This article got me thinking:
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?BRD=1078&dept_id=529468&newsid=10837492&PAG=461&rfi=9While I couldn't comment about the cell phones - had one for a few months, and it didn't ring too often - I'd do so about two other media: VHS and cable TV.
In both cases, the technology gave a great opportunity, and the market took it away. Or the way the market was filled from the supply side.
When they started porting movies and TV to VHS tapes (and DVDs now), I thought I could finally lay my hands on some nearly forgotten things I'd like to see again. I remember the names of the TV shows, the times of broadcasts, the channel, so I thought I would be able to order a copy. Never happened, that I know of. The VHS as a medium turned out to be worse than a movie, in the ways it limits your choice. An odd, non-commercial movie may still turn up in a small movie, specially if there's a film festival or university in your area. The same movie would never show up in Hollywood Video or Blockbuster. And ordering anything from the world's heritage? Unthinkable, unless it's made in Hollywood. Just getting the best movies of the year's world festivals is nearly impossible - try best ten European movies for 2002, and if you find more tha two, try Asian or African.
You may be more lucky with buying, though - I have bought Cimino's "Heaven's gate", even though I never met anyone here who remembered hearing about it, not to mention saw it.
Cable TV was supposed to bring choice and a multitude of channels, and the blossoming of the local TV, because now you didn't have to build or rent a network of repeaters to cover the territory. Which actually happened, except for the choice. You can't choose channels, you choose packages. I once asked Adelphia why aren't there channels a la cart, why can't I choose which channels do I want and which I don't. The answer was "it would be more expensive that way".
My doubts there. They may be cheaper in bundles, but the bang/buck ratio may be far better if I got to choose. First off, I'd have a chance to yank the HSN, QVC and similar, ESPN, Golf, Speed (no sports, please), Travel (nothing stays onscreen for more than a second, voices too loud, fast and awful), PAX (and any other religion-oriented channel), CNN (sorry guys, been there, saw how you lied), Disney (and any other "we're not showing anyone whose face fails our standards" channels), CMT (never liked country music, gimme R'n'R), Food (what's the point if it's not on my plate)...
And then they'd also have real data about which channels are watched and which are not - simply by the number of subscribers for that channel. The usual sample method would just show the hourly statistics.
The other promise was that there'd be no commercials on the cable - because we'd be paying directly to the channels - but nowadays nobody seems to remember that. So both the cable companies and the TV networks charge twice: we pay to watch the air time they already sold to show commercials.
One lesser technological promise which I doubted would be true was printed on the packaging of my TV - ad blocking. I still don't know how was that supposed to work, it wasn't mentioned anywhere in the manual, nor is there anything in the setup. Instead, I got one of the uversal remotes - picked the one with the biggest MUTE button I could find.
