On a trip home this weekend, I sat down to watch anything on an actual television screen for the first time in a long time. I had never considered purchasing a television for college, but it was surprising how little I missed the lack of one. I assumed it was due to my hectic undergraduate schedule or new hobbies, but I now consume more media than ever before. I may no longer rely on a classic television set.

1. Drawback of Modern Social Media
On a trip home this weekend, I sat down to watch anything on an actual television screen for the
first time in a long time. I had never considered purchasing a television for college, but it was
surprising how little I missed the lack of one. I assumed it was due to my hectic undergraduate
schedule or new hobbies, but I now consume more media than ever before. I may no longer rely
on a classic television set, but the podcasts I listen to on the way to class, the Netflix original
shows I watch on my phone during study breaks and the TikToks I scroll through before bed are
ready substitutes.
Cable TV and older forms of entertainment have quietly given way to streaming and social
media. Although tech-fueled changes in our media consumption patterns may seem innocuous
or even helpful, entertainment’s easy accessibility and greater integration into our lives saps the
meaning it once had for us.
Cable TV hasn’t become entirely passé as of yet, but it is safe to say that it is on the decline.
With the explosion of broadband (meaning new compression techniques and an increase in
available bandwidths) in the early 2000s, at-home internet became relatively common. Video
streaming became a viable service to sell to households. While criticisms about cable have
always existed, there wasn’t always an alternative way to relay high-quality video at a
reasonable speed before broadband.
But today, broadband technology has more than taken off. When I think of media entertainment,
what comes to mind are popular video sharing social media apps as well as on-demand
streaming services that provide comparable content to cable. In fact, since 2015, the
percentage of Americans who use cable or satellite to watch TV has dropped 20 points, from
76% to 56%, a decrease which was especially pronounced among adults under 50. By contrast,
streaming services saw a significant uptick during the same period, and social media
applications seem to have emerged as a major entertainment medium for Gen Z.
I grew up loyally following my favorite cable TV shows on a weekly basis for entertainment.
Even so, the transition to spending hours on my Instagram “Explore” page, binging entire series
on Disney+ and following my favorite YouTube creators has felt relatively seamless. After all,
these options are easier and more flexible than older entertainment mediums, as you can
stream your favorite content whenever and wherever you like. However, the more immersed I
get into social media and streaming services, the more I feel like that overwhelming
convenience takes something away from the entertainment experience I once had.
I've discovered that keeping entertainment at arm's length makes it numbing. We eventually
come to take it for granted. To fill the stillness, I sometimes find myself watching TV shows in the
background while doing tedious things. One day, I'll watch every YouTube video a certain
influencer has released, and the next, I'll forget who they are. And who hasn't spent hours on
their "For You" page only to forget which TikTok they watched later?

2. Streaming providers appear to concur, at least to some extent, with this judgment. After a rise in
shows being consumed in full-season installments several years ago, many streaming platforms
are reverting back to a weekly release schedule for some shows. And from Disney+’s
“WandaVision” to Showtime’s “Yellowjackets” to HBOMax’s “Euphoria,” there’s no shortage of
shows generating online buzz while they’re airing. In my pers​
​
onal experience, developing that
ritual of dedicating a specific time and day to a particular show makes you even more attached
to it.
If streaming services can pick up on the increased engagement we have with media when we
are intentional about it, it seems that we should be able to apply the same intentionality to the
rest of the media we consume. Whether it’s a new TV show obsession or the cornucopia of
content that is TikTok, this means being mindful about connecting with our chosen forms of
entertainment – from selecting them to taking pleasure in them to even retaining ideas they left
us with. Engaging with media half-heartedly only sentences us to unsatisfying and forgettable
entertainment experiences. This behavior isn’t inherently wrong, but we shouldn’t prevent
ourselves from getting as much joy out of entertainment as we can. At the end of the day, even
if technology enables us to access media conveniently, it means nothing if we end up enjoying it
less.
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