As far back as 1900 the word “Television” was part of the English vocabulary and John Logie Baird was responsible in providing the necessary “BOX” as it was so called. On the 2nd October 1925 Baird achieved his first mechanical transmission and in 1930 Baird installed his first television in No. 10 Downing Street. Ramsay MacDonald the then Prime Minister and his family watched the first TV Drama – “The Man with a Flower in His Mouth.” The rest is history with countless companies claiming they were all involved in the evolution of being the first to invent Television.
Although “Television Sets” are now climbing the endless ladder of success of three dimensional and with so many channels that in your own lifetime you would not be able to view or even want to view, mainly because advertising has cornered the market with such velocity that it has become more of a burden than a pleasure. You are bombarded with countless, repetitive, monotonous, boring advertising that tends to be lengthened to such a degree, that each advertising slot is longer than the programme you are watching.
Another added obstacle that spoils your viewing is loud music, so you can’t hear what the actors are saying to each other. Some of the new drama that has appeared on our TV screens has also fallen foul of the lack of actors being able to pronounce their lines sufficiently to be able to be heard or maybe the Production Team didn’t have their microphones switched on!
The one thing that puzzles me and at the same time irks me to distraction is having to put up the sound to hear someone speaking and then having to put the sound down when the advertising slot is on the air
I try not to let adverting get the better of me by recording all the repeated programmes I enjoyed the first time round and fast forwarding all adverts, so a two hour programme becomes an hour and a half. Obviously these advertising agents feel it more important to bash our ears with some unsubstantiated claims of what their products are capable of doing over and over again.
Some advertisements are really stupid, like the mobile armchair, the silly woman with a flower pot on her head. A Camel on a sofa and you’re so money supermarket with the obscene man wearing hot pants and having a large bum. Of course you can easily get into debt by borrowing from a Peach, a Satsuma and various other outlets.
The jolly old early TV box has turned out to be other people’s money box – just waiting for our money.