channels. I remember watching the 1968 Olympics in washed-out faded color on those crappy 1960s-era sets.

Today? Yes, there's more crap on TV. There are also a couple hundred channels to fill plus the Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Yahoo and more.. For every "Roots" on TV back then, there were dozens of "My Mother The Car". We tend to forget the lousy stuff. Go back and look at any Billboard Top 40 list for your favorite year and you'll see the songs you remember and love outnumbered by *crap* by a wide margin. Our memories are very selective. I have a book that describes this: "The Good Old Days - They Were Terrible!"

Tell me what network 'in the golden age' or even in the 1970s would put on "Game of Thrones" or "Nurse Jackie" or "Outlander" or virtually ANY of the series that come from HBO, Starz and Showtime. Tell me what network would have financed "House of Cards" or "Orange is the New Black". Mad Men? Falling Skies? West Wing?

The networks back then had Star Trek, cancelled it and it was independents that paid for 2 more series (and a net-let that financed another) totalling 18 seasons of television beyond the 3 that NBC did.

I can only think of one network series from 'back then' that would not make it on a network today under any circumstances - All in the Family. I'm not sure that any pay service would tackle race issues the way Norman Lear did back then.


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## MysteryMan (May 17, 2010)

That's because Norman Lear didn't have to be concerned with being Politically Correct.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

> Tell me what network 'in the golden age' or even in the 1970s would put on "Game of Thrones" or "Nurse Jackie" or "Outlander" or virtually ANY of the series that come from HBO, Starz and Showtime. Tell me what network would have financed "House of Cards" or "Orange is the New Black". Mad Men? Falling Skies? West Wing?


None.

Another PLUS for then.


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## Jaspear (May 16, 2004)

djlong said:


> Anyone who thinks that old analog is better than today's digital is either trolling or looking at the past through some VERY rose-colored nostalgia glasses.
> 
> Remember rabbit ears? Remember snow? Remember having to tweak the horizontal and vertical hold knobs? Remember having to touch the antenna to get a clearer signal? Remember the constant fritzing during every thunderstorm as every lightning strike within 20 miles produce an EMP-like disturbance to TV signals? Remember sets with edges so rounded you lost most of the 4 corners of your picture?
> 
> No? Well I do - and I lived in cities where we DID get more than 3 channels. I remember watching the 1968 Olympics in washed-out faded color on those crappy 1960s-era sets.


Well, as I mentioned, those "Mad Men" guys certainly did remember.  But while all of those pre integrated circuit analogue quirks existed, they were hardly bad enough to prevent millions of people from their daily TV watching binge.

It certainly was a different experience. When the TV's vertical or horizontal hold went berserk, it was a trip to the tube tester at the hardware store. If that didn't fix it, then a call to the neighborhood TV repair man was in order, who showed up in your home to work on the TV and hopefully was able to fix it on that visit. The worst was the dreaded "it has to go to the shop" diagnosis. No TV, cold turkey for a week, maybe longer if too many of your neighbors TV's were in line ahead of yours. Not good. No "Outer Limits", "Batman" or Ed Sullivan that week.


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## B Newt (Aug 12, 2007)

SeaBeagle said:


> This she shows were not the greatest.
> 
> Shows like the game shows were fun like Password, To Tell the Truth, I've Got a Secret, the Names the Same.
> 
> ...


Don't forget the great game show called Video Village.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

djlong said:


> Anyone who thinks that old analog is better than today's digital is either trolling or looking at the past through some VERY rose-colored nostalgia glasses.
> 
> Remember rabbit ears? Remember snow? Remember having to tweak the horizontal and vertical hold knobs? Remember having to touch the antenna to get a clearer signal? Remember the constant fritzing during every thunderstorm as every lightning strike within 20 miles produce an EMP-like disturbance to TV signals? Remember sets with edges so rounded you lost most of the 4 corners of your picture?
> 
> ...


I remember having only a few channels and having to get up to change the channel. Oh yes on the black and white screened TV.

Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

Jaspear said:


> ...When the TV's vertical or horizontal hold went berserk, it was a trip to the tube tester at the hardware store. If that didn't fix it, then a call to the neighborhood TV repair man was in order, who showed up in your home to work on the TV and hopefully was able to fix it on that visit. The worst was the dreaded "it has to go to the shop" diagnosis...


Back in those days the TV repairman carried a case with 6 different vacuum tubes in it. That was about it. All they really did was replace tubes until the problem went away, and since all TVs used some combination of those 6 off-the-shelf tubes, and tubes got old and wore out, they had pretty good odds of success doing just that. That, and probably blowing the grit out of your mechanical tuner contacts with some sort of chemically-dangerous aerosol. But of course a lot more could eventually go wrong, and then....."it has to go into the shop".

This meant that to do service calls in the field for TVs meant you needed less actual education and training than the guy who delivered the milk. Our guy was a PTSD-hobbled Korean war vet (back then it was referred to as "shell-shock") who was probably a radio operator in the service, which began his illustrious career. He was one of my dad's back patients. "Pooley" had a great personality, too; I was never more entertained by anyone visiting us than him. To a 4-year old, that tube case was a case full of wonder. I sometimes wonder how much these early impressions influenced my choice of career.

One day when our set had "gone into the shop" and sadly died on the table and hadn't survived, Pooley showed up with something he called a "Space Command". This was essentially a Zenith remote control with four buttons and four cylindrical metal bars suspended inside, with a wire grate over the front. You pushed a button and it pulled back a hammer that then slammed against one of the bars causing it to ring hypersonically, like a tuning fork. A similar bar inside the front of the TV would then vibrate sympathetically and either turn the set on or off, change the channel up or down one number, or make the volume go up and down in steps. It was a wireless, mechanical remote control. A clicker. Literally.

My dad bought that TV on the spot.


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## Nick (Apr 23, 2002)

Back In the pre-remote days, my pregnant young bride was ordered to bed by her ob/gyn.
I jerry-rigged a 3-function remote using a few components, three lengths of zip wire and a
Prince Albert pocket tin so she could turn the tv on/off, change the channels and adjust the
volume without having to get out of bed. It was a fugly device but it worked and, at the time,
she thought I was a freakin' genius.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Oh, yeah, I remember the ping! of an early remote or two. Plus we had a rotating antenna, which seemed to chug-chug-chug as it moved thirty degrees of so to pick up the other broadcast antenna.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

SeaBeagle said:


> I remember having only a few channels and having to get up to change the channel. Oh yes on the black and white screened TV.


I lived in a broadcast TV Mecca with Boston channels due south, Portland Maine's local TV farm to the northeast, one Portland licensed transmitter to the due north on top of Mt Washington, which could be received from further away than any other TV station in the country, and with a straggler early PBS station and a peculiar, redundant ABC affiliate to our west. Our rotor got a lot of use when we were trying to follow two sporting events at the same time on one TV.

For simple channel switches between stations on the same reception azimuth, we would watch it at the home of someone who had a kid brother t scootch alongside the TV and change the channels upon command.



TomCat said:


> ...One day when our set had "gone into the shop" and sadly died on the table and hadn't survived, Pooley showed up with something he called a "Space Command". This was essentially a Zenith remote control with four buttons and four cylindrical metal bars suspended inside, with a wire grate over the front. You pushed a button and it pulled back a hammer that then slammed against one of the bars causing it to ring hypersonically, like a tuning fork. A similar bar inside the front of the TV would then vibrate sympathetically and either turn the set on or off, change the channel up or down one number, or make the volume go up and down in steps. It was a wireless, mechanical remote control. A clicker. Literally.


Unfortunately, you could inadvertently change the channels on those TVs by jingling your key or by ham-fistedly handling your tableware.



Nick said:


> Back In the pre-remote days, my pregnant young bride was ordered to bed by her ob/gyn.
> I jerry-rigged a 3-function remote using a few components, three lengths of zip wire and a
> Prince Albert pocket tin so she could turn the tv on/off, change the channels and adjust the
> volume without having to get out of bed. It was a fugly device but it worked and, at the time,
> she thought I was a freakin' genius.


Believe it or not, that is how the $500 optional remote control panel for Advents incipient Model 1000A VIdeoBeam TVs were constructed. There was like a 50 conductor pair cable, and it went to a foot square box that was fitted with a duplicate of the television cabinet control panel.

http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/adventcorp_videobeam_1000.html


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## Cholly (Mar 22, 2004)

I think that shows like "All in the Family" and "In the Heat of the Night", both starring Caroll O'Connor, would thrive today on HBO or perhaps TNT. The broadcast networks and a few of the cable networks seem too timid to touch anything controversial. One wonders if a show like 'The West Wing", "Hill Street Blues" or "NYPD Blue" would find a spot on NBC or CBS today. I think all three would be successful on a PPV cable channel.

I lament the demise of sitcoms and variety shows that had live audiences. To me, an otherwise moderately enjoyable show can be ruined by laugh tracks. My family seems to enjoy "That 70's Show". I'm turned off by the contrived laughter at everything the show's producer seems to view as being funny, let alone the plot line that appears to have been developed by someone who either had not been born yet, or at best, was a very young child during those years. 

Well written scripted shows can disappear because the network feels that there is insufficient viewership in their targeted demographic, particularly ages 18-49. One of the most recent examples is A & E's "Longmire", based on the highly acclaimed series of mystery novels by Craig Johnson. In that case, viewer demand was so high that Netflix stepped in to carry the upcoming season 4 of the series.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

It's funny... the way people talk about today being permissible and all... how stuff is on the radio and TV that never would have been allowed years ago. Except, it's not always true.

As noted, shows like All in the Family and a few others had topics and language that might not fly in today's "permissive" world. I remember hearing songs on the radio in the 1970s and 1980s that had explicit lyrics that you can't play on the radio today. I also remember shows, and Saturday Night Live skits, from the late 1970s that would be dicey to put on broadcast TV today.

It's true that sensibilities have changed... what's misleading is trying to say it is "more permissible" today than yesteryear... The truth is that people de-sensitize to some things and sensitize OR re-sensitize to others... Just like clothes and hairstyles... language and sensibilities go in and out of style over the years too. At least a part of it is children who rebel to be different from their parents... so if your generation is demure, your kids might be more risque, and then their kids rebel by being more demure... and then stuff that is considered offensive today becomes commonplace in a few years.


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## B Newt (Aug 12, 2007)

My aunt Ione in Florida had a TV that had a rubber squeeze ball attached to the TV with tubing, you squeeze the ball and the channel would change. Cant remember the brand though.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

Stewart Vernon said:


> It's funny... the way people talk about today being permissible and all... how stuff is on the radio and TV that never would have been allowed years ago. Except, it's not always true.
> 
> As noted, shows like All in the Family and a few others had topics and language that might not fly in today's "permissive" world. I remember hearing songs on the radio in the 1970s and 1980s that had explicit lyrics that you can't play on the radio today. I also remember shows, and Saturday Night Live skits, from the late 1970s that would be dicey to put on broadcast TV today.
> 
> It's true that sensibilities have changed... what's misleading is trying to say it is "more permissible" today than yesteryear... The truth is that people de-sensitize to some things and sensitize OR re-sensitize to others... Just like clothes and hairstyles... language and sensibilities go in and out of style over the years too. At least a part of it is children who rebel to be different from their parents... so if your generation is demure, your kids might be more risque, and then their kids rebel by being more demure... and then stuff that is considered offensive today becomes commonplace in a few years.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Funny... I almost brought that up... not Sanford & Son specifically... but the word. It was offensive then as it is now... but it was somehow more permissible to say on broadcast TV than it is today. Although... to be fair... I have seen episodes of The Boondocks on latenight Adult Swim that use the word uncensored... but it is a cartoon, after midnight, and on a cable channel rather than OTA.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

Forget TV. I am not allowed to use that word. My friend and colleague at work is, but not me. Not that I would ever want or have a reason to use it, but that seems like the prime example of political correctness gone completely out of control. Its as if when I would use this word, it might be perceived as an epithet, but while a different person uses it, it would be perceived as a simple, benign noun. And that implies that you can't be a racist towards whatever race you belong to, which we know is not true.

Now when Redd Fox uses it, its pretty funny. That guy had the best comic delivery and timing ever, something we should never forget. And he was making a political point (which eerily echoes all the way to Baltimore in 2015) using a joke. Brilliant, and the clip made me laugh out loud. But when Michael Richards used that word in a club and was taped on somebody's iPhone, his career went down in flames. Maybe because he wash't very funny, especially in the creepy, clumsy way he used it.

So I'm all for being sensitive to people's feelings, but what hurts my feelings is the hypocrisy, which seems to be a common component of the human condition. There are fairly-innocent features of the human torso that are visible on a public beach, or on a family-friendly show like _America's Got Talent_ (worst grammar in a title ever), but only if those features are on male torsos. The most natural thing a human mammal can do is feed her infant, just don't try that on Jet Blue. It's OK for the most popular show on TV to be based on monster zombies continually eating and killing people, but somebody's butt crack ends up on _Grey's Anatomy_ for two seconds, and the economy goes into a tailspin.

Now that we have social media, the sports page had become a police blotter of overpaid millionaires who simply don't know any better saying stupid stuff and having to apologize. They always were saying these things; we just never got to hear them before. It's enough to make you stop reading the sports page. Or watching sports. Especially when clocking somebody into unconsciousness in an elevator is equated to letting a little air out of a couple of footballs. Hypocrisy is the evil, the words are just words.

OK, now James is going to have to pull out his hall monitor badge and close the thread; too far OT. My bad. One last thing: _You kids stay off of my lawn!_


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Redd Fox was funny... and I also took note of how the joke/point being made in that particular clip is still relevant (unfortunately) today... so while some things change with the times, others do not.

Meanwhile... sensibilities are always a funny thing.

I've always took note that male's going topless is not considered a problem, but females going topless is always something that creates a stir. Now, this alone is interesting... but then when you get into what is accepted as appropriate covering for females... quite often basically the "key" thing to cover is the one part that basically often looks the same on a topless male or female... the nipple. So pasties on the girl, and a skimpy bikini is fine... but have her go topless and show that one remaining part that we can all imagine the appearance of anyway... and people go nuts!

But language and clothes and behavior goes all up and down the spectrum over the generations... some acceptable words today were once taboo, while once taboo words are now acceptable. When you're living in the time, you can sometimes be oblivious to these shifts as they happen... but thanks to modern technology we are going to have ways of making direct comparisons to point out just how weird, inconsistent, and hypocritical people are about these things over the years.


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Thanks for the reminder of the talent of the late Mr. Foxx (double d and double x). He could be hysterical.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Tomcat, I grew up at a time when that word could be said. It was rude but it was just another swear word, not elevated to the level where it is today where the mere utterance by the wrong shade of person is grounds for banishment from society. Even the past utterance is damning enough today. (Never admit that you said that word 20 years ago unless you are secure in your employment and 100% repentant of the use.)

My grandmother used a worse version of that word that shocked my mother. But in her time the words were even more common and less objectionable. Crass but not a major problem.

Use of such language reflects an attitude ... but it is not the words or the attitude that are the problem. It is the action. As a member of polite society I refrain from using that word and similar racially charged language. I would not want it directed at me so I won't direct it at others.


Stewart, I have no problem with female toplessness except in my family. Yes, the same stone age attitude that would have allowed me to say "the N word" 40 years ago taught me that modesty is best. I would not want my wife, mother, daughter, aunt, niece, etc. to show cleavage or go topless except to their husband (or to be politically correct, "significant other"). It is their decision, of course, but my preference would be for them to keep their shirt on. (I only go topless in a swimsuit.)

Our society has a strange definition of nudity ... movies that get rated PG for side boob while some of the clothing at award shows shown on broadcast TV are literally painted on. The coat of body paint does just as an effective job of "covering up" as thin cloth would do so I suppose it makes sense. But apparently skin is bad.


TV likes to play with nudity ... the reality show playing in the mud or with contestants that like to strip (or are encouraged to strip for the camera). "Naked and Afraid" and "Naked Dating" are two more recent examples in the long line of nudity almost on TV ... but it seems that nearly every series has had a nudist episode. Charlie's Angels at the naturist camp (shown in a hot tub with no hint that they were participating or wearing a swimsuit - let the imagination work). Simon and Simon had a case at a nudist camp ("we dress for dinner") where apparently naked people were shown. LA Law had a nudist client and the episode ended with one of the lawyers starting to strip before entering a party and saying "you don't know until you try it" to another lawyer. Most series seemed to have at least one show toying with the topic of nudity.

In the modern era the mom on "That 70's Show" was upset that she was not invited to a neighbor's party so she crashed it and found out that it was a nudist party. "Chuck" had an episode where they infiltrated a nudist cult (and once the special effects budget ran out the people at the camp covered up). "Chuck" being a more recent show they either filmed it naked or with minimal covering and blurred the images for television instead of the lower budget "people behind objects" portrayal of nudity on broadcast television.


The blurring of nudity on TV is odd ... usually they blur more than would be shown if the person were consider clothed. And why they blur butts when no anus or medical condition is visible is beyond me. (It isn't something I want to see but is a crack nudity?) But I digress.

The standards of our society have changed but TV continues to push the boundaries. Sometimes guiding us into new areas where content and behavior that was not permitted before (such as general swearing) is permitted and sometimes guiding us away from behavior best left behind (words reflecting racist attitudes).


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

I'm not necessarily for or against particular things. I have words, including that word we have been talking about lately, that I don't ever say and don't ever want to say and cringe when people in my company say it even if I'm the only other person who hears it... but I'm not bothered per se to hear others say it, depending on what they mean by it. I'm not for or against nudity. I couldn't be a nudist myself... but nudity doesn't offend me. It can be awkward in certain situations, though.

I'm even fine with nudity on TV as long as there is a warning there might be some... I don't like surprise nudity or language because IF I'm watching with mixed company, it can be uncomfortable.

But it is interesting to note just in my lifetime the things we have talked about that were once acceptable but no longer are... and the things that are more acceptable now that once weren't. I wonder if I'll live long enough to see some of these things circle back again.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

The (initial) Sensitive Naked Man, on Yahoo_!_



...and because some SNL video hostings are unauthorized and eventually get pulled, this link is to the first one, but on the NBC site:

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/the-sensitive-naked-man/n10193

It is also on IMDB, which in turn gets it from HULU. The thing is, the NBC and HULU hostings make you endure the full length of their lead-in commercials:

http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi1354211097

SNL ran this second one, but it wasn't as funny, and they decided to discontinue the series:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xgqx5t_the-sensitive-man_shortfilms


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

You guys are making me think about this, and I guess that is a good thing for someone always at least trying to evolve.

i guess you could look at my last post another way, which is I can use the term "white trash" and while it is pejorative, it is still somewhat acceptable. But if my black friend uses that term, maybe that sounds racist. Context does matter, and maybe it is not as simple as it being hypocritical that one usage is allowed and another isn't.

The N word, used in a certain context, by a black person, could be equated to "fella" or "dude", and be only mildly pejorative or not be pejorative at all. Its that context that probably does not exist for a white person.

Another definition of the word as used by blacks is "a person who is not careful or respectful of the people or environment around them...someone who is just taking up a lot of space by virtue of their thoughtless or silly actions, in a world that is frustratingly filled by such people, which is just something I guess we have to put up with". Now that is a long definition, but when that single word is used in that particular context, everyone knows instantly what the person is referring to. And it may not be racist at all, at least in its intent, but being slightly pejorative it blurs that line and might sound a little racist, depending. Again, context.

So what is unfortunate is when we lose the ability of using a word that has a particular definition, to express ourselves. Not that we want to express ourselves in a knee-jerk fashion and go right for the extreme prejudice of the N word, but no other single word can be used to express that particular definition in that particular way. When that happens, language does not flourish and grow, but withers and dies.

As an example of that particular colorful usage, a famous subversive rapper, the late Ol' Dirty B------ or ODB (there's another word we really should try not to use, right in his stage name) born Russell Tyrone Jones, used the word in that exact way in one of my favorite quotes, from him or from anybody. When being interviewed about the antics of a colleague, he once said "I love a n-----, but n----- please". Which really said it all. Nothing at all racist, either. My interpretation of what he said, which may be way off the mark, was "my friend has a right to act the fool all he wants, but it gets a little frustrating after a while, and maybe he should consider ratcheting back a notch".

But ODB said that succinctly, in seven words. With a lot more impact that my definition could ever have. And he needed that particular word to get that point across, because there was no other word available. It was even polite.

And don't think that I don't get the irony of _TomCat_ pining over the inability to be succinct and use fewer words because a particular word is not available. :grin:

Sorry if that was a hijack...back to the topic.


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

I don't know why so many people get upset over the use of a word. When I was growing up we used the N word all the time and the black people called us crackers.
When a person is from Australia they are called an Aussie. I was taught that the first black slaves were brought from Nigeria. With different accents in all parts of the country and indeed in the world I do see how the N word as it is called now came about easily.
To me if it is offensive then the black people should not use it all the time like they do. It is or is not an acceptable word.

I remember when my second son was in elementary school and he brought home a picture that he had colored. It was supposed to be his teacher. She was a "Black person". She gave him an "F" on the coloring because he used a brown crayon instead of a black one.
I went to school with him the next day and went to the principal and had her, she was back also, bring the teacher to the office.
When she came into the office I took a black crayon and a brown one and held it close to her arm and asked the principal to tell me which color most designated her skin color. She was more brown than black. His grade was changed on his skill of coloring inside the lines than the color choice he had made.

Before I get any BS from any of you I am white. I have a grand daughter that is listed as black on her birth certificate.. She is now in the 11th grade. She calls herself a light skinned person. She refers to her other friends as black, white, Mexican or light skinned friends.
There you go, another word that some feel offensive, Mexican. Some want to be called Spanish or of Latin descent, etc.

People, they are just words, get over it.

*Yep, here we have done it yet again. This thread is titled is TV better now than when you were a kid. *

I have already posted this and I will reiterate this, TV is far superior now than when I was a kid in all aspects.
There is something for everyone to see that they will like. Look at an old monster movie like King Kong or Godzilla and then compare it to a modern version of the same movie. Holey Moley how realistic they look nowadays compared to the elementary attempts in the past. The stunts done in movies will blow your mind compared to what they used to do. The old screens were small and round faced and full of snow most of the time compared to now almost perfect life like pictures. In live sports we have the cameras that are placed in many many places instead of just one. They can back up and show us the same thing again and from different angles. I think that is called instant replay. In fact, that is used in many sports to determine if there was a foul of some sort or not. Look at tennis and the ball tracker that shows it's flight and if the ball hit the ground in or outside of the lines by a millimeter. There is a lot more to comparison of then vs now than just the content of what they are showing.
Talk about on the edge. Have you seen Naked and Afraid or Dating Naked, or Buying Nude ? Have you seen any of the shows rated TV MA ? I don't know how you could get any closer to the edge than that.

I am retired now and watch TV all the time except when I am clicking around on the computer. I would hate to think that I would have to watch only what was available back when I was a kid. I guess I could go out in the yard and trim the hedges incessantly like my neighbor across the street. NOT going to happen. Oh Nascar is coming on in a few hours and I will be watching it all weekend. Before that I will be watching the stock market LIVE. Did we have that back then ? NO.

.


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## MysteryMan (May 17, 2010)

"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me". Enough said, :backtotop .


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

James Long said:


> The blurring of nudity on TV is odd ... usually they blur more than would be shown if the person were consider clothed. And why they blur butts when no anus or medical condition is visible is beyond me. (It isn't something I want to see but is a crack nudity?) But I digress.


James, you crack me up! :rolling:

But you raise a good point. At the same time, I recall a few plumber kneeling under the sink type shots where the reveal of a bit of crack was thought by the writers to be hilarious.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

Maybe Dan Ackroyd in SNL circa 1975? Probably a lot funnier than Will Ferrel will ever be.

As far as TV being "better", and putting aside the content and creativity for a moment, there is no question that technically it is better. Not only is the set design, lighting, and camera placement better, the medium is more resolved, color is a little better, and the methods bringing it to us are worlds better. The result is a very realistic picture and sound.

But is this "better"? In some ways I wonder if it is. I would never want to step backwards, but in many ways TV today is "too immersive". By that I mean that I am now just a few feet from a very large screen with a better aspect ratio, watching much more defined picture with realistic surround sound. This means that all aspects of the experience are defined clearly, and executed fully. It is much more like really being there.

By contrast, in 1982 I was watching a 4:3 19" Zenith with blurry pictures and tinny sound, from 10 feet away, because the only acceptable way to have a TV was to put your furniture on one side of the room and your TV up against the wall on the other. The erudite renaissance man from _Friends_ Joey Tribiani once asked "If you don't have a TV, what do you point your furniture at?"

So here's the bottom line of the point I am trying to get to. I can't sit and watch more than about an hour or two of TV. It is so immersive that I feel like I am being forced into whatever experience the writers have created for us. And I start to feel trapped and want to get up away from the TV and live inside my own head, where I still have choices and am allowed my own thoughts and can create my own real story. Same thing with surround sound; I don't want to be in the middle of that sound field, I want to observe it from a slight distance; I want the sound to be coming at me, just not from all directions at once.

I want the ability to hold these experiences at arms length and think about them as I participate in them. But when I have my nose up against a large screen with 7.1 sound, I feel completely at the beck and call of the producer of the show, and in what they want to make me feel and in the precise experience they want me to have and in how to react to that. This lowers my participation, because I am no longer allowed the time or space to regard what I am seeing, because the sensory overload of whatever is happening actually gets in the way of that. This goes to something I have always said which is "just because we now have the technology does not automatically make using that technology a better idea", and is why one innocent little question has sparked the most active thread here in years.

Consequently, since HD I am watching less TV, probably at least 10 hours less a week, than I was before. When there was a little distance between me and the experience, and I had a little time to participate and think about what I was experiencing while I was experiencing it, I think I enjoyed that better than being so drawn in where it feels like a forced experience where I have no room to think about and regard what is happening, because there is too much happening up close and personal, in my face.

_Modern Family_ is a great example. I love that show, and it is always top-notch and well done, and deserves its unofficial title as the best sitcom ever. But I still have 47 of them on my DVR, because it is too much pressure to be placed directly in that super-frantic world for 30 minutes. You have to make a commitment to do that, and it is not often I am in the mood where I want to give over all of my sensibilities to that, regardless of how great a show it is.

So there is something to be said for TV of old, because it was LESS IMMERSIVE, and allows the viewer to regard the experience he is having, rather than be force fed that experience like Malcolm McDowell's character with his eyes pried open in_ A Clockwork Orange_. This is why radio was successful. Theatre of the mind is so much more powerful than any world Damon Lindelof or Vince Gilligan can come up with. Give us the framework, and let our minds fill in some of the detail. Let us play, too. That will work much better.

TV used to be called a "closeup medium", but that was because the screen real estate was small and far away. It was a compensatory technical concept that fit that viewing experience. But it doesn't make sense anymore now that the screen dominates our view. I was watching _Aquarius_ last week, and I found it disturbing that every shot of someone, like picking up a toothbrush, had to be an extreme closeup. Move the camera back, dammit, and that will actually be more representative of what we see when we walk in the room. Stop hitting us over the head with it. I don't want to feel like I'm violating the personal space of whoever is speaking to me.

Now Heidi Klum on AGT? More closeups, please. Yeah, get all the closeups you want; I'll stay tuned.


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

You can get a 32 or 26" set and watch it to get distance between you and the experience TomCat.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

TomCat said:


> I can't sit and watch more than about an hour or two of TV. It is so immersive that I feel like I am being forced into whatever experience the writers have created for us. And I start to feel trapped and want to get up away from the TV and live inside my own head, where I still have choices and am allowed my own thoughts and can create my own real story.





> I want the ability to hold these experiences at arms length and think about them as I participate in them.


You are not alone ... There are a lot of people putting HD (and now 4K/UHD) TVs "too far away" to get the full resolution - perhaps because they do not want to be immersed in television. (The TV set shall NOT dominate the living room.) Or they spend a lot of money to build a theater that gets used on special occasions and do their bulk TV watching on smaller sets that do not dominate their rooms.

CNN started their series "The Seventies" last night with a retrospective on television. I believe one commentator referred to TV as the fireplace that people gathered around ... except instead of people telling each other stories or getting the stories from books or a radio they get their stories from "the tube". Even if one has a massive fireplace that takes up an entire wall the fire part is small. The fire is there and and noticeable but does not dominate the room to where one wishes it wasn't there (unless the flue is closed or blocked).

Some "theater rooms" used for special presentations have smaller sets for day to day use that are more of a fireplace than setting an entire wall on fire. Most people want the best resolution large picture and correct viewing distance for special viewing ... but are happy with less for routine TV.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

When it comes to language, and what is offensive to some, there are always multiple issues in play.

The United States has a somewhat unique racial issue between blacks and whites that cannot be denied. We were one of the last (if not the last) nations to outlaw slavery. There were white slaves, even in the US... but in the US by far the black slaves were the majority. Post-slavery there was also in some parts of the country a systematic devaluing of the freed blacks. This also cannot be denied.

Not all white people, even in the era of slavery, were abusive or even owned slaves at all... but you can't deny that the history exists AND frankly, we aren't as removed from that time as you might want to believe. I was born in 1970... just after the big Civil Rights movements in this country. for a time, though I was too young to know it, there were a lot of people alive who had direct experience with the post-slavery era AND some older folk who had direct experience with slavery! We shouldn't beat ourselves up over it in the "modern" era, but we aren't so far away from it to treat it like the "ancient we-have-moved-on" past.

So... while there are words I don't like to use... I'm hesitant to try and control others' use of it. And if some words are offensive to a black man coming from a white man, I'm okay with that. There are some words that a black man can say that might be offensive to a white man, but if you're being honest with yourself... no white man really feels the same "sting" from those words that a black man feels in the reverse scenario. Is that fair? Maybe not... but neither was several generations of slavery and thinking it was "ok" to own people.

We have a similar, but different, issue with religion and gender. Men can't say certain things to women, or at least shouldn't say them... there are words, at least one comes to mind, that if a man says to a woman most men would even cringe... but women get a little more freedom to use that same word AND call men other things. There's a similar historical "power" dynamic here too... with women usually being the oppressed if there ever was an oppression situation in history.

If you are religious... you might joke with others who share your religion, but be resentful of someone outside your faith taking a poke at your beliefs. Lots of different religions, and lots of different situations that I could name where this stuff happens. Some jokes you can make, some you can't.

And this is a constantly evolving thing... and to get back to the topic... it's why what we have on TV today is judged differently than 50 years ago.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Stewart Vernon said:


> We were one of the last (if not the last) nations to outlaw slavery.


Not quite. Slavery in the entire US was abolished in December 1865 (13th Amendment). There were plenty of other countries after 1865.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolition_of_slavery_timeline

Only 27 of the then 36 states were required to ratify the amendment. Three states waited until the 1900s to ratify after initially rejecting the amendment:
Delaware - February 12, 1901 (After rejection - February 8, 1865)
Kentucky - March 18, 1976 (After rejection - February 24, 1865)
Mississippi - March 16, 1995; Certified - February 7, 2013 (After rejection - December 5, 1865)



Stewart Vernon said:


> ... if you're being honest with yourself... no white man really feels the same "sting" from those words that a black man feels in the reverse scenario. Is that fair? Maybe not... but neither was several generations of slavery and thinking it was "ok" to own people.


I will only take the blame for my generation ... perhaps the next. If someone (anyone of any color or creed) chooses to play the victim card or the race card for actions I did not commit I am not going to feel guilty about it. I am not responsible for the world wars or the Holocaust either.

I saw more racism on television than in real life.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

Then; Naked City. (Paul Burke, Horace McMahon)

Less 'Then': N.Y.P.D. (Jack Warden, Robert Hooks, Frank Converse)

Even less 'Then'; NYPD Blue (Dennis Franz, Gordon Clapp, James McDaniel)

Now; I'm sure there probably is a NYC cop show or two, but I don't watch them.


I'll take 'Then' if you don't mind.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

SayWhat? said:


> Then; Naked City. (Paul Burke, Horace McMahon)





AntAltMike said:


> ...I watched an episode of Naked City last night, with guest star George Segal, that was a bad joke. Some suspect had barricaded himself into an apartment and there were about 30 cops in front of the building, but they couldn't get tear gas into an apartment because the occupant had put a mattress in the window. The cops had to burst through his apartment door and provided cover fire for the first man in by blasting a Tommy Gun into the ceiling, which must have been exciting for the people in the upstairs apartments, but then the suspect escaped by moving the mattress and climbing up the front fire escape and then down the rear one, because the cops didn't think to station anyone behind the building. It was as plausible as Gary Shandling escaping from his apartment by going through the audience.,,





> NYPD Blue (Dennis Franz, Gordon Clapp, James McDaniel)


Greatest witless comeback of all time. From NYPD Blue's pilot episode.

_"I'd say res ipsa loquitor if I thought you'd have a clue what it meant."_

_"Ipsa this, you pissy little *****._"

NYPD Blue trivia: That line by Sipowicz was originally scripted to be "pissy little *******" because it was thought that the District Attorney would be a male



> Now; I'm sure there probably is a NYC cop show or two, but I don't watch them.


I've recently started watching Blue Bloods now that is is in block programming on inspiration Network (formerly Pax). Oddly, I had trouble buying Tom Sellick as Magnum just because he had been sensational in his two Rockford Files episodes where he played the implausibly perfect Lance White.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

OOOHH, OOOHH, OOOHH, OOOHH, I forgot one!

'Car 54, Where Are You?'



They just don't make' em like that anymore.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

SayWhat? said:


> OOOHH, OOOHH, OOOHH, OOOHH, I forgot one!
> 
> 'Car 54, Where Are You?'
> 
> Hard to imagine that show only lasted two seasons. I saw it again a couple of weeks ago on Decades.


Joe Ross played the same character on Car 54 that he did on Bilko. I used to buy satellite parts from a company that had a secretary named Toody, and I used to begin every order writing Oooh, Oooh! She never indicated that she "got" it.

Mary Tyler Moore, Bob Newhart, James Garner, Gene Barry and Lucy always played the same characters. If Gene Barry ever played a garbageman, he'd be the first garbageman to have a handkerchief in his breast pocket.


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## Cholly (Mar 22, 2004)

I've been a fan of Tom Selleck for many a year. When Amazon offered a deal on box set of the entire Magnum, P.I. series several months ago, I jumped right in and purchased one.Interesting to watch old shows in all their 480i 4:3 format glory. I enjoyed Selleck in the Jesse Stone specials of recent years, and am a huge fan of Blue Bloods. The casting is superb and the series is well written. The shows come off as being quite believable.

Interestingly, Donny Wahlberg, who plays Selleck's detective son, tried his luck at producing a Boston police show, which lasted perhaps a season.


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## bidger (Nov 19, 2005)

SayWhat? said:


> Now; I'm sure there probably is a NYC cop show or two, but I don't watch them.
> 
> I'll take 'Then' if you don't mind.


Anyone surprised? I'll take "True Detective" myself, but then I'm not stuck in the past.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

jimmie57 said:


> You can get a 32 or 26" set and watch it to get distance between you and the experience TomCat.


Of course, but you possibly miss the point. I get a "better" quality experience with the large TV, but it is very immersive. So I get "all the TV I need or can take" in a couple of hours, rather than in 3 or 4 hours. The total amount of the experience is the same in just those couple of hours, and it is generally a better experience; it is just more intense as a large, clear, HD, surround-sound experience than it ever was with the 19" port-hole-screened Zenith in 1982, so I get the same amount of TV watching experience filling up my viewing capacity in fewer hours, and then I just don't want to do that anymore and I have hours left to do something else (that I didn't have before) like talking to you fine folks.

I agree that the HD experience in 2015 is much better. Its not that I want to dilute the experience by sitting further away or getting a smaller TV, I just don't need as much of it to get my fill when the TV is so large and immersive as it is now. It would be like eating a larger pizza; I only have room for so many slices of pizza, and while everybody loves pizza and that first slice is terrific, after a few slices, that last slice (or two) that you really should not have eaten, _just doesn't taste very good at all_. And none of it tastes good if you are shoving it down your throat like you're trying to win a hot-dog eating contest. Diluting the experience by sitting further from a smaller TV with the sound lower would be like preventing yourself from eating those other two slices of pizza by ordering a crappier pizza from a chain, like Papa John's or Pizza Hut, rather than ordering the best pizza in Manhattan. That dog just won't hunt.

Its sensory overload. It's like a drive by. Binge watching 3 eps of _Modern Family _in giant-sized HD is like eating an entire large deep-dish pie, all by yourself. Enough already. Claire Dunphy is as cute and adorable as anyone, but after about 30 minutes of her crazy energy, I've seen quite enough of her for the moment, thankyouverymuch.

But it could also be improved by the experience being less frantic and jam-packed and about super-close extreme closeups. Find a way to tell the story with a "less is more" approach, that leaves some actual room for my mind to help fill in those blanks in the story so that I am an active participant rather than a mindless viewer, taking in information so extreme and so quickly that I don't have a chance to regard or consider what it means, or to participate. It's not that we can't remember what happened last week because our memories are bad, its that too much happened so quickly that we never got the chance to really experience it and get it into our long-term memory. Stop putting my Porterhouse steak into a blender so that it will go down faster. I want a serene babbling brook, not a 60's Memphis firehose.

I love _The Black List;_ I think it it brilliant and James Spader is the best. But there is _so...much...mayhem...constantly...going on_, that it just becomes a blur, and I can't absorb what is happening properly before I have to absorb what comes next. Its like taking the scenic route at 100 MPH. So I have 11 of those piled up on my DVR, too, because it takes a lot of commitment to watch even just one episode of that show. Plus, there is a lot of people really treating other people badly, which is a little soul-crushing. A show that moves a little slower without running gun battles and car chases, like _Masters of Sex,_ is much easier to watch, and much more pleasant, even though I consider _The Black List _a better show.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

AntAltMike said:


> ...I've recently started watching Blue Bloods ... Oddly, I had trouble buying Tom Sellick as Magnum just because he had been sensational in his two Rockford Files episodes where he played the implausibly perfect Lance White.


Well, I though Magnum was a terrible show for a lot of reasons, and considered Selleck nothing more than the "haircut of the week", even though he was far and away the only actor on that show that I could even stomach.

But Lance White; wasn't that the most brilliantly-written character ever? TRF was my favorite show from 1975 to 1980 and I loved the movies afterward (I even owned a Firebird because of that show, and started wearing sports jackets without a tie). I thought it was the first really intelligently-written show on television, and single-handedly ended the Quinn Martin era of mindless cop shows like _Cannon_. The Lance White episodes were among the best eps from that show. I can still picture that quick-release gun in the glove box of his car. And TS was perfectly cast, and played it perfectly. It would not surprise me if that is not where Magnum came from...a producer seeing Lance White and saying "we gotta sign this guy".

I also was a big fan of _Las Vegas _and thought TS was a poor replacement for the completely under-rated James Caan (who also killed in _Back in the Game_). But I can't get enough of _BlueBloods, _and TS is pretty great as the PC; its the role he was finally meant to play. What other show has a teenage girl that is not petulant and jaded and obnoxious? Not since _Gilmore Girls_. She is written like the daughter you wish everyone could have. The Sunday dinners are amazing. A Leonard Goldberg pedigree is nothing to be sneezed at. I am not particularly emotional, but the way this show ends every week almost makes me cry. I hope it runs forever.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

TomCat said:


> ...TRF was my favorite show from 1975 to 1980 and I loved the movies afterward (I even owned a Firebird because of that show, and started wearing sports jackets without a tie).


Some friends of mine started pronouncing, "my" as, "muh" like Rockford did. It annoyed the hell out of me.



> I thought it was the first really intelligently-written show on television, and single-handedly ended the Quinn Martin era of mindless cop shows like _Cannon_.


If it weren't for QM production, I'd never have learned what an Epilog was. Of course, I'd never have needed to learn what one was, either. I felt William Conrad was miscast, as I just couldn't accept an old, fat slow guy being seen as physically intimidating to anybody.

Those shows did get repetitive. Seems like no matter what Kimball said or did, someone would say, "You're no janitor/drifter/gardener. You're educated. I can tell", though I really appreciated the scene in the Fugitive movie where the female doctor says to him, "You're no janitor", and, "What are your other hobbies? Brain surgery?". It was one of the few real throwbacks to the TV series.

Every time a young pilot would "cowboy" it on a mission, Paul Burke would say, "But I need him. He's my best pilot", and Inspector Erskine was a dignified robot who could have been replaced with a hand held tape recorder that said, "Put it through the NCIC computer".

I was surprised to learn that 12 O'clock High was a ratings flop. I had no idea that it's alter ego show, Combat, ran for twice as long and was more successful. Paul Burke was brought in to replace caveman browed Robert Lansing because he didn't attract the desirable, younger audience, yet Burke was actually two years older than Lansing.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SayWhat? said:


> 'Car 54, Where Are You?'


Good show ... but putting Car 54 into the same list as dramas like Blue Bloods is like listing Gillian's Island with Survivor. (With the latter shows both have just as believable plots.)

TV has different shows for different people. Back in the day there was less TV - but there was still good shows and bad shows. Today there is more TV ... with more good and more bad. And in both eras, a lot of forgettable programs in the middle.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

James Long said:


> Good show ... but putting Car 54 into the same list as dramas like Blue Bloods is like listing Gillian's Island with Survivor.


No comparison. I would never insult Gilligan by comparing it to a game show.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SayWhat? said:


> No comparison. I would never insult Gilligan by comparing it to a game show.


And that is the point ... to consider "Car 54" a NY Cop show is to portray Gilligan as a survival show.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

James Long said:


> I will only take the blame for my generation ... perhaps the next. If someone (anyone of any color or creed) chooses to play the victim card or the race card for actions I did not commit I am not going to feel guilty about it. I am not responsible for the world wars or the Holocaust either.


No one, including me, says our generation has any guilt or responsibility for what our ancestors did... but... keying off your second example... how comfortable do you feel making a Holocaust joke? How about making that in a room full of Jewish people, especially if some are descendants of people killed or surviving that Holocaust?

It's not about feeling responsible or guilty or owing anything for what happened in the past that didn't involve you or I... it's about a little sensitivity to things that might bother them. I don't find any great restrictions being placed upon me by not saying the n-word or a handful of other things. We're not talking about restrictions on every day words that everybody uses in this case.

But... since it was a word once allowed on TV... less-so now... I could see it coming back into fashion again at some point. The cycle continues. Your grandkids might be watching things on TV that are considered offensive now but tame by then... only you might remember from your youth when it was similarly acceptable.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Stewart Vernon said:


> No one, including me, says our generation has any guilt or responsibility for what our ancestors did... but... keying off your second example... how comfortable do you feel making a Holocaust joke? How about making that in a room full of Jewish people, especially if some are descendants of people killed or surviving that Holocaust?


It is not a joke. I did not participate in the Holocaust, neither did my parents or their parents. One would need to go back generations before the Holocaust to find any connection to Germany - and anyone who potentially had children who might have possibly participated in the Holocaust. I am not going to live my life in guilt for a crime that I did not commit.

If I give a job to a Jewish person because of "guilt" over the Holocaust or to a dark skinned person as reparations for slavery is that not as racist as denying the job because of faith, heredity or skin color? True equality is color blind. True equality is race blind.

I watch and enjoy Jon Stewart because he and his show is funny ... not because he is Jewish. The same for Colbert ... I watched because he and the show was funny not because he is Catholic. I'll watch his next show if it is funny regardless of his faith and heritage. The same goes for Larry Wilmore. His show is good, I'll watch it. If it ceases to be good I'll stop. Not a race or religion based decision.

As already noted I have chosen not to use that 'N' word and other racially based epitaphs - regardless of group targeted. Even if it comes back into style I'll leave that one out of the vocabulary.

Larry Wilmore's show did a "dramatic reading" quoting an incident reported in the news using the exact words used in the incident. A white actor was given a line with the 'N' word in it ... he initially refused to say it, but after being encouraged by black actors he spoke the word ... and was immediately condemned for saying it. Unfortunately that is where we are today with that word in today's society.

"Picking on your own kind" has been acceptable in society and on television for decades ... Jewish people telling jokes about Jews, Irish joking about the Irish. Comedians often choose themselves and their families and situations as the targets for their jokes ... people find it more acceptable for a handicapped person to joke about their condition than someone without a handicap.

Keeping TV acceptable to the masses has not changed since it was invented. What is acceptable has changed and will change. For better or for worse.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

James Long said:


> And that is the point ... to consider "Car 54" a NY Cop show is to portray Gilligan as a survival show.


Car 54 was a cop show.

Gilligan was a survival show.

Survivor is a game show. Same caliber and The Gong Show.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SayWhat? said:


> Car 54 was a cop show.
> Gilligan was a survival show.


Both shows were situation comedies or sitcoms. Sticking the comedic characters in police uniforms does not make the show a police procedural. Sticking the comedic characters on a deserted (but often visited) island does not make a survival show.

I suppose "Everybody Loves Raymond" was a cop show because of Raymond's brother Robert?


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

Or Reno 9-1-1!


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## djlong (Jul 8, 2002)

Cholly said:


> One wonders if a show like 'The West Wing", "Hill Street Blues" or "NYPD Blue" would find a spot on NBC or CBS today. I think all three would be successful on a PPV cable channel.


Well, I know that West Wing would be picked up today. There's a show called "Madam Secretary" on CBS. My wife and I have both commented that "MS" feels like it's trying to be a State Department version of West Wing.

Not that it's a bad thing - I rather enjoy "MS".


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Laxguy said:


> Or Reno 9-1-1!


NTSF:SD:SUV:: is a cop show too!

Also, Children's Hospital is a medical show... AND a cop show!


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## Dude111 (Aug 6, 2010)

James Long said:


> I have avoided this thread because it seems to be more heat than light ... but I understand to a point the quality issue being raised. Perhaps it is just a memory issue ... I seem to recall a clearer picture 30 years ago than I get today on some channels.


I am glad you replied Jim. EXCELLENT REPLY AND SPOT ON MY FRIEND!!!

Thank you for not being afraid to chime in!!


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

I watched an old movie last night in HD. It is called Bullitt and it was made in 1968. It is a good movie with incredible high ratings from all the ratings groups.
The worst thing about it is the sound. It is pathetic compared to what they do today.

Yesterday I watched Golf, Tennis, Nascar racing and recorded the NHRA drag racing. Not possible in the old days when I was a kid.


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## bidger (Nov 19, 2005)

SayWhat? said:


> Car 54 was a cop show.
> 
> Gilligan was a survival show.


Didn't know cop or survival shows had laugh tracks.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

jimmie57 said:


> I watched an old movie last night in HD. It is called Bullitt and it was made in 1968. It is a good movie with incredible high ratings from all the ratings groups.
> The worst thing about it is the sound. It is pathetic compared to what they do today.
> 
> Yesterday I watched Golf, Tennis, Nascar racing and recorded the NHRA drag racing. Not possible in the old days when I was a kid.


Oh I agree the sound is much better on shows. But, the shows are not as good.

Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

bidger said:


> Didn't know cop or survival shows had laugh tracks.


Yes, Car 52 Where Are You has a laugh track.

Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

But it is not a drama as are real cop shows.


Sent from my iPad using DBSTalk


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## yosoyellobo (Nov 1, 2006)

SayWhat? said:


> OOOHH, OOOHH, OOOHH, OOOHH, I forgot one!'Car 54, Where Are You?'They just don't make' em like that anymore.


I you to love that show but I any remember two shows. One was when Muldoon is afraid to ask Sherri Lewis to a big dance because he was so tall and in the other they are for some reason driving on I believe the Bronx Expresway real slow and cause a big backup because nobody would pass a police car. I was surprised at the number of stars and guess on the show.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car_54,_Where_Are_You%3F


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

Boom, boom, boom, boom!

They called me chief.

I'm a Toody... of the singing Toodys


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SeaBeagle said:


> Yes, Car 52 Where Are You has a laugh track.


Must be the off brand version of the show.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

I can't say TV shows or movies are better or worse now than today. Special F/X are better, that's a quantifiable thing. HDTV is better than SDTV... Much of the home audio is better today too. We've also established that more TV is made today, so more good stuff AND more bad stuff... but there has always been good and bad stuff.

Some TV shows (modern and classic) are good the first time, but do not hold up as well on repeat viewing. Other shows not only hold up but get better sometimes on repeat viewings!

But if you ask me... was Star Trek better/worse than Firefly? I can't quantify that. They are two examples of shows I like ~40 years apart.. there are some things about each that are quantifiable as better or worse... but the general "is it good or better" question is hard for me to answer.

Music is the same. I like music from most eras... I like classical and rock. I can't say a particular concerto is better than a modern pop song or vice-versa. Sometimes I want to eat pizza, other times hamburgers... but I couldn't say I like one better than the other.

The good stuff stays good... the ok stuff becomes less good than I remembered it... and that's as true of TV 50+ years ago as it is to shows airing right now!


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## Laxguy (Dec 2, 2010)

There's one constant no one's mentioned yet: Saturday Night Live. Recent versions pale in comparison to the first five or ten years. And none of the late night hosts matched Carson or Paar or Allen.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

Stewart Vernon said:


> I can't say TV shows or movies are better or worse now than today. Special F/X are better, that's a quantifiable thing.


See, I can't even buy into that. Today, it's all faked by computer. Back then, they had to do everything, one way or another. Took a lot more talent and creativity to figure out how to make it presentable on screen. Same with stunts and driving (and I don't mean the inside the car shots in front of a moving screen).

We can carry that into cartoons too. They were all drawn by hand and filmed. The only mouse involved in Tom & Jerry scenes was Jerry.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

SayWhat? said:


> See, I can't even buy into that. Today, it's all faked by computer.


Well, technically... all F/X is fake, right? I mean it's fake stuff and slight-of-hand to make you think you saw something that never happened.



SayWhat? said:


> Back then, they had to do everything, one way or another. Took a lot more talent and creativity to figure out how to make it presentable on screen. Same with stunts and driving (and I don't mean the inside the car shots in front of a moving screen).


I'll give you grit and creativity, though... If you watch horror movies... Nightmare on Elm St is a good case that makes your point. Not comparing anything else about the remake to the original in terms of quality (original was better)... but a particular scene where Freddy is coming through the wall behind the headboard of the bed... In the new movie it is all CGI, and it does look kind of fake. In the original they got SUPER creative and the wall behind the bed was actually a stretched bedsheet with pictures hanging on it. With the nighttime lighting you couldn't tell it wasn't a real wall... so Robert Englund pushed through from the back of the sheet/wall and it looks really creepy like a wall suddenly gone to soft goo and him coming through it. You're 100% right that modern effects can't improve on that particular stunt.

However... to counter... Smallville. They did some cool stuff on Smallville that was only possible by computers today. They would have scenes where Clark lifted a tractor, for example, and the lift was actually done by a crane and wires like the old days. BUT in the old days, you'd have seen the wires no matter how hard they tried... but for Smallville, they shot the scene and then digitally removed the wires. That's where modern F/X wins hands-down... not in replacing real in-camera stunts BUT in enhancing them.



SayWhat? said:


> We can carry that into cartoons too. They were all drawn by hand and filmed. The only mouse involved in Tom & Jerry scenes was Jerry.


This one I have to give you with very little pushback. Hanna Barbera (maybe unfairly by me here) gets credit for killing quality animation in my book. They went for quick, and could do stuff faster but it wasn't as good... and eventually everyone was mimicking them.

The classic WB cartoons run circles over stuff produced closer to and since my lifetime. Early Disney runs circles around modern Disney even when Disney really goes for it. Pixar is a rare exception in that they usually knock home the computer animation better than anyone else and it's comparable to me to the hand-drawn stuff... but that's largely because of how big of fans the guys at Pixar are of the classic animation.

The thing is... people could do modern animation as good or better than the old stuff... they just don't. Maybe because it costs too much... who knows... but it is a conscious choice in that case to not be as good as they can be sometimes.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Some of the "practical" effects of days gone by are happily forgotten. My wife mentioned an episode of Gilligan's Island where they all ate soap and talked with bubbles. They used the practical effect of having a bubble pipe next to each actors mouth ... but were off enough that it was obvious the bubbles were not coming from the mouth. We can do better than that with today's effects.

Superman flying by laying on a board and having a projection or painting move behind him. Jumping in and out of scenes where wires could not be masked. CGI has improved "reality" in our fakery.

I appreciate practical effects ... Stunts that really happened in some way. Explosions that occurred. But I am glad that we no longer have to shake the camera and have everybody lean the same way to simulate an impact. That what is in the minds of the author and screenwriter when they thought up a scene can ... to the best of the artist's ability ... be shown on screen instead of being cut because filming it would not be practical or would bust the budget.

Anything can be over done ... but good CGI makes television and movies better. The best CGI is the stuff we never notice.


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## Dude111 (Aug 6, 2010)

I dont like CGI that much,it doesnt look as good (Not natural)



jimmie57 said:


> I watched an old movie last night in HD. It is called Bullitt and it was made in 1968.


I love that movie......Took me awhile to find the original PURE mono version (Print date 4/3/87) on VHS 

Took 3 times before I found it and I love it!!!!


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

Once place that screw up both then and now is certain sound effects. Emergency! (and a few others) always annoyed me when they'd confuse a mechanical siren with an electronic. Or they'd run exactly the same siren sound loop on several different shows. Didn't matter if it was Charley's Angels, Knight Rider, Police Story, McCloud or any other drama or comedy, you just knew the sound crew hit the button that said 'siren' and that same loop would play.

One that got it right was a movie called 'The Driver'


L&O went overboard. Seems like every scene in Schiff's office was drown out by sirens going by the windows.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

Laxguy said:


> There's one constant no one's mentioned yet: Saturday Night Live. Recent versions pale in comparison to the first five or ten years. And none of the late night hosts matched Carson or Paar or Allen.


The original Saturday Night Live cast, plus Bill Murray, was simply one for the ages. Still, there were a few skits they did that floored me the first time around because they were so brilliant, but disappointed me when I saw them as reruns, namely Landshark and the King Family Christmas Special. I'd like to see Steve Martin's breakout appearance again to see how well it holds up. I was at a place with a 7 foot TV that had Saturday Night Live on, and normally, the people only half paid attention to it, but that night, this goofy guy with white hair and a white suit comes out and acts like a jerk, then acts like a different jerk, then acts like another different jerk, and within minutes the whole house was captivated by it. He probably did the animal balloons and maybe the arrow through the head, while plucking the banjo in between.

Funny thing about Carson. He had a pace that we simply will not accept today, just because we are all conditioned to having things play out faster. Of all the late night wanna-bes, Chevy Chase most closely replicated the Carson demeanor, but his show bombed. Similarly, there is no point in anyone emulating Jack Benny, either, because with remote controls in hand we'd click out during the extended intervals of anguish.

I remember when Carson ended his show and PBS did a segment on it, and comedian Johnathan Winters said a big part of what made that show special was that Johnny always made the guest look good, and he said he entertainers went on to that show knowing that the host was going to try to make them look good. He then made a remark about Letterman not doing that and said he just didn't under his show.

The very next night, Letterman had football player Darrell Green on, and the first question he asked him was, "If you could change any football rule, what would it be?", and I'm expecting a joke answer, favoring defensemen over offensive, and Green sits there in silence for maybe ten seconds, which is like an eon on TV and says, "I don't know. I've never really thought about it", and then Letterman rephrased it and gets the same non answer, so then he awkwardly moves on to something else, and I'm left thinking, "What an effin' hack". Letterman once had a Playboy Bunny on and he kept questioning her over and over about her fathers disapproval over her photoshoot, and even though it was clear that she didn't want to talk about it, Letterman would talk about nothing else, and when they came back from a commercial, she had walked out. Obviously that never would have happened with Allen, Paar or Carson.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

SayWhat? said:


> ...Seems like every scene in Schiff's office was drown out by sirens going by the windows.


I got sick of hearing Michael Moriarty preaching, "Adam. Someone has to stand up for the integrity of this office." I was glad they got rid of him, as his character never grew cynical.


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

James Long said:


> Some of the "practical" effects of days gone by are happily forgotten.
> 
> Superman flying by laying on a board and having a projection or painting move behind him. Jumping in and out of scenes where wires could not be masked. CGI has improved "reality" in our fakery.


I won't forget Batman and Robin climbing up the sides of tall buildings. Here are all fourteen times that they did it.


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## bidger (Nov 19, 2005)

SeaBeagle said:


> Yes, Car 52 Where Are You has a laugh track.
> 
> Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app





Laxguy said:


> But it is not a drama as are real cop shows.
> 
> Sent from my iPad using DBSTalk


Exactly. I was just piling on to SayWhat?'s claim that "Car 54, Where Are You?" was a cop show and "Gilligan's Island" was a survival show.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

Talk about shows getting away with things then and having no chance to get picked up now, think "Laugh-In"

There's no way that show would get on the air today. I'm not sure The Smothers Brothers would either.


For that matter, I'm not sure Ed Sullivan would.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Those three would probably get to air ... but there are other choices. They would have a lot more competition today than they did when they originally aired.

The content they "got away with" is tame by today's standards. If the shows failed they would fail because of the core format. There are skit/variety shows on cable. So I would not rule them out.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

Talk shows were definitely better then... I'll grant that too. I can't speak as much to pre-Carson... but Carson was unique and great. He talked WITH the guests and gave them every opportunity to shine. Modern hosts either talk AT their guests, talk OVER their guests, or set them up for one-liners like they rehearsed the whole thing. The shame about Carson retiring when he did was not just about losing him... but already seeing the direction talk-show hosts were headed.

I don't hate the other shows... but they don't compare to Carson by a mile.


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## Shades228 (Mar 18, 2008)

You can never beat nostalgia unless you live it again. I have found that, except in very few occasions, it's not the show itself it was the time and feeling we had with the older shows. It's easier to remember the good than the bad in most cases.


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## SeaBeagle (May 7, 2006)

Stewart Vernon said:


> Talk shows were definitely better then... I'll grant that too. I can't speak as much to pre-Carson... but Carson was unique and great. He talked WITH the guests and gave them every opportunity to shine. Modern hosts either talk AT their guests, talk OVER their guests, or set them up for one-liners like they rehearsed the whole thing. The shame about Carson retiring when he did was not just about losing him... but already seeing the direction talk-show hosts were headed.
> 
> I don't hate the other shows... but they don't compare to Carson by a mile.


True, some of these talk shows where these family members accuse each other of this and that those actions are staged for ratings. Jerry Springer is a great example.

Sent from my iPad 4 128GB using DBSTalk mobile app


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

SeaBeagle said:


> True, some of these talk shows where these family members accuse each other of this and that those actions are staged for ratings. Jerry Springer is a great example.


Jerry Springer is a great example ... look at his shows from the early 1990s and he was respectable. Look at his shows now and he's tabloid.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

I've heard Springer talk about this... he's at least honest about it... I think he set out to do a different show originally, but the ratings demanded the other kind that his show eventually devolved into... I don't think he cares too much, though, since he wants to entertain and if he is getting good ratings he figures he is entertaining.


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## Dude111 (Aug 6, 2010)

James Long said:


> Jerry Springer is a great example ... look at his shows from the early 1990s and he was respectable. Look at his shows now and he's tabloid.


Ya Jim I cant stand that show..... The beeping every other word,etc......... Its really a shame....... I dont know If Jerry originally intended that......


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

He takes the paycheck ... perhaps he feels that he has sold his soul making a show like he does. If he didn't want to make the shows he could walk away.


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## jimmie57 (Jun 26, 2010)

Dude111 said:


> Ya Jim I cant stand that show..... The beeping every other word,etc......... Its really a shame....... I dont know If Jerry originally intended that......


Trash TV for sure. I never ever watch anything remotely similar to that show.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

AntAltMike said:


> ... I felt William Conrad was miscast, as I just couldn't accept an old, fat slow guy being seen as physically intimidating to anybody...


What was really a WTF moment was when Frank Cannon would be in a foot chase with somebody, like a 23-year-old bank robber, who could outrun him with one leg tied behind his back. He'd be 50 feet behind, then he would take a different tack and come around the corner and body slam him. Riiiiiiiiiiight......... But he really needed a time machine to actually catch up.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

djlong said:


> Well, I know that West Wing would be picked up today. There's a show called "Madam Secretary" on CBS. My wife and I have both commented that "MS" feels like it's trying to be a State Department version of West Wing.
> 
> Not that it's a bad thing - I rather enjoy "MS".


Please.

Those shows should not be mentioned in the same sentence. About all they have in common is location. That is like mentioning Mario Mendoza in the same breath as Joe DiMaggio.


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

AntAltMike said:


> ...that never would have happened with Allen, Paar or Carson.


Which is why Dave lasted longer than all three of them. Or Jay. Or anybody else.

People tuned in to Jay or Johnny for the monologue and the guests. People tuned into Dave to see _what Dave would say _to the guests. Dave was the show. Jay and Johnny were emcees. Their shows weren't about them. Dave's show was absolutely about him, which is why guest hosts never worked for that show. Johnny was gracious to the guests, and made them look good. Right before he went home and beat up on all of his three wives.

Dave is somewhat an acquired taste, and a little narrow for the unwashed masses, which is why he came in second to Jay, who's show was as dumbed-down as a late-night talk show could get. But acquired tastes are always much more rewarding than something bland and sugary and designed to appeal to everyone. It was a victory of quality over quantity.

But compare the outpouring, the "we'll really miss yous" and the legacy, to the sendoff Jay got. Jay had his last show, and the attitude was. "OK, see ya."


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

TomCat said:


> Jay had his last show, and the attitude was. "OK, see ya."


Which last show? 
Are we sure he's gone?


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## AntAltMike (Nov 21, 2004)

TomCat said:


> ...
> But compare the outpouring, the "we'll really miss yous" and the legacy, to the sendoff Jay got. Jay had his last show, and the attitude was. "OK, see ya."


Which reminds me of the obligatory farewell tour that the NBA gave to Kareem. They gave one to Havlicek, and then they gave one to Erving, so they had to give one to Kareem. I think it was Doug Moe who actually asked, "Why are we having a Kareem Day? No one likes him. He's been a giant pain in the neck to everyone who's been around him."


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## TomCat (Aug 31, 2002)

Well, exceptional talent can change the rules, as it did for Michael Jordan. Roger McGuinn, Prince, half a dozen other talented folks, their stock goes down for me when they feel the need to change it up like that, so Kareem is not a surprise, and neither is the reverence for him. Just feeling like you have to change your name is annoying to everyone else. Unless its "Caitlyn", I guess.

No triple names, no initials, six syllables max. Otherwise you start at a disadvantage. Elitist, pretentious, narcissistic, boring. If you are a sports figure or Hollywood B-lister, folks already assume you are at least the first three of those things, so changing your name, or giving yourself a hi-falutin' fake name, just confirms that.


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