Online Entertainmentvs. Traditional Entertainment

Online entertainment has not only grown into a multi-million dollar business but it has become a big part of our every day lives. When I was growing up the only forms of entertainment available were the traditional entertainment forums. We had television with very few channels available, analog radio, drive-in movie theaters, and eventually indoor movie theaters. The online entertainment industry has opened up so many avenues for us to have access to entertainment at the push of a button. The online entertainment industry enables us to watch movies, videos, television shows, listen to music, make videos, play video games, chat with friends around the world in real time, and so much more. The online entertainment industry continues to grow and develop with the advancements we are making in technology. It sometimes scares me to think about where things are headed with the online entertainment industry. I personally think people spend too much time online and feel our world would have happier and healthier children and adults if we spent more time outside.

We only had land line phones when I was a kid because the cell phone had not been invented yet. My father worked for a telephone company all of his life and I remember when wireless home phones came out we thought it was the coolest, most amazing thing. Then they had the first cell phones, which were “bag phones”. For those of you that are too young to know what a bag phone is it “was a transportable cellular telephone manufactured by Motorola, Inc. from 1992 to 2000” (“Motorola Bag Phone.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia).

The bag phone was more powerful than the cell phones we have today and they were very durable. Some people still use them today because of their durability and stronger power wattage they put out. The bag phone was definitely not as slick and easy to carry as the smartphones we have today. The bag phone is just one example to show how technology has advanced over the years and how this has effected the entertainment industry. The bag phones did not have the capability to play games or watch videos and movies. The smartphones we use today allow us to talk, text, listen to music, play videos, play games, play movies, surf the net and even talk face-to-face with loved ones who may be on the other side of the world via FaceTime or Skype. It is amazing how far technology has come with cell phones and even more amazing to see what the next technological advancement brings in that industry.

Face Time

Skype

Another example in how the online entertainment has changed from the traditional entertainment industry is the camera. The cameras that were used to make films used to require four men and “Now, with high def, one man. That means 75 percent of the workforce is looking for a job. The medium has changed. The type of entertainments people seek have changed” (Tobolowsky, “How has technology changed the entertainment industry?”). The changes in cameras have made it easier for to film movies which in turn has led to many amateurs getting started in the film industry. The introduction of YouTube has also hurt the filming and entertainment industry. Anyone can post a video or short movie and possibly become an overnight success.

The way we view movies has changed significantly over the years from VHS video to DVD, video rental stores and now online video rentals such as Netflix. Netflix allows you to pay a monthly fee and have access to numerous video rentals, although most of the movies are older films and not recently released videos. This change in how we view media/videos “from books and media printed on paper, music on CDs, movies rented on DVD at the local Blockbuster an dTV networks that forced the viewer to be in front of the screen at a given hour in order to watch a given show, the industry has changed dramatically into an always on, easy to time-shift, always with you on mobile platforms, customizable stream of news, entertainment, movies and music” (“Introduction to the Entertainment & Media Industry”. Plunkettresearch.com. n.d.). This played a major role in Blockbuster movie rental chain to go bankrupt.

The online access to all the latest news has led to national and local newspaper sales to decrease over the years. This decrease has contributed to “Many of America’s leading newspapers have gone bankrupt, while others have downsized or become electroniconly” (“Introduction to the Entertainment & Media Industry”. Plunkettresearch.com. n.d.). Local radio stations are also feeling the effect of the online entertainment industry. You not only have your traditional FM/AM radio to listen to music. You still have the traditional radio to listen but you also have online options such as YouTube, Pandora, Spotify, IHeart and many others.

It is great to have so many options and with the online music you can customize the music so that you can only listen to genres that interest you. The downfall in this is it hurts the local radio business because “As more and more drivers replace FM and AM talk jockeys on their daily commutes with Rdio and Spotify on their smartphone or Pandora or Slacker Radio apps pre-installed on their car’s dashboard computers, Internet radio will eventually eclipse the radio start” (Gilbert, “Internet Radio Is About To Surpass FM/AM, But Have Spotify And Pandora Really Changed Anything?”).

Technology has changed dramatically over the years and will continue to change. It is amazing how much things have changed in the entertainment industry since I was born in 1968. I have a 10 year old son who only knows flat screen televisions, DVD movies, hi-tech digital movie cinemas and smartphones. I was cleaning out a closet the other day and ran across some old vinyl records. He saw them and asked “mom, what in the world are these?”. I explained what they were and he was in awe at the fact that they could produce music. I’m sure when he has children they will look back at a DVD and wonder how that small disc could produce a movie on the television. Of course, by then the televisions of today and their current capabilities will be obsolete because “In an age when nearly all forms of media are digital, where broadband signals course through the industrial world as surely (and as critically) as electrically and freshwater, it should be possible to sit on one’s couch, push a button or two, and call up to your television any form of video-related entertainment you desire” (Moyer, “How the Internet is Changing the Way We Will Watch TV).

Sources

Moyer, Michael. “How the Internet is Changing the Way We Will Watch TV (Preview)”. Scientficamerican.com. 22 October 2009. Web.

1 June 2013. http:// www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-everything-tv

Tobolowsky, Stephen. “How has technology changed the entertainment industry?”. Curiosity.discovery.com. n.d. Web. 1 June 2013.

http://curiosity.discovery.com/question/how- technology-changed-entertainment-industry

Gilbert, Jason. “Internet Radio Is About To Surpass FM/AM, But Have Spotify And Pandora Really Changed Anything?”.

Huffingtonpost.com. 09 November 2012. Web. 2 June 2013.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/09/internet-radio-is-about-t_n_2101311.html

“Introduction to the Entertainment & Media Industry”. Plunkettresearch.com. n.d. Web. 2 June 2013.

http://www.plunkettresearch.com/entertainment-media-publishing-market-research/ industry-and-business-data

“Motorola Bag Phone”. Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 4 May 2013. Web. 2 June 2013.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Bag_Phone