Is TV as we know it dying a slow death?

[Scubby]

I am amazed at how much my use of the box in the corner has gone down - just over the last year. My children who are 19 and 22 rarely watch it at all and for hours on end in the evening it is switched off. Now even a couple of years ago this would have been very different. These days, I will regularly have a tablet propped alongside my laptop or my phone in my hand. I often have no desire to watch things that are scheduled and even dip in and out of live sport or just watch a few minutes. If I do switch the box on then it is often over to Netflix or Prime etc. 

As I said this is a very recent change for me, Sky Sports News used to be on a lot of the time killing dead time as did BBC1 or BBC2. I wonder what the landscape will look like very soon when my children's generation become parents and 40-somethings like me? Will TVs eventually become really cheap like microwaves did due to a fall in demand? I don't even care if anything is in HD or 4K anymore.

If this is the case, how on earth do we sell live sport like RL? It must be impossible to predict the next few years in terms of sporting viewing habits? Or is it different for RL if it naturally has an older viewer base?

[Futtocks]

For a lot of people, TV is a long way from dying. The main revolution is connected/time-shifted viewing, and you still need a screen in the room that more than one person can watch at a time. But a lot of people aren't even on board with that, so we still see spikes in viewing figures when certain programmes/events are broadcast.

Broadcasting is changing, but the box in the corner still gets lots of use in most households. Quite apart from anything else, you can usually cast what's on your phone/tablet to a bigger screen, for shared watching.

Personally, having got a HDTV about a year ago, I do appreciate the better picture. I didn't go for a stupidly-gigantic screen (just 32"), so SDTV still looks okay, but HD is a clear step up. And, if there's a streaming option for a channel, my non-fibre internet connection can deliver a better picture than regular SD FreeView. My eyesight's pretty poor, but the difference is very obvious.

As for sport, it is one of the few things that is still very much "of the moment". I'll watch a recorded RL match if I can't see it live, but even if I don't know the final score, it just isn't the same.

[EastLondonMike]

I was surprised at how little i missed Sky sports when i dropped my subscription some years ago, and subsequently how i started to get my TV fix, which changed from the traditional way to streaming and catch-up. the knock on effect of that was that i was never really tied to a certain time to watch anything, so ended up watching TV less and less.

I watch youtube more than anything else at the moment.

I work in an industry where our target market is very much the young consumer, and how they consume their information these days is important to understand for us. TV is changing rapidly.BBC, ITV, SKY, Ch.4 and Ch.5 all have apps that allow you to watch content online. Lots and lots of kids these days simply do not watch TV, everything is streamed, watched online and generally through a laptop or tablet. The current generation of 20 somethings will probably be the last generation where TV is king.

Edit: I recently went to the launch of a major E-sports event, something that i've heard of but not really given much notice of as im not remotely into games, but was surprised at how big E-Sports is and how much growth it still has. E-sports is potentially going to be a major sporting attraction in the years to come. 30,000 kids watching two other kids play a sports game is quite mind boggling, but its happening. With some of these players pulling in millions in winnings. The world is changing!

[Farmduck]

Answer: Yes but I don't even think it's "slow." When Trump was elected, I decided to start looking at some different media sources for a change because I was so shocked I wondered if I was completely out of touch. Since then, I've only used TV to watch RL, and only the 80 minutes of game time, not the rest of RL programming. I haven't missed it although I am slightly unusual:

- I grew up in a country town in the late 50s and early 60s so TV didn't reach my town until I was 11-12 so I didn't grow up on TV. Even when we got a TV station it only started at 3pm. I can't imagine watching TV before lunchtime.

- I worked a lot of night shift for many years so there are many huge TV shows that I've never seen - Dallas, Dynasty, even Neighbours and Home and Away.

- I've never been big on gadgets so even when some massive new TV technology came out it had no effect on me. I never owned a VCR and I had a DVD player for a months then never used it again.

I predicted a few years back that the big NRL TV deal would be the last one because their future lay in packaging their own product and delivering it via subscription to online devices. It's no surprise that the NRL has maintained a close relationship with Telstra for so long - Telstra is OZ's biggest ISP and Phone carries with about 60-70% of the market.

[John Drake]

Viewing habits are changing, audiences are more thinly spread across a huge variety of channels and there are a multitude of other distractions out there, but the recent England football internationals pulled in massive terrestrial TV audiences, so who really knows?

Home taping was going to kill music (it didn't) and home video was going to kill cinema (it didn't). 3DTV was going to be the next big thing (it wasn't).

It's a brave person indeed who tries to predict where we'll be in even five years time with the onward march of technology.

I can watch Super League games on my phone these days. I choose not to because the screen's too small and you can hardly see anything, but still, 20 years ago that would have been considered science fiction.

The Beeb streamed live coverage of the Women's Challenge Cup and Plate finals this afternoon. All those years we've moaned that the Beeb doesn't do our game justice, and then they go and do that. Not that long ago it would have been unimaginable.

Technology will inevitably keep on advancing. The days of fixed schedules and the tellybox in the corner of the living room will one day seem as archaic as wax cylinders or 78rpm records. But the changes will affect every sport, not just RL, and for every door that closes, there will be loads of others opening up to put the game in front of new audiences too.

I bet one day, probably not that far in the future either, you'll be able to put on a headset in Fev and watch a game in Toronto as if you were actually there, without even leaving your living room let alone having to go to the faff of getting on an aeroplane. It'll be a challenge recreating the experience of the hot dog gun, but I'm sure the tech boys will crack it somehow.

Either that, or we'll all be living in caves and eating old tins of spam when the machines have taken over.

[Scubby]

What has really surprised me in RL terms is how missing a match you get pretty much decent highlights within minutes. Often less than half an hour after an NRL game you can go on Fox Sports site and watch all the tries. This means that in RL terms a game can pass me by and there is no overwhelming urge (or time) to record that and watch the whole 80 minutes.

It is likely that I will watch both semis on my phone tomorrow - which I would have laughed at the suggestion of that a year ago. I would probably have recorded and watched on delay.

[Dave T]

I think it is where Live sport is an interesting one. I had no desire to watch the rugby this afternoon on my phone, so didn't bother, had I had it setup on my tv I possibly would have.

I won't binge watch sport or watch on catch up like I will with other shows.

Live sport is probably the only thing I actively watch when it is on.

[Futtocks]

Other than live sport or breaking news (on the occasions when it is really important) are the holdouts when it comes to broadcasting. For everything else, you can catch up when it is convenient.

But sometimes you have to be up to the second on what's happening. Sport is very fortunate by it's nature, as it can see the effects on every other type of programme and formulate its response.

[Mr Plow]

Most of the TV I watch is either catch up or Netflix. I reckon we'll go back to having 5 channels and the rest will be streamed

[David Shepherd]

1 hour ago, Scubby said:

I am amazed at how much my use of the box in the corner has gone down - just over the last year. My children who are 19 and 22 rarely watch it at all and for hours on end in the evening it is switched off. Now even a couple of years ago this would have been very different. These days, I will regularly have a tablet propped alongside my laptop or my phone in my hand. I often have no desire to watch things that are scheduled and even dip in and out of live sport or just watch a few minutes. If I do switch the box on then it is often over to Netflix or Prime etc. 

As I said this is a very recent change for me, Sky Sports News used to be on a lot of the time killing dead time as did BBC1 or BBC2. I wonder what the landscape will look like very soon when my children's generation become parents and 40-somethings like me? Will TVs eventually become really cheap like microwaves did due to a fall in demand? I don't even care if anything is in HD or 4K anymore.

If this is the case, how on earth do we sell live sport like RL? It must be impossible to predict the next few years in terms of sporting viewing habits? Or is it different for RL if it naturally has an older viewer base?

Similar story in our house.

Other than sport, I can't remember the last time I watched a scheduled program. It was probably GOT last year.

Sky box sets, Netflix or Prime are the norm. Kids almost exclusively watch Netflix or Prime (Or some dodgy illegal stream)

 

[Man of Kent]

As ever with media, it’s not either/or. It’s both.

My 7yo daughter watches Netflix and CBBC, just as I watched Blue Peter on BBC1 as broadcast and VHS tapes of Star Wars etc.

Like with newspapers, terrestrial TV no longer dominates as it once did but it is still highly influential.

The balance has shifted more towards on-demand viewing and streaming, but I’m sure we’re all glad tomorrow’s Challenge Cup semis are being carried by the flagship channel of the state broadcaster and not by Proper Sport.

For rugby league, the actual viewing device is probably less important going forward than having a product in Super League which sells a large volume of subscriptions, whether that’s for satellite, smart TVs, phones or tablets.

But that’s a whole other thread.

[deluded pom?]

3 hours ago, Scubby said:

I am amazed at how much my use of the box in the corner has gone down - just over the last year. My children who are 19 and 22 rarely watch it at all and for hours on end in the evening it is switched off. Now even a couple of years ago this would have been very different. These days, I will regularly have a tablet propped alongside my laptop or my phone in my hand. I often have no desire to watch things that are scheduled and even dip in and out of live sport or just watch a few minutes. If I do switch the box on then it is often over to Netflix or Prime etc. 

As I said this is a very recent change for me, Sky Sports News used to be on a lot of the time killing dead time as did BBC1 or BBC2. I wonder what the landscape will look like very soon when my children's generation become parents and 40-somethings like me? Will TVs eventually become really cheap like microwaves did due to a fall in demand? I don't even care if anything is in HD or 4K anymore.

If this is the case, how on earth do we sell live sport like RL? It must be impossible to predict the next few years in terms of sporting viewing habits? Or is it different for RL if it naturally has an older viewer base?

That’s just total rubbish. No way are you a 40 something. 60 something more like.

[Scubby]

20 minutes ago, deluded pom? said:

That’s just total rubbish. No way are you a 40 something. 60 something more like.

Early 40s mate. I was still a schoolboy in the 1990s!

[TheLegendOfTexEvans]

3 hours ago, Scubby said:

I am amazed at how much my use of the box in the corner has gone down - just over the last year. My children who are 19 and 22 rarely watch it at all and for hours on end in the evening it is switched off. Now even a couple of years ago this would have been very different. These days, I will regularly have a tablet propped alongside my laptop or my phone in my hand. I often have no desire to watch things that are scheduled and even dip in and out of live sport or just watch a few minutes. If I do switch the box on then it is often over to Netflix or Prime etc. 

As I said this is a very recent change for me, Sky Sports News used to be on a lot of the time killing dead time as did BBC1 or BBC2. I wonder what the landscape will look like very soon when my children's generation become parents and 40-somethings like me? Will TVs eventually become really cheap like microwaves did due to a fall in demand? I don't even care if anything is in HD or 4K anymore.

If this is the case, how on earth do we sell live sport like RL? It must be impossible to predict the next few years in terms of sporting viewing habits? Or is it different for RL if it naturally has an older viewer base?

The interaction we would have had through local newspapers / radio and people going to the training ground we now to sell through facebook, twitter and youtube.

My youngest kids drive me mad with youtube channels but they watch essentially childrens documentaries and tv that I would have watched on BBC as a kid.

Youtube, Now tv, Vimeo, Netflix, Amazon, iplayer, 4OD are all built into the TV.

I watch things that I get interested with on catch up and netflix by picking bits from facebook.

New netflix series and things like Who Is America, Colbert, Daily Show by catching the clips on facebook.

The model is certainly not as simple as it used to be.

But I can watch Bradford, Manchester Rangers, USARL, PDRL, etc using Chromecast and PlayTo onto a widescreen as well.

Just more selective with my viewing habits.

But also think I am the wrong age and IQ bracket for main stream broadcasts they are not aimed at me.

 

 

 

[deluded pom?]

23 minutes ago, Scubby said:

Early 40s mate. I was still a schoolboy in the 1990s!

A bit slow were you?

[Scubby]

Just now, deluded pom? said:

A bit slow were you?

nippy little number 9 in my time  

[17 stone giant]

I'm an 80's child so I grew up with four main tv channels and no internet. Back then there wasn't much else to do so people would watch tv, and because there were only four channels there was a fair chance that a large number of people would be watching the same thing. Nowadays that only really happens with stand out shows or things like England at the football world cup.

Regarding the RL aspect - and I'm thinking more in terms of the casual RL fan, rather than the diehards - the key is to make sure you have on offer some showpiece events. Things that people will still find time to watch because they are a spectacle, even though we all have millions of other choices nowadays. That's why I'm so in favour of an origin series and an Ashes series. They have the potential to get peoples attention, even if only for a couple of hours. Realistically, the casual sports fan isn't going to find time to watch loads of RL matches, and the chances are that games such as Warrington v Salford just isn't going to have the pulling power that's necessary. People can afford to be far more selective than they could in the past. I remember in the mid 90s I didn't have Sky and on Sunday afternoon there might not be much else on, so I'd end up watching a RL challenge cup game on BBC. Nowadays, I have to admit the chances are that I'm more likely to ignore the RL and be watching a Premier league football game on a Sunday afternoon. If you like a range of sports as I do, you have to be selective and it's inevitable that you will only find time for the really big events. Every major sport tends to have one or two show piece events that are enough to keep themselves in the public minds. In a world where football is so dominant and so ever present, that's the best you can hope for really.

[Henson Park Old Firm]

I'd like to see rugby league games on Redtube... it would make my life a lot easier.

[Man of Kent]

1 hour ago, Henson Park Old Firm said:

I'd like to see rugby league games on Redtube... it would make my life a lot easier.

Try searching for ‘Head tackle’. You may find something of interest there. 

EDIT: Should have said ‘double header’. Funnier!

[Mr Wind Up]

When people say TV is dying, what exactly do they mean?

Are they talking about the terrestrial channels, or that large screen you find in living rooms?

As someone who streams alot on many devices, I regularly cast what Im streaming on the big TV because bigger screens are a flat out better experience. But it also gives you flexibility in that you can always stop and continue watching wherever. To say nothing of the fact that gaming is a big deal, and that's usually best experienced on a large screen.

So are large screens dying? Probably not.

Are terrestrial or even subscription channels dying? Well, most of them are adapting by offering viewers options to stream and catch up. And really, is TV really dead if everyone is just watching the same stuff on smaller screens?

Always find it funny when people boast about not watching TV anymore, but then going on to profess how much they watch youtube.  you've just replaced one idiotbox with another. 

Either way, in terms of sport, the main demographic watching live sport is males aged 35 and up I'd have to guess. That means sport subscription channels are going to keep offering the option of watching on TV for a long time. Whether that feed comes through a satellite or over the internet through streaming, what difference does it truly make?

 

[RayCee]

On demand is becoming much more popular, even satellite boxes now offer it. I still watch games on TV but highlights on my iPad. What I do find strange is the inconsistency of highlights availability.

The NRL allows me to watch free all brief match highlights.

Sky UK allows me to watch a few highlights and post match interviews but most are blocked due to my location. Even then, some weeks I have seen all SL highlights/interviews and other weeks maybe one.  I can't see why Sky UK are so precious about 3 minutes of highlights (often without commentary and certainly inferior to what the NRL offer). 

It seems that companies such as Sky find the move to alternative forms of (RL) viewing an inconvenient truth they will ultimately have to adapt to. Achieving that transition while maintaining sufficient revenue is what they have to grapple with. TV viewing won't go away, but won't be as dominant. 

[dealwithit]

Having read all the above comments, I guess one of the best strategies for RL is to continue introducing the game to school kids - both boys and girls. RL is a fun sport to play; touch, tag or tackle. Wheelchair, juniors, masters, students; it doesn’t matter.

As long as participation numbers across ALL forms (not just adult tackle) are strong, we’ll have good viewer numbers on TV, Facebook, Mobile Apps or at the pub. Our viewers will adapt. 

[ojx]

One thing that needs to happen is that every SL game is professionally covered with full video recording. It is actually shocking that they aren't already, and is a worrying sign. There are no top leagues that don't have complete video coverage of every single game. This should be available on demand for a fee. In Canada, cable companies are adjusting to offer their channels, as well as online access to the content.

[Copa]

9 hours ago, John Drake said:

Home taping was going to kill music (it didn't) and home video was going to kill cinema (it didn't). 3DTV was going to be the next big thing (it wasn't).

Blockbusters are taking an ever increasing percentage of cinema tickets though. Movies that 20 years ago would get a cinema release are increasingly being released on streaming sites instead.

[Copa]

Since I started getting 45Mbps a while back my kids have never watched traditional TV again except for some live sport.

Young people have suddenly been given a 10000 plus new channels to watch at a time of their choosing.

For rugby league to maintain audience it needs the movie equivalent of blockbusters, street credibility, glamour and a connection to culture.

It also needs to spread its appeal so that people outside of the global heartlands can make up for those fans lost locally. SL absolutely must, in the near future, have all games available for broadcast even if old style views means that they are not shown in the UK.